How our daily stress is caused and how to avoid it.
Today I would like to share some thoughts on stress. Despite the fact that stress is unhealthy and harmful for us humans, it also makes us very unproductive by consuming our mental capacity. Therefore lately I started to put more thoughts into it on where it comes from and how may we reduce it.
If we look deep into ourselves we will notice that the stress comes from dependencies. These dependencies are external factors that we unfortunately have no direct control of. And as soon as we start to sense that the outcomes, which depend on these factors, might not align with our internal expectations, we start to get the feeling of worry and stress.
I would personally define stress as a constant worry that is at the back of our mind or even worse, when it is something that keeps us awake at night (like me right now).
So with that being said, the question now is: “How can we reduce the stress and worries that are constantly on our minds to have a prosperous and more productive life style?”.
To answer this question I believe there two following approaches that we can take:
- Make yourself independent: Making ourselves independent from external factors that cause us stress is probably the fastest and most direct approach that we can take. By having a Plan B that we can fall onto any time, should things not work out up to our expectations is something that would provide us more internal security and calmness. It might not always be the most effective way since best outcomes are achieved through interdependence and collaboration, but when it comes to lack of trust and increasing uncertainties, then this is probably the most peace-in-mind way to go.
It is also to consider that this Plan B shall have equivalent outcome benefits as the current plan that we are pursuing. Why is that so?
Well, let’s imagine if that Plan B would actually higher potential outcome. Then obviously it would make most sense to switch to it without looking back.
Same applies for a the Plan B to be worse: we would still feel this dependency and distress of losing out, which leads me to the next point. - Acknowledge the potential loss: Assuming that there is no better Plan B out there, the second best option would be to acknowledge the potential loss that can happen. The sooner we imagine and acknowledge our life along the path where the outcome did not match our expectation, the sooner we will be able to move on and feel independent. Imagine it as a nice-to-have if eventually everything falls into place how we imagined it. And honestly, the less depended (and desperate) we are on external things, the more things come to us. This applies for relationships, business, friendships and more. Just reflect on this for a moment…
As we now have a better understanding on where our stress is coming from and how we can avoid it, lets take some actionable steps:
- Let’s write down all the current worries and stress factors that keeps us awake in the night and are constantly behind our minds on a daily basis
- For each of those above, write out what are the outcomes that we “desperately” striving for
- Then let’s define what would be a Plan B that we could take, which would deliver at least as good results as the current path. Alternatively if there is truly no better path than which we are already pursuing, how can we acknowledge and live with the fact that the outcome will not match our expectations?
- Finally, always be ready to act upon your Plan B or the acknowledgements you made. The most important is that you enjoy your life. It is too short not to.
You might want to repeat this exercise on a regular basis before you start feeling stress levels coming up. Some times things might not be very clear on the first attempt and other times our Plan Bs need to adjust.
With that being said, I hope the exercise was helpful. Feel free to share your experience and also tips that have helped you to reduce your stress levels.
Wishing you a happy and prosperous day ahead.
