Are You Feeling Crushed by Work-Related Stress?

Whether you’re a student, a part-time worker, or someone with a full-time career, your work is a major aspect of your life. What you do for a living takes time, physical energy, and mental energy from you. Even if you love your job, your work can still be a source of plenty of stress, especially if you struggle to maintain a healthy relationship with your career. 

In this post, we’ll be unpacking some of the best techniques for reducing work-related stress. If you’re feeling overwhelmed and stressed at the thought of all the obligations and responsibilities that your work brings into your life, don’t give up hope. 

At R3SET, we want to help equip you with the information and resources that you need to defend yourself against stress and live a happier, more fulfilled life.

These five key tips for feeling less overwhelmed at work aren’t just methods of stress relief. They’re also positive, constructive habits that have a place in anyone’s daily routine. 

Stress support is only half the battle – you’ll need to replace your stress and its causes with positive practices that make your life better. 

So, what are some of the best ways to reduce work-related stress? Let’s find out.

Tip #1: Set Up a Consistent Bedtime and Wake-Up Time 

One of the best ways to stress-proof your life is by placing an emphasis on structure and routine. If your days tend to feel jumbled, rushed, and chaotic, you may be lacking much-needed rituals to keep your tasks organized and prevent stress and overwhelm.

The start of your day and its end are two of the most important times to emphasize structure and routine. By practicing the right habits in the morning and evening, you’re setting yourself up for success and reduced stress during the day, and a restful night of sleep afterward.

To lay the foundation of your morning and evening routines, start by making your wake-up time and bedtime as consistent as possible. 

Waking up at the same time each day helps to strengthen your internal clock and can also be a strong defense against distraction and occasional feelings of anxiety during the day. Likewise, setting a designated bedtime is a great way to stay consistent with the amount of sleep that you get each night. 

If you’re going to bed and waking up around the same time throughout the week, it’s far easier to get the amount of sleep that you need – ideally 7 or more hours per night, according to the CDC. 

Tip #2: Cultivate a Strong Work-Life Balance 

If you’re feeling stressed out at work, that stress has the potential to bleed into your life outside of your career. 

Work-related stress can have a significant negative impact on your relationships, your personal life, and your ability to fulfill non-work responsibilities. If your mind is constantly consumed with thoughts of work, it’s all too easy to become distracted and neglect the other important aspects of life – your family, friends, passions and hobbies, and your health.

Furthermore, when you experience feelings of overwhelm, your brain's typical response is to work even harder, which may cause fatigue and burnout. 

Therefore, it's crucial to address the toll workplace stress can take on you by reducing workloads and the way you handle them in order to give your mind greater freedom and clarity.

The solution? Strengthen your work-life balance. This term is often used to describe the degree to which your career obligations affect your life outside of work. Ideally, once your workday is over, you’re able to switch gears and engage with your family and friends and spend time with yourself. If thoughts of work consume your mind day in and day out, it may be time to rethink your relationship with your job.

One of the best ways to strengthen your work-life balance is to set boundaries that separate work time from the time that you dedicate to the other aspects of your life. It can also mean saying no to certain assignments or important projects that push you beyond your comfort zone and triggers more stress. 

When your boss is piling on too much work that creates added stress, it's important to be honest, and give valuable feedback that may be beneficial not just to your own life but to other employees as well who may not be comfortable standing up for themselves. 

 If you’re a remote or freelance worker, setting up these boundaries can be especially tough since you may not have a specific schedule for your job. However, it’s entirely possible to maintain a healthy work-life balance, even if you’re a self-starting entrepreneur, a telecommuter, or a full-time student.

Lastly, many of us simply don't practice proper time management which can lead to complexity of mind and longer hours in the end. The level of complexity in your mind can stem from being a perfectionist and complicating even the simplest task. However, sometimes we just have tight deadlines or things that require special attention which we cannot put off until "tomorrow." 

In that case, fight the urge to overwork yourself by taking short breaks, deep breaths, and little walks every once in a while to gain perspective which should help take your brain out of “survival mode.”

Tip #3: Keep Your Work Environment Tidy

If you tend to do your work in a designated space, this space can either be a source of stress or a powerful focus-enhancing tool. The best way to make your workspace work for you rather than against you is to keep it organized and tidy. 

If you find it helpful to do so, you can take designated breaks during your workday to clean up and return your workspace to a state of equilibrium.

If clutter tends to make you feel stressed and overwhelmed, consider turning your office into a minimalist workspace. This practice involves removing everything from your desk and the surrounding areas except for the essentials. 

If there are mountains of old papers, boxes of office supplies, and knick-knacks sitting everywhere in your workspace, putting these things somewhere outside of your designated work area may help you calm your mind and stay focused throughout the day.

 Tip #4: Monitor Your Caffeine Intake 

Caffeine is one of the most popular stimulants on the planet. It’s the chemical in coffee and tea that allows these drinks to perk you up and give you a boost of mental energy. However, caffeine is also known to have the potential to increase feelings of anxiety and restlessness when too much is consumed. 

While a little bit of caffeine at the right time may help you concentrate on your work, relying too heavily on the stimulant – and other substances – to stay alert and productive can become a problem. 

If you find yourself needing multiple cups of coffee to get through the workday, you may want to find an alternative pick-me-up that has less potential to make you feel restless and anxious.

If you’re currently depending on numerous cups of coffee to get through each workday, we highly recommend trying Calm, R3SET’s daytime stress support supplement, instead. Calm is formulated with stress-supporting, focus-boosting ingredients like L-Theanine, GABA, and more to help you stay relaxed yet alert as you work. 

While caffeinated drinks can provide a quick spike of mental energy, it’s tough to reach and maintain a sustainable level of focus and motivation when relying on coffee or tea. 

Try Calm instead – it’s better for a busy mind and won’t lead to an energy crash!

Conclusion 

Work-related stress can have a major negative impact on your quality of life. Fortunately, there are plenty of simple, practical ways to keep the stresses of your career from overwhelming you and causing problems. In addition to the habits and practices we’ve discussed in this post, other techniques, such as meditation, journaling, exercise, and more can also be helpful in lowering your levels of work-related stress.

To learn more about the science behind stress management, healthy habits for calming a restless mind, and R3SET’s stress support supplements, make sure to check out our blog. 

There, you’ll find helpful articles about a wide array of topics, from how to spot stress and anxiety symptoms to how to create an anti-stress routine that works for you.

 When it comes to stress management, R3SET is your new best friend. We’ve got plenty of information and resources to help you along the way on your journey to a less stressed life, and our natural active and botanical ingredients can help soothe your mind day and night. 

Sources:

How and why waking up at the same time every day can improve your health

How Much Sleep Do I Need? - Sleep and Sleep Disorders

Caffeine consumption and self-assessed stress, anxiety, and depression in secondary school children