Ah stress. It’s something we ALL deal with, in one way or another. We can experience stress from so many different sources in our lives: our jobs, our schedules, our personal lives, our finances… and the list goes on!

And this varies from person to person, from day to day. In fact, the only thing constant about stress is… well, stress! 

And this is the first step to productively facing and dealing with stress in your own life… but I’ll get into that in just a minute.

Since stress is something we all experience (I know I certainly do!), today I want to take some time to share some strategies and realizations that really helped me when I first started my business to gain a more healthy perspective on stress, and to better managing it. 

4 Great Stress Management Techniques

I use the word “stress management” because first I want to make something clear: although “stress” usually carries a negative connotation, it’s not always a bad thing! Oftentimes, stress motivates us, and can even excite and energize us for a new challenge.

But when stress becomes heavy and burdensome, and adds to the weight of expectation (whether it’s our own expectation or someone else’s) that we are already carrying, then it must be managed. Here are my four favorite strategies for doing so.

1. Acknowledge stress realistically

The first step to being able to better manage and deal with stress in your own life is to realize that stress isn’t something that will ever permanently vanish from your life.

This may not be what you want to hear, but it’s the truth. 

It’s easy to fall into the familiar thinking of trap of, “If I just do X, then my stress will go away.” For example:

If I just finish this project brief before I leave today, my stress will go away.

If I just send that email I’ve been meaning to send for a few days now, I won’t feel stressed anymore.

Or WORSE:

If I only had the TIME to do all these things on my list, then my stress would be gone.

Nope. Sorry friends, this isn’t how it works.

While, yes, the completion of certain tasks or particularly burdensome asks will help us feel better in the short term, the reality is that stress is a permanent part of life.

What’s not permanent, however, is the way you think about stress, and the way you react to it. This is where the real magic happens when it comes to managing and lessening the weight of stress in our lives. 

The sooner you realize this, and remove “if only” thinking from your live regarding stress, the sooner you’ll be able to realistically, productively manage stress and start feeling better.

2. Recognize your own role in creating stress

Once I had the realization for myself from Step 1, that stress was always going to be present in my life in some capacity, so I needed to find a way to manage it in a healthy way, then I was able to come to this realization I’m going to share with you in Step 2:

When it comes to stress: How much of it are creating for yourself?

How much of the stress that you feel on a day-to-day basis actually comes from within? From standards that you hold yourself to? Deadlines you set for yourself that you feel like you need to hit? Pressures you put on yourself to be doing as much as you possibly can, every.single.day.

This was a huge breakthrough realization for me in my own stress management. Once I realized that a lot of my day-to-day stress stemmed from pressures I was putting on myself (Hiiii, chronic high-performer over here!), I was able to break down individual stressors and make them more manageable.

And to be honest: the majority of my stress (if not all of it) was self-imposed. And the majority of that self-imposed stress came from poor time management, or I guess – time estimations.

How I Was Shooting Myself in the Foot When It Came to Stress (And You May Be Too)

You guys know that I’m a big fan of to-do lists – I swear by them, actually! But I started setting myself up for failure (and major stress) without realizing it, by consistently overloading my daily to-do lists. I’d write down 20+ things I wanted to accomplish for the day, feeling all smug about how productive I was going to be and how much WORK I had to do (Internal Dialogue: “Go you! You’re successful!”), but then at the end of the day, around 5 pm, I’d start to feel panicky about all that still remained on my plate. I’d head off to a rehearsal for a show, and come home and work until midnight because of a deadline I had imposed on myself… and I STILL wouldn’t have finished everything on my list!

And after several months of this crazy cycle, I started to ask myself: “…Does it really matter?” As in:

Does it really matter if I deliver this article to my client tonight at midnight? Or will getting a good night’s sleep and spending half the time (when I’m rested) to finish and send it tomorrow morning work just as well?

Does my client care if I put together their career coaching plan by first-thing Monday AM? …OR will they be okay if I set a more open deadline and deliver it by Thursday this week? After all, they’re probably busy too.

Do I REALLY have to the the laundry today? Or can I de-prioritize it to tomorrow for something that’s actually urgent.

…See what I mean? Now of course, this also depends on other factors, like managing relationships and setting realistic expectations, and just generally being a good communicator with the people you’re working with… but the point is the same: Don’t set yourself up for daily failure by creating unrealistic deadlines for yourself.

This also lead me to make one of the most important discoveries of my entrepreneurial career, which I wrote a post about a little while ago: the number one skill you can develop as an entrepreneur is to become a ruthless de-prioritizer. You can read the full post here, but long story short: there is RARELY enough time in the day to do everything you had planned on doing, so get okay with (and get good at) de-prioritizing

3. Time-block your days

Now we’re going to get into productivity land. (I know – very exciting!!!)

But first – a little psychology lesson for you. There’s a well-known theory called the “locus of control theory” – it basically states that we feel happy to the degree that we feel we are in control of our lives. Which makes sense!

And this also makes sense in our understanding of stress, and how it manifests in our lives. When we feel “out of control” – maybe we have too much on our plate, there are things that are bothering us, whatever it is – THAT’S when the stress kicks in, which leads to unhappiness, anxiety, and whole bunch of other unhelpful emotions, depending on how stress affects you.

So, the way to defeat stress in this instance, is to take back control of you life, which starts with taking back control of your time. Here’s an example: how many times have you felt stressed out by something that you had yet to start working on? You KNOW it’s something you have to do (maybe by a certain deadline), but you haven’t done it yet, and you’re stressed out because you know you need to get it done.

…Sound familiar?

It’s easy to get stressed out by the things we need to do – the longer we put them off, the more they grow and “snowball” into bigger problems than they need to be.

So, the solution here: block the time for when you’re going to do the task. Instead of worrying Monday-Thursday about a task you need to complete by Friday, pick a time during your week that you’re going to work on that task (ideally to completion) – and nothing else! And make this time block incredibly specific; for example, Wednesday from 9 am-noon. Write it down.

When you make the time for the big tasks you need to do, your mind is at ease knowing that you’ve created the time you need to complete them. This action alone helps to decrease day-to-day stress, and helps you feel more in control of your time and your life.

4. Try the 10% rule

At the end of the day, sometimes the easiest way to alleviate stress is to just DO the thing that you’ve been putting off that’s causing you stress. However, your time (and your mental health) doesn’t always allow for that. This is where a little strategy I call “the 10% rule” comes in handy.

The 10% rule basically means that to help you get over the hump of procrastination and beat stress surrounding a specific project, you will do 10% of the work – right now. That’s all – you ONLY have to do 10%.

But… sometimes just getting started gives you enough momentum to continue (and even complete) a task that was giving you stress. That’s the beauty of the 10% rule.

The next time you find yourself really stressed out by something you need to do (especially if it’s work related), just tell yourself that you’re going to do 10% of the work right now… and see what happens!

So – those are some of my favorite stress management tips that I’ve learned and put to use in the last year. Do you have tips for managing stress in your work and in your life? Share them in the comments!

Is your job the BIG thing stressing you out? Do you suspect there’s a bigger issue at play than just stress? Have you been dreaming of quitting, and working for yourself? I can help! Download my “Quit Your 9-5” Jumpstart Guide here.