Stressed at Work? Try These 5 Stress-Relief Techniques

Many factors can cause you to be stressed at work. Unfriendly coworkers, unnecessary regulations, difficult clients, and long hours all potentially release stress and anxiety chemicals, which, without intervention, can affect our entire day. But you can cut down on feeling stressed at work.

How to Reduce Feeling Stressed at Work

Two Quick Stress-Relief Movements

When you feel mental strain, your blood pressure usually rises while the stress-related hormones cortisol and adrenaline flush through your body. These physical symptoms create or heighten emotion and anxiety. Moving your body, however, can help achieve calm (Working with the Body - A Pathway to the Mind).

Try a puppy dog pose: it’s basically a modified version of the iconic downward-facing dog yoga position. Stand and raise your arms overhead. Keeping your legs straight, bend forward at the waist to about 90 degrees so that your torso is parallel to the ground. Place your hands on the wall or a chair. Hold for 10 seconds while breathing deeply. If you can’t find any place immediately accessible at work for this kind of movement, even the bathroom or parking lot can suffice.

Here’s another physical movement especially useful for those stationed at a desk and stressed at work. In a sitting position, place your hands on your thighs and tilt your head back. Look at the ceiling or close your eyes as you press your heels into the floor for 10 seconds. This is a type of grounding exercise intended to dissipate the intense negative energy flurrying around in your head.

Two Stress-Relief Tactics for Your Mind

When you get stressed at work, move away from the spot in which you accomplish your work. If you can step outside, even better. A quick change of scenery can help clear your mind. If your job already moves you around, take a different route on a commute or walking between areas.

Something that’s accessible if you use paper or a computer throughout the day is writing. Write down all the things you would love to say but can’t. Craft that nasty email you’d send, that verbal argument you’d have, or that scathing review you’d post. Just getting those thoughts out can be cathartic. When you’re done, destroy your list. Drag it to the computer’s trash folder, shred the physical paper, or take the paper home and burn it. Don’t forget to actually take it home if choosing the burn option. The destruction of your negative words will create relief (and will avoid embarrassment by destroying the evidence).

One Attitude Adjustment

In trying moments, you’re probably focused on the problems around you. To open up other emotional channels, think of three positive aspects of your job. Your list might include only simple things, like income or a step towards a larger goal. Write these benefits down in their own list; keep this one handy and refer back to it again next time you’re stressed at work. In fact, this can be a bliss book for your career.