Stop, Breathe and Listen When You’re Stressed to the Max? Really?

stop breathe and listen

Stop, breathe and listen, especially when you’re stressed.

When you are under pressure, stressed, or interrupted mid-project, the advice to stop, breathe and listen might seem counter-intuitive.

But the reality is that sometimes a counter-intuitive step is what will help you more than anything else.

So, while finding time to stop, breathe and listen when your instinct is to plow ahead can be a huge challenge, it’s often a challenge worth undertaking.

Picture it.  You’re racing to meet a deadline, or you’re churning out work and creative ideas like there’s no tomorrow. How do you feel when something interrupts you?

Maybe it’s a call from a colleague. Maybe it’s question from your child, or maybe even just a friend stopping by to say hi.

What do you do in that moment?

Boundaries help.

Of course, if you have established some time boundaries, you could remind the person of that boundary, say that you’re busy, and indicate that you’ll be available to talk or listen or answer that question later.  (Be sure to give a specific time that “later” refers to if you can — especially if you’re speaking to a child.)

But there may be circumstances in which you want or need to find time to listen right then. How do you manage that for yourself?

Here are five tips that I have found helpful when I am making the choice to stop, breathe, and listen.

Stop, breathe and listen — try these 5 tips

  1. Always use the two times rule, building in extra time for your tasks from the very beginning. This will give you some room for flexibility if you want to pause during your task.
  2. Be sure you let your values guide your choices. Whatever you decide, strive to not create regret for yourself. Remember that you will always be able to learn from your experience, no matter what.
  3. Try doing a quick cost/benefit analysis of the situation. Will what I am doing matter in 10 minutes? Will it matter in 10 days, 10 weeks, 10 years? This may help clarify the direction you want to choose.
  4. Can someone help you? Can you hand off your task to someone else, either temporarily or permanently, so that you can attend to whatever has come up?
  5. Always, always, always… take a breath and step into your wise mind before responding.

So, does that work for you?

Do you find time, sometimes, to stop, breathe and listen when you’re stressed or when you’re interrupted?

How do you decide when to be flexible and when to keep to your plan and maintain your time boundaries?

There are no hard and fast rules … so how do YOU make those challenging choices?

Drop me a line,  I’d love to hear.

This helps you build boundaries and own your time…

Setting and maintaining boundaries is a skill that makes everything else in your life possible. And it’s a difficult challenge for lots of smart, motivated people. People like you.

“Your Secret Power: How to Honor Your Time and Claim Your Space with Boundaries” gently steers you to a more profound understanding of where and how your boundary-setting efforts get short-circuited. Not only that, but it helps you establish the boundaries you need to unlock the door to your freedom. Boundary-setting is a skill that’s learnable, doable and definitely within your reach. And the strategies, tips, and exercises in “Your Secret Power” help you discover how to:

  • Set and maintain boundaries to enhance your productivity and, yes, make more money;
  • Recharge your energy so you have the time and freedom to do what you value and what you’d like to do in your life; and
  • Learn how to say no, which opens the door to your next big Yes.

Ready to start using boundaries to maximize your time and energy? Click the link below to learn more about this transformative time tool and the bonuses that come with it:

http://thetimefinder.com/secretpower.html

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