Whenever you take time to reduce your stress, you can be sure that you will be repaid for your efforts.
Stress reduction is one of the surest ways to increase your focus, energy, creativity, and appreciation of life’s moments. And yet, when things get busy or our minds and energies are cluttered, stress reduction is probably not something that comes naturally to mind.
But I’d like to encourage you to consider the choice to reduce your stress as a core time and energy management skill. And today I’m sharing 3 techniques that I’d love you to try.
You’ll turn overwhelm on its head by using it as an opportunity to exercise your stress reduction skills. And at the same time, you’ll immediately increase your presence, your productivity, and your pleasure!
1. Reduce your stress by setting boundaries.
As you set out to practice this skill, make it a game. For every boundary you set and maintain, you “win” that amount of time for something fun or something you enjoy. For example, if you set a boundary that has you checking your email only twice a day, how much time will you save? Reserve those saved minutes for something you enjoy that fits within that time frame. Reward yourself after each success. It’s so much easier to follow through on boundaries when you know you’ll benefit right away. And the even bigger benefit is that when you do this daily for a month, you’ll establish a helpful new habit.
2. See your glass as half full.
This is an excellent tool for cultivating optimism and broadening your perspective when stress narrows it. Purchase a set of small note cards and, at the start of each day, write a quick thank you to someone who has brightened your life in some way. The energizing thing about this technique is that you relive the kindness as you write about it. And your connections are enhanced when you let people know you appreciate them. You can expand on this technique by thinking, throughout the day, of people you’d like to thank. Focus on sending out this grateful energy toward others, and pay attention to how it makes you feel.
3. Use affirmations and visualizations to reduce your stress.
How much time and energy do you spend ruminating over thoughtless words or deeds? This is self-created stress that can be difficult to recognize and weed out. But the good news is that to convert stress to strength, you can capitalize on how your brain focuses on just one image at a time. When you catch yourself ruminating, make the choice to shift your focus to another image of your choosing. And each time you do this your grievance recedes from center stage.
Then, building on this even further, use the senses that are most evocative for you to create your ideal inner space. Recall healing or uplifting music, review personal successes, remember warm interactions or inspiring quotations. Let yourself fully absorb the pleasure.
It’s in your hands.
Each of these exercises taps into your power to manage your time, energy, and thoughts in stress-reducing, health-enhancing ways. Recalling kindness, expressing appreciation, reaching out to others, and affirmations all flood your body with endorphins that lower stress.
Each time you choose this, you reinforce your awareness of how much power you possess to make yourself happy, no matter what others may do.
Remember, no amount of time is too short to reduce stress and increase your pleasure. Energy turnarounds don’t have to be difficult to be enormously effective. So start improving your life today by exploring your capacity to reduce your stress and enhance your moments.
And for more help…
Time is pure potential. You decide how to use it; and once you do, it’s gone. That’s why it’s so important to build on your best time choices. If you feel like your time slips through your fingers, then you’ll want to claim your copy of my complimentary “Daily Choices Template: Proven Strategies for Tracking Your Best Time Choices Today, Tomorrow & All Year!” There’s no time like the present – to start moving toward the future you envision for yourself.
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