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And 'It' begins

Beep beep beep….Oh no, it was Monday again, I hit the alarm and I lay there knowing that the second a toe touched the floor that would be it, ‘it’ would begin all over again.  I could feel the stress levels rising, I longed to just put the covers over my head and make it all go away.  

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‘It’ was the relentless drama of trying to fit in the 36hours of things that I needed to do in to the inadequate 24hours that I actually had. That was the game I used to play all day everyday. I remember laying there trying to figure out how was I going to get through another week, forget that, I didn't even know how was I getting through the day!! I felt exhausted, but I dragged myself out of bed and got through 'it'. I did this day after day, week after week, year after year. I did it quietly, never really telling anyone how close to breaking point I was. I knew that it was just how things were and that if I wanted to get where I wanted to get to then I was just going to have to suck it up!

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Wishing it would get better

Do you know what is really sad? It's that when I was going through that period of my life I used to wish I would get ill, I did, I used to lie in bed or at sit at my desk at work and wish whole heartedly wish that I would get sick. Not with something life threatening (I was still just about clinging on to some kind of sense of reality), just something that was bad enough that I could call in sick for a few days and get off the relentless hamster wheel that was my life.

It is so easy to look back now and know that I should have just stopped, but I couldn't see that then, I couldn't let people down the thought of that horrified me more than the 14-16hr days that I put in day after day after day. After all, I had ajob that wasn't going to do itself, a family that also wasn't going to look after itself, a house to look after, finances to worry about, so I just worked harder and harder and put more and more pressure on myself to do it all.

Looking back now I don’t know how I let it go on for so long, but I couldn’t see a way out. I’d given up every hobby I’d ever had, I barely saw my friends and I longed to be able to exercise and eat right, but they were fantasies!

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The Good News

Life doesn't have to be like that, no matter what dreams you are chasing life can be fun and enjoyable. But how do you start to break free from the stress.

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1. Stop

it sounds counter-intuitive doesn't it, but it isn't. When you are running at 100 miles an hour, jumping from one thing to the next, and the next and the next. You lose your perspective. Do you even need to do all of the million things on your to do list. Stopping is what gives you time and space to think. Have you ever heard yourself say, 'if I'd just had more time to think about it I would have...'

Stoping even for a few moments can make a difference

Here are 2 ways to start stopping

- When something isn't going the way that you want it to, stop before you react and give yourself some time to consider the options available to you.

- stop what you doing and take a look at the 'big picture' of your life, what are you trying to achieve, how are you trying to achieve it and what other ways that you might be able to get what you are aiming for.

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2. Will This Still Matter In 6 Months?

I love this question and I use it pretty much every single day! It reminds me of a day many years ago when I was away for a weekend with friends and I was cutting my trip short and going home early on the Sunday morning so I could get back to work. One of my friends running a 10mile race and I was going to leave and not watch her because I needed to work. As luck would have it, the race went past where I was parked so my car was blocked in and I couldn't leave, and I got to watch my friend race. But, my stress levels went through the roof I was filled with panic, I worried all day about the things I wasn't doing. The reality is that the thing that was so 'important' that I would miss being there with my best friends to cheer on our friend as she ran, has dissolve in the mists of time, it wasn't important and there is no way in the world that it would have passed my 'would this still matter in 6 months' test today.

There are lots of things in life that will still matter in 6 months and they are the things to spend more time on. If you ask yourself this question and the answer is no, give yourself permission not to worry (this take a bit of time and practice) or at least not to run around like a crazy trying to fix it/solve it etc.

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3. Good Can Be Good Enough

For all of us control freaks and perfectionists the thought of this makes us twitch a bit and feel very uncomfortable. But the truth is that unless you are working in a job where peoples lives depend on absolute precision perfection then that relentless drive to be perfect is not likely to be serving you well. It may be causing untold amounts of pressure that you (probably don't even realise you) are piling up on top of yourself. You are not alone!

Where do you start? Or are you still twitching at the thought of lowering your standards?? Start small and work your way up...maybe the house of the car can have a quick going over rather than a deep clean...maybe every email doesn't need a reply or they can wait a day or two.

If you are someone who puts lots of pressure on themselves to be perfect, you're also quite likely to think that you are not a perfectionist, you just have high standards - same same but different as they say in Thailand. Your high standard are somebody else's perfect and often if you'd have stopped 80% of the way there you would get the same outcome...just with that bit less stress.

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What I love about these three tips to stressing less is that they work well together and on their own.