Life is always going forward, no matter what. Sometimes, it’s going slower, sometimes faster, it depends on us and all the other factors. But when its speed and all the things that are going on make our lives too stressful, it’s time to stop. However, if we notice the stressful periods coming upfront, we can slow down and all the stress will fade away. So how to slow down in the times of stress?
Feel Yourself
First of all, in order to foresee the stressful periods coming, you must feel yourself. Our bodies and minds always make us aware of such things before it’s too late. When life is too fast for us, we have too many things to cope with and spend too much time working on them. Also, during our free time, we still think about all those things that are going on and can’t even have a proper rest. This is when stress comes in and takes over our lives.
Gladly, on most occasions, we can avoid the stress. Usually, it comes to our lives very fast, that’s why we must always consciously feel ourselves. We must notice when we think too much about the problems we need to solve and tasks that need to be done. This is the very first signal that we’re going to stress out soon. Right then we need to stop for a moment. Breathe in. Breathe out. And say to ourselves: I’m gonna do just fine and I won’t let stress in.
Slowing Down
Everything seems chaotic when there are too many things on our plate and we have no idea where should we start. Once we feel ourselves getting stressful, we must put everything in place. A clear action plan is what always helps to do things on time without stress. If you need some valuable tips on how to prepare an action plan, I suggest you read the post about short-term planning and if you always feel stress, then you probably should read the post about long-term planning as well. These tips are written for businesses but the main points are the same for every case so they should help you too.
When you have an action plan, it’s much easier to deal with things consistently and avoid jumping from one thing to another and losing your mind. However, it’s also very important to take some time for yourself. You must keep the balance, even if you have incredibly many things on your to-do list, you still must find some time to take care of yourself. It might be a calming bath before sleep, reading a book for half an hour or a nice walk in fresh air during your lunch break.
Slowing down means that you know what you doing, there’s no chaos and therefore there’s no stress. Instead of rushing about one thing and another, you stick to your action plan, follow its guides and at the same time take care of yourself.
Stress is a horrible feeling and it does no good nor to our mental health nor to our bodies. However, we live in a world where, in most cases, you simply can’t avoid it completely but you can slow down. Know what you’re doing and the stress will be gone or at least it won’t be too harsh on you.