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Happiness Isn't Brain Surgery
Happiness Isn't Brain Surgery
47 - Tips to Deal with Stress
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Tips to Deal with Stress and Increase Productivity
Dr. Dawn-Elise Snipes
Happiness Isn’t Brain Surgery Podcast
Causes of Stress
~ Politics
~ Relationships
~ Finances
~ Work Environment
~ Too Many Responsibilities
~ Health Problems
~ Unhappiness with Appearance

~ Common effects of stress on your body
~ Headache
~ Muscle tension or pain
~ Chest pain
~ Fatigue
~ Change in sex drive
~ Stomach upset
~ Sleep problems

~ Common effects of stress on your mood
~ Anxiety
~ Restlessness
~ Lack of motivation or focus
~ Feeling overwhelmed
~ Irritability or anger
~ Sadness or depression

~ Common effects of stress on your behavior
~ Overeating or undereating
~ Angry outbursts
~ Drug or alcohol abuse
~ Tobacco use
~ Social withdrawal
~ Exercising less often

Find Your Groove
~ Identify what is important
~ Take active, mindful steps to use your energy in productive ways
~ Get recharged

Perspective
~ Who and what is important in your life
~ Family?
~ Attending kids events?
~ Spending quality time/visiting family?
~ Friends?
~ Your career?
~ Pets?
~ Hobbies?
~ Achieving certain financial or career goals?
Mindfulness
~ How can I deal with this issue in a way that helps me get closer to those things and people who are important to me. (Accept it, Let it go, Address It)
~ Politics
~ Relationships
~ Finances
~ Work Environment
~ Too Many Responsibilities
~ Health Problems
~ Unhappiness with Appearance
~ What thoughts am I having about this situation that are moving me further away from those things and people who are important to me?
~ How can I change those thoughts

Reduce Input
~ Set aside a certain amount of time to read the news and/or be on social media each day. (preferably not before bed)
~ Be aware of the availability heuristic and the algorithms of social media
~ If certain topics bother you on social media—don’t respond to them or tell the provider you don’t want to see that in your feed.
Set Aside Venting/Worry Time
~ It is easy to get caught in a negative funhouse.
~ Set aside time each day to just get it out, but then, when the time is up, you are done.
Create Healthy Routines
~ Sleep
~ Nutrition
~ Exercise
~ Recreation
Effective Time Management
~ What actually “HAS” to be done
~ What can be delegated
~ What can be simplified
~ What can be combined
Develop Focus
~ Know your temperament
~ Visualize the day
~ Create a task list
~ Schedule in certain no-interruption times
~ Know your task and before saying yes to anything, check in to see if saying yes will enhance or reduce your movement toward your goal.

Practice Mindfulness
~ Work with your rhythms
~ Check in periodically how are you feeling? What are you needing? Sometimes it is better to take the day off and recharge then muddle through and be totally unproductive.

Effectively Communicate
~ Listen to understand not solve or defend
~ Ask instead of tell
Address a Burnout Environment
~ Too many demands without enough support
~ Can you enlist support from others?
~ Can you reduce your demands?
~ Little or no control
~ What parts do you have control over?
~ No sense of community
~ How can you develop community?
~ Lack of appreciation
~ How can you show yourself appreciation?
~ How can you encourage others to show appreciation (HINT: Model it)

~ Lack of fairness
~ Can you make it more fair?
~ Can you change the situation?
~ Lack of security in your situation
~ Imagine the worst…and make a plan
~ High levels of negativity
~ What can you do to buffer the negativity?
Schedule in FUN