In time for National Stress Awareness Day, here are the 7
C's behind Stress and what you can do about them.
Stressor No. 1 - Poor
COMMUNICATION
• Poor
communication leads to misunderstanding, missed opportunities, bad feeling.
• Assertive
communication helps deal with these. Learning good communication skills can help you at work
and at home.
Stressor No. 2 - Lack
of CAPABILITY
• If
you have not been trained to do a job then is it fair to expect you to do it
well?
• Give
yourself the best possible chance to do well by getting the best possible
training for the job in hand.
Stressor No. 3 - Too little CAPACITY
· Not having enough capacity to deal with day-today issues can lead to a sense of overwhelm which can be overpowering
and cause you to want to give up or walk away.
· This may be a case of needing to review your
work life balance or getting yourself organised.
·
It may be the case that you need to learn how to
say "No."
· Make sure you review where you are in your life,
the things you want to keep and the things you want to walk away from. Now work
out a plan to do just that.
Stressor No. 4 - Loss
of CONTROL
• People
get stressed about a situation because they feel out of control.
• Different
people react in different ways to loss of control and will use different
strategies to get back to a level of
acceptable control for them .
• Learning
how you react to loss of control and the strategies that you use, can help you
to understand what you might do differently.
Stressor No. 5 -
Dealing with CHANGE
• Many
people don’t like change and get very stressed as a result.
• The
first steps to dealing with change is to accept it is inevitable and then deal
with the consequences rather than the fact itself.
• Learn
to embrace change so it doesn’t scare you as much.
Stressor No. 6 -
Resolving CONFLICT
For those of us who don’t like
conflict, it can be a major source of stress. Learning to deal with it can be a
major benefit. There are many ways of dealing with conflict, dependent on your
situation. Here are a few:
1.
Don't take the bait.
2.
Consider the underlying causes. Is it obvious
why someone is upset?
3.
Pause before you react. This will give you
thinking time.
4.
Check your own behaviour. Is it part of the
problem?
5.
Listen.
6.
Acknowledge that they may be correct in part of
their concern.
7.
Be willing to negotiate if appropriate.
8.
Remain assertive.
9.
Stay in adult.
10.
Look for
warning and danger signs.
11.
Check
your distances.
12.
Avoid
competing.
13.
Think
Win/Win.
14.
Be
prepared to deal with emotion and anger.
15.
Be aware,
be alert.
16.
Know your
legal position.
Stressor No. 7 -
Dealing with a CRISIS
• We
all have to deal with crisis from time to time, whether it is personal or at
work. Knowing how you are likely to react will help you plan on how to deal
with things in the future.
• Crises
can hit us at anytime. Illness, a death in the family, divorce, bad debt.
Unfortunately they are all too common. And can really knock you for six when
they happen.
• If
you are dealing with a crisis, make sure that you have the support mechanisms
in place to help you as much as possible,. This might include medical and legal
professionals, friends and family, a coach or counsellor.
Want to find out more about how you can manage stress more
effectively? Here are some useful links:
De-Stress
You- Kindle Version
Useful
Guides from Pansophix including: A
Useful Guide to De-Stress You, A Useful
Guide to Resolving Conflict, A Useful Guide to Create a New You - by Berry
Winter
For Stress Coaching - http://www.jamberry.co.uk/coaching/coaching_home.htmlFor a variety of online products - http://www.jamberryonline.co.uk/index.html
