Recognize Your Style Under Stress
We Communicate at Our Level of Well-Being
We’re well aware of the fact that workplace stress is having a massive impact on our physical, emotional, and mental health. Even so, we don’t always recognize how stress impacts our ability to communicate and the toll that it takes on our relationships. The good news is that we have far more control over our well-being than we utilize.
How we experience life is largely up to us and how well we take care of ourselves. A little common sense will tell you that too much stress without adequate recovery negatively affects well-being and compounds communication challenges. So, let’s commit to being and doing better, shall we?
Self-Awareness Is Always the First Step
The Elevated Communicator: How to Master Your Style and Strengthen Well-Being at Work
When our well-being is low, we experience a disconnect between our self-awareness and how we express ourselves. This tends to lead to more misunderstandings and difficulties in our working relationships. Our interactions are more likely to stir up insecurities, frustrations, and resentment which adds to our stress and erodes trust.
This means that how we communicate plays a vital role in maintaining or disrupting our personal well-being and that our well-being directly impacts how effectively we communicate.
When we’re feeling exhausted and frayed, it’s easy to slip into the stress side of our communication style. What would normally be a small annoyance becomes intolerable. People start to get on your nerves and, if you’re not careful, you end up saying or doing something that makes matters worse.
We’ve all been there. It’s that moment when your quick wit turns to sarcasm to let everyone know how you really feel. Or maybe you’re the type who withdraws from conversations that frustrate you, leaving it to the most dominant voices to hash out an imperfect solution. We all have our ways of coping or tapping out when we’re done. Rarely do those coping mechanisms serve us.
Small Changes, Big Impact
If we want to raise our level of well-being and communicate more effectively (and we do!), we need to practice restoring, replenishing, and uplifting our energy on a daily basis. We need to rise above our faulty, unconscious programming––and consciously choose new ways of operating.
Here are three powerful and proven techniques to elevate your physical, emotional, and mental well-being. Activate one today!
Sleep Well
The simplest, most impactful place to strengthen your well-being is to make sleep a priority. If you’re not getting 7 hours of sleep each night, start here.
Sleep is foundational to your physical well-being––without it we increase our risk of developing chronic conditions like obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart disease, as well as strong and frequent mental distress.
Make it a point to go to bed and wake up at the same time. This practice will also sharpen your focus, brighten your mood, strengthen your immune system, and improve your job performance.
Set some firm boundaries with your screens and turn all of your electronics off one hour before bed.
Take a short 15-minute nap in the early afternoon when your energy dips. This helps to regulate emotions, lower stress, strengthen your immune system, and improve performance! Follow it up with a few minutes of movement or sunlight to signal to your body that it’s time to focus again.
15-Second Burst of Gratitude
Shifting your attention to a moment of gratitude is one of the fastest ways to fill your mind and body with positive emotions to negate stress. Psychologists call it the “undoing effect.” It turns out that savoring positive experiences for as little as 15 seconds changes your brain for the better. Give it try.
Think about someone or something that you appreciate in life––being with someone you love or an experience you’ve enjoyed––and take a few deep breaths as you let all of those positive emotions sink into your body.
Simply stay with this feeling for 15 seconds to encode your new programming deep into the fabric of your mind.
Think of it as a micro meditation that you can access at a moment’s notice to clear your mind and boost your mood!
“Cancel” Your Negative Thoughts
We’re often our own worst critics and it’s quite literally exhausting: Studies have shown that negative thoughts have a draining physical impact on your body. Negative thinking creates emotional states like fear, anger, anxiety, guilt, shame, and regret, which cause stress levels to increase––and who needs that?
Here’s how you can put a stop to it right in the moment.
Set an intention each morning to listen to how you talk to yourself (and others).
Check in on your internal dialogue. Are you focusing on the negative? Are you judging or criticizing yourself or others?
If you catch yourself thinking a negative thought, say the words “Cancel! Cancel!” silently or out loud, and then consciously redirect your mind to a positive thought and emotion––maybe a 15-second burst of gratitude!
When you recognize that you play a key role in determining your level of stress and well-being, you empower yourself to evolve and re-create who you are. Day by day, as your self-awareness and well-being become stronger and you elevate how you communicate, you move your autopilot setting closer and closer to your “healthy” expression. And over time, healthy can become your predominant way of being and communicating. It’s a game changer!
Happily,
Maryanne
