5 Simple Ways to Reduce Stress and Overwhelm at Work
These five, when stacked together, will genuinely save you from burnout.
Photo by ThisisEngineering RAEng on Unsplash
What’s the thing you complain about most at work?
Not enough time?
Too many meetings?
Your overflowing inbox?
Doing things outside the scope of your role?
Yearning for a vacation?
We like to think that we’re superheroes of highly-efficient productivity, yet on most days, that’s far from the truth. Because back in reality, we can only do so much.
The way to produce consistent, high-quality work while maintaining a sense of self and having time, energy, and capacity for your family, friends, and passions is to set boundaries around your time.
And yet, boundaries can be scary. We don’t know how to do it. So we avoid the conflict at all costs.
But not knowing how to do something hasn’t stopped you before. Why should it stop you now?
Here are a few simple ways to reduce stress and overwhelm at work. You may think they’re too easy, but are you actually doing them?
Each of these has the potential to tremendously impact your time, productivity, relationships, and mental health. If you tackle all 5, you just might create the freedom, peace, and ease you so desperately desire.
1. Opt out of all meetings that you’re not required to attend.
Meetings are overrated. They’re simply not as productive as popular business culture tends to think.
I can’t even count how many hours of my life I wasted sitting in a dreary, windowless conference room while someone droned on about a topic that wasn’t relevant to my focus or current priorities.
When you get a meeting request where the topic isn’t directly related to your core work or an important matter that affects you or your team, hit decline and move on.
You only have a finite amount of time and energy to focus on the critical tasks that move the needle. When we waste hours trapped under the pressures of other people’s priorities, our work and personal commitments suffer.
How many times have you been held up in an irrelevant, unproductive meeting only to return to your workstation mentally and physically depleted?
This stops now.
As I shared before, the only way you can produce high-quality work with consistency is to reserve your precious time, energy, and capacity for your direct responsibilities. Period.
I get there are meetings that you must attend. We all have those. But next time a meeting request pops up, pause and ask yourself, do I really need to or want to participate in this meeting?
What comes up in your body? Do you feel excitement or wonder? Curiosity or intrigue? Are you stoked to participate?
Or does your body tense up with feelings of dread or disdain? These are important signals to pay attention to.
You don’t have to suffer through other peoples’ monologues and waste valuable hours of your workday. Oftentimes, you have a choice. Use it to say, “No, thanks.”
But what if it’s MY meeting?
Not every meeting is unproductive. Most are. But yours doesn’t have to be.
You can be the forward-thinking person at your company that does things differently by hosting effective meetings.
5 Tips for Hosting Productive Meetings
Plan the agenda of key topics to cover.
Communicate the agenda and goals of the meeting. Share expectations in advance and ask folks to come prepared.
Set calls and meetings for 30 minutes. You likely don’t need a full hour.
Host meetings early in the day when people are more alert and engaged.
Leave space for creativity, problem-solving, and questions. While folks are together, sincerely ask how they are and how you may be helpful. Promote an environment where it’s OK to make a mistake, be stuck, or not know exactly how to do something.
2. Close email and interoffice messaging for most of the day
I remember reading one of those “highly successful habits” books a few years ago, and it shared similar advice. At the time, I was drowning in hundreds of emails that arrived at all hours, seven days a week. I thought, How can I NOT respond to emails?
It turns out the book and dozens of other time-management experts are right.
The only way your gonna get your work done in a low-stress, efficient manner is to remove distractions. Contrary to popular belief, multitasking is doing two things at once poorly.
You won’t be successful at work while having a happy, fulfilled life outside the office until you take control of your time.
Email is an infinite hole of time suck that you’ll never catch up on unless you establish and communicate boundaries. Set specific times of the day that you check and respond to messages.
Maybe it’s 30 minutes in the morning, 15 minutes after lunch, and an hour toward the end of your day. You decide what works best for you.
If you have to, set a timer. When time’s up, close the program and focus on your priorities. If someone needs you, they’ll call, text, or show up at your workspace.
To reduce overwhelm, unsubscribe from the following:
Interoffice group lists
Auto-generated reports
Vendor marketing emails
Any person or company that makes you cringe
Any email sender whose messages you haven’t opened in a month
3. Reread your job description.
Are you consistently doing things that aren’t part of your role? If so, do you want to?
There’s a fine line between being a good “team player,” wanting to advance your career or appear helpful, and taking care of your core responsibilities within the hours of a regular workday.
I ask clients to do a time inventory where they write down everything they do on a workday. When I ask which of the things on their list are part of their primary responsibilities, often, they respond with only a handful of tasks and sometimes even none.
Few of us are immune to the pressures of compliance and agreement in the workplace.
If you’re doing work regularly that’s outside the scope of your role, I encourage you to press pause and think about what you want.
Typically, these extra duties are meant to be temporary, yet you’re still doing them. And while you may enjoy the recognition or additional exposure, are you being properly compensated? Most importantly, is this causing undue stress and overwhelm?
It might be time to not only ask for a raise but to delegate certain responsibilities or even pieces of responsibilities to another.
Something is off if you’re struggling to get your work done within the confines of an eight-hour workday. I encourage you to inventory your time and determine where it’s going. You’ll likely be surprised.
4. Decline after-hours work events that you’re not thrilled to attend.
This is pretty self-explanatory.
It’s nice when our employer plans a fun event or provides a meal for the company. Interacting with colleagues in a relaxed setting promotes better communication and stronger relationships.
The challenge is when companies try to do something great and fail to consider your personal time. Work events should be held during work hours. Your early mornings, evenings, weekends, and all holidays are yours to decide how to utilize.
Now, if there’s a happy hour or fun activity planned after hours and you’re excited to go, by all means, indulge. If your work crew is going bowling or meeting up at a new sushi restaurant, and you’re happy to spend time with them, do it.
However, if work events and activities infringe on your self-care, family time, and personal commitments, or you simply don’t wanna go. Say, “No thanks,” and head home guilt-free.
Don’t feel obligated to make up an excuse or feign a headache. You having boundaries around your personal time needs no explanation.
Especially if you’re battling overwhelm, take time to rest and rejuvenate in the comforts of your own home.
5. Plan a vacation, even if it’s for one day.
When was the last time you took a day off?
Our minds and bodies will tell us when it’s time for a break. The problem is we’re typically too busy to pay attention. If you’re feeling frustrated, burned out, or barely surviving the day, take the time you need to reset.
Resist the urge to push through and tout your resiliency. Don’t play victim, “tough gal/guy,” or be a martyr. None of those roles serve you.
Unfortunately, many people live in a state of non-stop hustle where busyness tends to be a badge of honor. And in my coaching work, I see clients that feel guilty if they’re not being productive. This form of codependency is both exhausting and pervasive.
Pause and listen to what your body craves. Is it rest, authentic connection, a delicious home-cooked meal, being in nature, laughter, and silliness, or unstructured time to do whatever your heart desires?
The best way to reduce stress and overwhelm is to honor these small, quiet requests.
Habits, Choices, and Responsibility
You are in control of your time. It’s a responsibility that we can’t delegate.
And as terrifying as this realization might be, would you really want it any other way?
While your career may dictate your priorities and focus, how you spend the minutes of each day is typically up to you.
Our lives are comprised of our daily habits and choices. As James Clear writes in his best-selling book Atomic Habits,
Until you take responsibility, your job will be a convenient enemy.
Freedom from stress and overwhelm can be yours, but you gotta decide that enough is enough — and do the work necessary to set boundaries around your time.
You’re worth it.
. . .
Rebecca Murauskas is a Life Coach for Professionals. She helps people be free of stress and overwhelm, reclaim their purpose, and feel fulfilled. Rebecca and her husband, Adam, abandoned their careers and moved to Panamá in 2019 to pursue passions for helping people heal. Take the free Time Saver Quiz and find additional content at RebeccaMurauskas.com.