Reminder: Your mental health matters! We know how tough life can be and how easy it is to get anxious or stressed. Whether you are a business owner, or someone who battles with anxiety, today’s episode is to help you get through it!

If you’re anything like me, you’ve got a lot going on in your life and work, especially now that the world is opening up again after the pandemic! You’ve got school starting again soon, sports opening up, events happening, and so much more. It can feel overwhelming sometimes, especially if you are still on a smaller staff than you were pre-pandemic. I want you to know right away that I completely understand and I see you. I am right there with you and I’m here to share a little bit about how I am getting through this anxiety ridden world, and perhaps you can apply some of these practices to your daily life, too!

6 Tips to Ease Anxiety and Stress

1. Find a space daily to unwind and feel whatever you need to feel. If you need to be happy, excited, mad, frustrated, overwhelmed, anxious, or anything else, find a space at your office or home that you can go into and feel those things. Let out whatever emotion you need to without the judgement of others or yourself.  Mine is my closet at home and my car at work 
2. Separate the times and things that stress you out. What do I mean by that? If you know a specific email, or call, or message will stress you out, then figure out what time of day you will have the most courage to open that up and have that conversation. Not everything needs to be dealt with in the moment. So, if you know you have to talk to an upset client or deal with a legal situation, and you know you’ll be in the best space to do so after you eat something, have your morning coffee, or when the kids go to bed, then make space for that. Prep for those times you know you will be stressed. Create a playlist on your phone of two things: Songs that will change your mood immediately from stressed to happy AND songs that you need to just get the anger out! 
3. Turn off all notifications! Seriously, try it and see how less stressed you feel by not being notified about every little thing! I did this two years ago. I took all social media notifications off, apps, and so much more. The only notifications that I get are texts or phone calls. I even mute notifications for the texts I may know I could receive that would stress me out! I challenge you to try it just for a week, and then see how you feel.  
4. Counseling and Therapy! I’m a huge fan of counseling as it helps you see things from a different perspective and look at situations from a lens that you may not have seen before. This could be someone you trust like a best friend or parent, someone at your church or in your community, or a paid professional.
5. Journaling. Grab a journal and pen and actually write things out. No one ever has to see it, but using a journal to write down everything that is stressing you out is so freeing. You may even have a few journals, like one by your bed at night and one in your work bag. If you don’t have a journal, using the voice memos on your phone can help, too, just by talking out loud to yourself. 
6. Take one day a week to unwind and give yourself some self-care. If not a whole day, can you fit in a half-day? Listen to Episode 62 about how I prep for vacation for some good tips on how to unplug and really lean in o those moments of self-care and time off. 

We hope these tips were helpful for you! We are bookmarking this episode for ourselves to come back and listen to when we need to remind ourselves of how to really get past some anxiety we may be feeling! You should do the same!

Joyfully,

Cam