Unfortunately, these days stress is part of all our daily lives, and seems to be increasing as more and more pressure is heaped upon us. Whatever happened to the promise of shorter working days, 3-day weekends, longer holidays, all achieved by letting technology take the stress and pressure off of our lives?
Instead, technology now allows us to carry a piece of equipment that gives access to the internet, email, texts, phone calls, all day and every day, no-matter where we are or what we are doing.
Typical working parents, even out of hours sometimes have to deal with calls from clients and keep on top of work issues, while using any spare time at the weekends to catch up on jobs around the house and run the kids to their various activities. Sound familiar?
It's very stressful trying to be a supportive partner, dutiful parent and career person. And although these things are very important and necessary, if you fail to introduce some rules and organization into your life, stress and anxiety will almost certainly become a factor.
Time and motion experts suggest that many of us allow our precious me-time to be wasted, and by organizing ourselves a little better we will have less stress and more opportunity in our hectic day for other things, like relaxing and unwinding. Try the following tips and see if it makes a difference to your stress levels.
1. Cut out time-wasting calls - How many of the calls you get need to be answered there and then when you are already doing something important? Much better to set to silent, then go through the callers when you have a moment. You can usually tell by looking at who the caller is whether it was likely to be important or not.
2. Your inbox - Same thing with email. Although it is one of the most important breakthroughs in our lifetime, it can be a great time waster if those endless "Spam" mails keep popping up. Make sure the spam filter is on for all your e-mail accounts. Clear unwanted email immediately, and prioritize non-urgent messages to deal with later.
3. A place for everything - Find a convenient place at home to always keep your keys, wallet, purse, so that you avoid that stressful 10 minute panic search every morning.
4. Simplify you day - A few minutes spent at the start of your day to review your projects and tasks could save lots of time later, especially if you can combine them. By making a priority list, starting with your main goal, the day will naturally get less stressful as it progresses. If you don't achieve something at the bottom of your list, it won't be so important and therefore you will be less anxious about it. Your commitments will be simplified in this way, and not so difficult to accept if you have to say "NO" to something.
5. The morning post - Sort it out, get it over with, and don't allow your post to pile up. File away when necessary and do away with paper clutter by shredding any junk mail instantly.
And finally, if you find yourself with some spare time on your hands, don't go looking for things to do - enjoy it! Spend quality time with your family, enjoy a walk with the dog, or simply do nothing, and you can if you follow the tips. Now doesn't that sound less stressful?
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Steve_L_Thompson
No comments:
Post a Comment