Stress Relief is Just a Laugh Away

CareerBuilder (CB) did a survey of human resource managers on quirky requests by employees. Here is my top 10 from the CB list.

1. Allow clothes changing in cubicles
2. Tanning bed in the break room
3. Beer in the vending machine
4. Request to have jail covered under Family Medical Leave Act
5. Instituting Bikini Fridays
6. Time off to pursue side business as a clown
7. Replace desk with a futon so employee could lie down and work
8. Request to only be required to work during daylight hours because employee is scared of the dark.
9. Request for a special smoking area for medical marijuana.

10. 10.Request to have the team meeting to be held in Hawaii.

You just know number 5 was a submitted by a guy! Although if number 1 is approved, he might just get number 5!

Keeping your spirits up is crucial when job-hunting. Actively seek out amusing things like the above list. It will make you smile and relieve your stress. Speaking of stress ...

Two weeks ago I talked about Holiday Stress. My local newspaper, the Sacramento Bee had an article today on, “Don’t let stress ruin holidays.” Here is the link to the full story. Here are some highlights and additional comments.

Simplify. Be courageous and say "no" to excessive obligations or overindulgence. Downsize your obligations so you can up-size your fun.

Boost your energy with exercise. Find ways to incorporate 30 minutes of exercise into your daily regimen, even if it means parking far away in the mall parking lot. You will decrease your stress levels and increase your energy.

Sleep seven to eight hours a night. Chronic sleep deprivation increases fatigue and stress.

Continued sleep deprivation can result in trouble concentrating, blurry vision, impaired judgment, and even more severe mental effects. After just a few days of no sleep, people can begin to experience hallucinations, mania, and nausea. Luckily, if you repay your sleep debt right away, those effects vanish immediately. The immune system is also thought to be maintained while asleep; people who don’t get enough sleep tend to be more susceptible to infections and have slower healing times.

Sleep deprivation also has an effect on how the brain stores information. A study showed that those who were taught a task and allowed to sleep afterward remembered what they had learned better than those that didn’t sleep. Among school-aged children, those who get even one less hour of sleep than their peers have shown to perform more poorly on tests of memory and attention.

Get some sunlight. Make sure you are in the sun at least 20 minutes a day to help boost your vitamin D and maintain your diurnal rhythm and mood.

Take time for you. Try to get 20 minutes a day to yourself, away from TV. Meditate or listen to your favorite music – it will help you decompress. Break it into two segments: try 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes at night. I do my time at sunrise and in the evening about 12 hours later. It balances my day and keeps me on an even keel. I’m alone at sunrise, which means I’m uninterrupted! Bonus.

Rethink your spending. A consumer study in October by Context-Based Research Group showed, surprisingly, that many people feel the recession has positively affected their mood. Many are focused on doing meaningful activities in place of spending: 50 percent of adults plan to give gifts in the form of volunteering, and 80 percent are spending more time with their family and friends this year.

See your doctor if increasing depression, anxiety, fatigue or stress is affecting your relationships with others, your performance at work or your health.

Practice gratitude. Learn to love each moment and to live a life you love. This is an amazing de-stressor.

Gandhi said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” This also applies to you and your life. Don’t put it off. Don’t wait until … you’ve lost weight; after the holidays; when “I’m not so stressed out”; you get a job/better job; or whatever your "something" is gets improved. Just start doing the change you want in your life.

What are you grateful for? How often do you ask yourself and others this powerful question? Sadly, many of us don’t take the time to ask or answer this question on a regular basis – especially in the midst of these difficult times.

Thanksgiving is a perfect time to spend some time acknowledging what you’re grateful for this week and over the next few weeks during the holiday season. However, focusing on gratitude is something that we can do all the time, not just on special occasions or during holidays. Sadly, we often feel “funny” or get embarrassed expressing our appreciation and gratitude. Gratitude is one of the most powerful emotions and states of beings we have access to.

Gratitude not only makes us feel good, it’s also one of the greatest attractors of abundance, love, peace, success, health, connection, and more. The more we focus on what we already have, the wonderful aspects of our lives, and what we appreciate; the more we end up having to be grateful for. Stop for a moment right now and think about some of the things that you’re grateful for in your own life. Make a list – either in your head or on paper. We each have so much. When we take the time to acknowledge our many blessings, we utilize the power of gratitude in a way that benefits us and those around us in a profound way.

An Attitude of Gratitude. We can expand our capacity for gratitude in our lives by creating simple and genuine practices. It doesn’t really matter what we do or how we do it, just that we come up with easy and meaningful ways to focus on what we’re grateful for all the time. Below is a short list of some different possible gratitude practices. Pick one, many or choose something else:

• Write cards or emails expressing your gratitude for others – and do this for no specific reason or occasion
• Meditate/pray and focus on what you’re grateful for
• Have everyone at the dinner table share something they’re grateful before you eat (or go around in the car or other times you’re together with your family and play this “grateful game”)
• Ask people what they’re grateful for (and/or ask this question as part of your outgoing voice mail message)
• Use a “gratitude journal” and write in it regularly

While so many of us understand and know about the power of gratitude, it’s the practice and expression of it that really has impact. When we take the time to think about, feel, and express our gratitude and appreciation for life, others, and ourselves – we can literally transform our lives and relationships in a beautiful way.

Let me know how your job hunt is going. What are your particular challenges? What is your attitude of gratitude? Send me an email to eal@EALCoaching.com . I’d love to know how you are doing and what strategies you are using.

A dream with a plan is a goal. A goal without a plan is just a dream.

Warmly, Elisabeth Elisabeth Adler-Lund Executive And Life Coaching Telephone: 916 • 803•1494 E-mail: eal@EALCoaching.com

Are You Stressed?

Tis the season to be stressed. Yep, we are entering the … > > > > > > > > > > > Holiday Zone. < < < < < < < < < < < < It isn’t as if you aren’t stressed enough already. You have work, you have family, you have a demanding boss, you have all the events your kids belong to, you have work at home, you have work at … whoa! You have too much going on. What are you going to do about all this activity? Are you stressed-out?

First, breathe. Just put everything on pause for two minutes, and just breathe. For these two minutes, notice your breath going in and out. Just focus on your breath. Notice how it slows down as you focus on it. Breathe in for a count of four; breathe out for a count of four. Now breathe deeply in for a count of four, hold it for a count of four and then breathe out for a count of four. Repeat this throughout the day. Especially, do it when you are about to explode from the frustration and overwhelm.

Plan A

The “A” stands for attitude. I’ll bet you had thought this is where we talk about priorities and making a list. Only partially true. Your attitude towards what you are doing is more important than what you are doing. Stress is supposed to be a part of our lives. It is only when we are overwhelmed that we think stress is bad. If it wasn’t for stress, we would have many fewer accomplishments, on a personal level and on a societal level.

Yes, stress is good for you. Like all good things, stress is good in moderation. It is when it gets out of control, when it takes over our lives and snuffs the joy out of other things that it is bad for us. “I've learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not on our circumstances.” (Martha Washington, 1732 - 1802)

Now before you think I am trying to get you to change your mind about stress, I think you do need to consider how important what you are doing is and is it in your best interests to be doing it.

Importance and Best Interests

Things that you do usually break down into three categories. First are the “must do’s” – and these include your family, your job or source of income, your friends and your community. The second category of to-do’s is the should-do and the final category is the nice-to-do. Not everything in these broad categories is required. What are your goals as a family, for example? If one of your family goals is to all sit down together for dinner, how do you accomplish that? Perhaps compromise and creative thinking can also accomplish your goals. Perhaps by setting a goal of just four nights of ‘family dinner is doable. Or by bringing the entire family to a practice, you can have a family dinner, picnic-style at the practice.

The second category of to-do’s are should-do’s and third are nice-to-do’s. When a season has its own set of demands, they often take the place or add to your should-dos and nice-to-dos. Again, review what you are doing or planning to do against what is important to your goals of: family, work, friends and community. What will further your goals and what is getting in the way? A couple of years ago, I did it all – baked the cookies, made homemade gifts, decorated “everything” and was too tired to really enjoy the season or my family. At the same time, many family members had gone on diets. You guessed it, my cookies went untouched. This, in turn, hurt my feelings. When I asked, “What, you don’t like my cooking anymore?” The family member asked if I was trying to sabotage their diet! Talk about a communication gap. We laughed about the mix-up in expectations and intentions. Now, I take in the bigger picture and weigh my to-do list against how it affects everybody. This has had the happy effect of dropping some things off my list or reducing the load. I love to bake, but now I only bake cookies for those who will welcome them. This has reduced my baking time and expenses. Win-win.

How important are the obligations and commitments that you have right now? The things that you usually do at the holiday times, how important are they really? What can you delegate? Who can support you? What are your limits and where do you draw the line? How important is your fun-level to you? For everything you put on your list, ask the question, “What benefit will it bring to the goals I have for my family, work, friends or community? If your goal is more family time, don’t put “join the holiday choir” on your list, unless singing is your passion and giving back to the community your goal. Just because you “always” do it, doesn’t mean you need to keep doing it. Perhaps it is time to let someone else do it. Pass the torch. Enjoy the fruit of their labors for a change. Own Your List

Now that you have a list of just those things that are truly important to you, enjoy doing those things. “Change your thoughts and you change your world.” (Norman Vincent Peale, 1898 - 1993)

When you are stressed, when you are harried, remember you chose to do these things. Take a couple of minutes and do the breathing exercise outlined at the beginning of this article. Breathe. Do the counts for a slightly longer period, but stay comfortable. You can do it at a stop light. You can do it in the middle of cleaning up the kitchen. Better is to do it when you take out the trash! Enjoy the night sky while you breathe. You’ll come back in the house with a smile on your face.

If you are very stressed, ask, “Is it time for a course correction?” Do you need to reevaluate what you are doing? If so, do it. Get back to enjoying life and the things you are doing. If it isn’t fun, it isn’t worth doing. Life is too short not to have fun at all times of the year.

Do you feel burdened with too many responsibilities and not enough time for personal enjoyment? Balance is important in your life. Call me and we’ll evaluate the balance in your life, and identify areas that are out of balance and develop a personal action plan to determine your most important priorities. You’ll learn how to set limits, delegate and gain support. You’ll develop a personal action plan to achieve better work life balance. A dream with a plan is a goal. A goal without a plan is just a dream. Warmly,

Elisabeth

Elisabeth Adler-Lund

Executive And Life Coaching

Telephone: 916 • 803•1494

E-mail: eal@EALCoaching.com