More people than ever before are currently working from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s natural to have some difficulty separating home life concerns from your professional life as you transition into home-based work. By being proactive about keeping them separate and using practical stress management techniques, you can enjoy the numerous benefits of working from home without finding additional ways to deal with anxiety.
Practical Stress Management
According to the Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine, practical stress management is:
…set of techniques and programs intended to help people deal more effectively with stress in their lives by analysing the specific stressors and taking positive actions to minimize their effects
Popular examples of practical stress management techniques include meditation, which is also a major advantage of yoga, and exercise. We can all benefit from identifying our stress and managing it better, especially while we are at home. Let’s review some of the practical stress management techniques that should be used while working from home during the pandemic.
Create a Home Office
Ideally, you would furnish a separate room in your home as an office, so you can go there and shut the door while you work. However, if you don’t have this space in your home, find a corner to set up a desk or even clean out a spare closet and install a shelf at desk height for a makeshift office. When you sit down in your work area, your mind will know it’s time to focus, and when you step away, you can let all your work concerns go. In addition, you set boundaries for family members who know not to interrupt you in your workspace.
Set Work Hours
When you’re working at home, you may find that your home and work responsibilities start mixing at all hours of the day. You might stop work in the middle of the afternoon to handle the sink full of dishes or cook the kids lunch, then find yourself making up for that by finishing up your work late at night. As a result, your mind is always in “work mode,” which causes stress. Keep to your regular work hours, focusing only on work during that time and focusing on your family and home outside those hours. By doing so, it’s much easier to wind down mentally at the end of the day.
Take Breaks
Burnout occurs when you overwork yourself, leading to stress and reduced well-being. Regular breaks are essential for your mental and physical health, as your brain gets a reset, and moving away from your desk gets your blood pumping. It’s easy to forget to take breaks when you may not need to clock out for a lunch break or grab coffee with your co-workers. Set timers throughout the day to remind you when to take your breaks. While you’re working, get up and take a walk if you need a break.
Besides your mental health and emotional clarity, mindfulness has many other benefits including a practical way to manage stress. Research indicates mindful meditation can also contribute to physical health by boosting immunity. Consequently, you will be less likely to become infected or infected by the virus causing the current pandemic.
Find effective ways to balance your mood with the MoodWellth Journal. The Wellthy Mood journal was created by a therapist who is also a health and wellness coach. The safe approach that she designed was created to help you evaluate four specific areas of your life in order to balance out your mood.
