6 minute read
How Stressed are You?
By Leslie Vizcarra-Tierney
Vice President of Operations & Patient Navigator
Quiz Yourself : How Stressed are You? Scoring for questions one through six: 0=Never, 1=Almost never, 2=Sometimes, 3=Fairly Often, 4=Very Often
In the last month, how often…
1. Do you feel upset because of something unexpected? 2. Do you feel unable to control the important things in your life? 3. Do you feel nervous or stressed? 4. Do you feel angry because things happened that you couldn’t control? 5. Do you feel you had many troubles that you could not overcome? 6. Do you find yourself unable to cope with your responsibilities?
7. Do you feel confident that you can handle your personal problems? 8. Do you feel that things are going your way? 9. Do you feel you are able to control irritations in your life? 10. Do you feel you are on top of things?
Add your points. A score of 13 is considered average; scores of 20 or higher are considered high stress.
Working through life’s pressures can result in something beautiful. How do you decipher between good and bad stress? What is pressure? What do you do under pressure? How do you best cope with stress? These are all great questions to help you understand your coping skills. Let’s explore answers to these questions by discovering strategies to manage pressure.
Strive to Survive Under Pressure
Do you feel you have so much to do that you don’t know where to start? Maybe you have overwhelming feelings of other people’s expectations. You feel that other people are disappointed with the progress you have made. When you’re under pressure, it’s way too easy to feel like this.
Pressure is part of everyday life. Finding a way to manage pressure can result in something precious and wonderful and prevent a downward spiral into feelings of helplessness and hopelessness. In addition to managing pressure, working on balance can help you achieve your goals. Under the right amount of pressure, diamonds form! Even one irritating grain of sand can turn into a precious pearl. Let’s discover together how to control pressure and use it to your benefit. The trick is to make sure you are working with yourself and not against yourself. Finding balance is the key to success.
What is Pressure?
There are two types of pressure; internal and external.
Internal pressure comes from yourself. Setting goals and pushing yourself to reach and strive for your idea of “perfection.” Sometimes these goals are unrealistic. Internal pressure can also come from trying to meet other peoples’ expectations. You might push yourself too hard to meet career/ life goals. Or, you assign feelings of doubt that interfere in achieving your goals.
External pressures come from an outside influence or from other people. Like family members or co-workers who micromanage, making you perform in a specific way. They give you certain expectations or a heavy workload that surpasses your ability to handle.
These external pressures may have little connection with your work, but the way you react to them can negatively impact your ability to perform. A long commute, illness, financial struggles, family obligations, or a death or loss in the family can all weigh heavily on you. Launching you into a period of unmanageable chaos and stress.
You may start to feel like these pressures build up and act against
you changing your normal behavior and finding unhealthy ways to cope like overeating, excessive alcohol, or use of drugs. These coping mechanisms are harmful and not true coping skills.
Too Much Pressure
You need to be careful not to confuse pressure with stress. They are different. Pressure can be a positive motivator. Pressure can be used to your benefit to work hard and meet your goals. Increasing pressure and learning to juggle multiple priorities can help tip the balance in the direction of success. negative and will first appear with dissatisfaction or a minor deterioration in the quality of your work. When the pressure becomes too much it turns into stress and anxiety leading to feelings of unhappiness.
If the situation doesn’t improve, and the pressure continues, you run the risk of burning out. The repeated negative pressure can turn into physical symptoms leading to a lupus flare. Some people even develop emotional issues like depression or behavioral problems like aggressiveness when they are under an excessive amount of pressure. Discover Techniques to Manage Pressure
Learning techniques to cope with pressure will be your most valuable skill to learn. The first step is to practice simple basic self-care practices.
• Routine regular exercise. • Consume only moderate amounts of alcohol, if at all. • Maintain a healthy diet. • Get plenty of sleep.
These common sense recommendations for self-care will start you on the path to responding appropriately to pressure. Responding appropriately to pressure will help to manage the negative impact
you might face. Here are additional helpful techniques to help you discover how to manage pressure.
• Proactive Approach: To use pressure as a positive approach you need to be in command of the situation through your attitude and actions. When you lose your sense of control you can quickly feel anxious and disturbed in the situation. By staying on top and believing in your own success you are building internal self-control to manage your ability to appropriately deal with rising pressure. Work on building an internal com• Address Your Weak Spot: Consider how your self-confidence and personality may interfere with your response. Look to influence how much pressure you feel by having a better understanding of yourself. Addressing your “weak spots” and using that to balance your reaction can help you to optimize your performance.
• Change Your Response: Create a positive mindset. When you respond to pressured situations, place a positive outlook and develop a way to defuse a negative situation. Use your motivation to succeed as a technique to restructure negative situations.
• Get Organized: Take control of what you can right away. Clear away physical clutter and emotional baggage This will enable you to directly see when the pressure starts to build. When you have too much clutter it can distract from the actual situation that needs to be addressed.
• Believe in Yourself: Pressure can come straight from your own selfdoubt. Be your number one supporter. Appreciate your attributes and work on believing in yourself. If you don’t believe in yourself first, how can you expect anyone else to believe in you too?
• Take Control: Work on self-control. Emotions can run high when we have many responsibilities. It is important to develop your ability to cope in these situations and manage responsibilities. Know that you have the ability to work past a confrontation or difference in others’ opinions. • Create your own Synergy: Read this next sentence out loud to yourself ten times. “You are important, unique, special, and one of a kind.” Remember there is no one else like you. You need to believe in yourself and live in that kind of positive energy. Without this positive self-belief, your energy toward yourself can flatten. You can easily fall into a rhythm that is not vibrant with positive energy. Creating your own positive synergy will allow you to energize yourself to gain focus and clarity on what you feel is best for you. you know who you can reach out to for help? Never be afraid to ask for help or look for guidance. Especially when you are already feeling the negative effects of pressure and stress. Recognize where the pressure is coming from. Ask your support network who is appropriate to ask for advice. You also have the Lupus Foundation of America, Greater Ohio Chapter patient navigator team to help answer your questions. Our office can help connect you with a patient navigator to talk to and help find answers to some of your questions. Contact the office by email at Info@LupusGreaterOhio.org or call 1 (888) NO-LUPUS.
