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Simple Tips To Reduce Your Summertime Work Stress

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It’s the rare person who doesn’t feel stressed and frazzled in the office these days. A moderate level of stress can motivate you, but too much will take a serious toll on your health and well-being. No matter what’s happening around you at work this summer, these tips can help you stay calm:

1. Breathe

When we feel stressed, our breathing changes as part of a “fight or flight” response. This reaction may have helped our ancestors escape a grizzly bear, but does little to help when we’re stuck in a traffic jam or fed up with the boss.

Fortunately, we have the ability to deliberately change our own breathing. Breathing deeply sends a message to your brain to relax, and, in turn, your brain sends this message to your body. When you feel at the end of your rope, take several minutes to focus on your breathing: sit up straight (or stand up tall), inhale deeply through the nose, hold it, then exhale through your mouth.

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2. Get Outdoors

It’s easy to lose perspective when we’re working indoors in front of the computer all day. A few minutes outdoors can change your frame of mind, and that missing file or tense email won’t seem like such a big deal. Sunlight (or bright light) increases our serotonin levels, making us happier. And, fortunately, there’s plenty of sun in the summertime. Take a coffee break outdoors or walk outside if you find your stress level starting to rise.

3. Get Moving

No matter how busy your schedule gets, you should always make time for exercise. Physical activity causes your body to release more of those feel-good neurotransmitters called endorphins. A good workout helps release stress and keep your mood up no matter what the day throws at you. Don’t worry about the type of exercise you do. Just choose something you love so you’ll be more likely to stick with it.

4. Tackle the Tough Stuff First

Maybe it’s a difficult conversation you need to have with a colleague or an unhappy customer. The fact is that some things at work are stressful even if you sit in the lotus position. The best strategy is to get your most complicated or stressful tasks out of the way early so they’re not looming over you for the rest of the day. As Mark Twain said, “Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.”

5. Clear Your Desk

A relaxing workspace is not cluttered with papers, receipts, and miscellaneous junk. The key to starting each day with a calming work surface is to keep only what is needed -- nothing else. Recycle or shred whatever paper you don’t need; create trays for items that need to be filed (or just file them directly). Think about how often you use the rest of the items on your desk: place the ones you use frequently in a convenient place (like the top drawer), while trashing or stashing the rest.

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6. Green Your Space

Want an easy way to reduce stress? Put a plant in your office or cubicle. Studies have shown that workers with plants nearby were less stressed, had quicker reaction times, and felt more attentive. Another simple, green solution is green tea, as it contains an amino acid that calms and helps you focus.

7. Stop Multi-Tasking

More and more research is showing that we aren’t as good at multi-tasking as we think. Each time we need to switch gears (for example, when an email comes in), our brain needs more time to move from one mode to another. Juggling too many things at once doesn’t make us more productive, just more prone to error and stress.

When you feel like you are being pulled in too many directions, focus on completing one task at a time. Close your email and turn the phone ringer off. In fact, a Stanford professor of communications recommends logging off from email altogether and then committing 20 minutes at a time to reading and responding.

The route to Zen is different for everyone; the key is figuring out which methods work for you. Lowering your stress will help you perform better at work; most important, it will reduce your chances of developing chronic stress-related health conditions like hypertension and headaches.

Read all of Nellie Akalp's articles on AllBusiness.com.

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