We're celebrating Too Much on Her Plate Week from November 14-November 21, 2011. In honor of you, I've asked some of my favorite experts to donate gifts and giveaways designed to help you take charge of overwhelm, overload, and overeating AND help you create more ease, joy, and success in your life. Today's guest post is by Therese Skelly. To claim her free gift and choose from almost 20 others, go to http://TooMuchonHerPlateWeek.com between November 14-21, 2011.
How to take control of the stress in your business Have you ever noticed that having a business can be both exciting, AND stressful?
It takes a bit of work, but if done properly, you can manage your mindset and stay on top of the stressful elements in your business. You just need to realize that managing your energy is your #1 job! Here are two ideas for you to begin exploring that will get you back to center quickly.
Come Clean – Be honest. You can’t do anything about a problem if you don’t acknowledge it. So what does stress mean to you? How does it look? And what are your unique ways of doing it?
These are some common symptoms that I see –
· Overwhelm because you don’t know what to do next
· Lack of sleep because your mind is going over and over and over…..
· Self-doubt which causes you to under charge
· Loss of productivity (because you are just doing mindless busy work all day)
· A dip in revenue because marketing stops or slows down
· Immobilization because at this point, shutting down feels like a good solution
The way out of this is truthfully some good old self-reflection. An exercise which would be helpful would be to notice when you are at your peak what you experience. How do you show up? What do you do? What thoughts are in your mind that feel supportive? Now do the opposite. When you break down or get stressed or overwhelmed, what’s going on? The problem most of us have is that we are such little worker-bees that we don’t notice that we are getting fried! Taking the time to map out your ‘stress cycle’ will give you the heads up when you are sliding back there.
Stop the Spinning – Good for you. You have acknowledged that you may be a bit stressed. And now it’s time to get off the merry-go-round for a bit. In this phase you will consciously notice that you have slipped into stress and now make conscious decisions to do something different. Notice a lot of emphasis on the word CONSCIOUS because for most of us, getting out of our zone and on the stress-train is usually unconscious. No one chose that destination, but suddenly we wake up one day and it’s like, “Holy Cow….how did I get here? The big red sign that says “STOP” is just what you need to do right now.
Set your Course – Phase three is where you now look at what you are aiming toward. There is a fine dance between the details of today and the dreams of tomorrow. If you are too mired in the details, you’ll be overwhelmed with all there is and how to crank it all out. Being too caught up into the big dream for your future will have you not knowing what you are working on next to move you forward.
Here’s what you do – Pick a relatively short term goal like 3 to 6 months out. Then you will list all the tasks that need to happen in order to get that done. After you list all the tasks via a big brain dump, you will calendar it. What happens most often when folks are stressed is that they don’t know what to work on next and they have VERY unrealistic time frames set up. This method will allow you to not only stay focused on the bigger picture goal, but will also solve the “what to do tomorrow” challenge as well. And one more thing….make sure you have a visual reminder of that big goal. It’s easy to get lost and stressed about the minutia, so having the tangible thing to focus on can keep you in the game a bit more.
There you have it. Remember to notice, slow down, and get realistic and doable goals. That will be you back on track in no time.
Therese works with service professionals who love what they do but haven’t gotten their work out in the world in the biggest way possible. She blends her background of being a psychotherapist, strategist, and business consultant to work on both the inner game challenges and the outer game tactics and is passionate about helping people create businesses they will love. Learn more about Therese at www.HappyinBusiness.com
