Managing the impact of stress on our lives.

In this blogpost:

• Manage stress by changing your perspective.

• Three practices to change your perspective.
  

Many of us would agree that because of the world at war, economic instability and rising living costs, most people are living with mild to high levels of stress. With that in mind, we are starting a series on managing stress in our lives. The fact of the matter is that while on earth we will never completely be without some form of stress. In fact, we need stress which is some form of resistance to help us grow, learn new things, and keep moving forward.

The point is not avoiding or trying to live without stress, but to minimize harmful stress that leads to feelings of depression, anxiety, loss of quality of life, and even health issues.

Each week we will look at one practice that will assist in managing stress and minimize harmful effects of stress. 

I once heard a story about two people riding on a bus together. The one had a wonderful time while the other was miserable. The only difference between the two of them was their perspective, the one looked out over the view outside seeing mountains and valleys, the other stared at the passing cold and black rockface. In the same way we can find two people doing a job or task, the one loving it and the other hating it, all because of their perspective.

Please do not misunderstand me, I am not referring to avoiding feelings of frustration, loss, and trauma, I am referring to changing your view to alleviate some of the stress that the situation is causing.

I have found while coaching, many people just need to change their perspective about a challenge or goal to make progress.

Your answer to moving forward is many times in front of you but you fail to see it because of your perspective.

Get a fresh perspective.

Below are three practices that will help you gain a new perspective.

Kickstart your creativity.

Kickstart your creativity by engaging in a hobby or some other form of work than what you are used to. If you, for example, you are in meetings the whole day analysing numbers, think about a more tangible activity outside, that you can do. By doing something different than what you are used to you activate your brain and creativity which gives you new perspective.

Encourage those around you.

This is a powerful practice that will satisfy your core need to add value to those around you. When we get stuck in a negative loop, we often feel that we are not adding value and start to doubt our purpose. By intentionally seeking out people to encourage and compliment we take the focus away from the challenge and focus our energy on others while satisfying our need to add value and be helpful.

Seek out people with different perspectives. 

We naturally tend to seek out those who think and speak like us because it makes us feel that we belong. While there is nothing necessarily wrong with that, it is not helpful when we are stuck and stressed out. In that case our natural tendency to find those like us will reinforce negative and harmful perspectives. We can overcome this by intentionally looking for a different perspective than ours. A tip is to pray and ask Jesus His perspective which will always be life giving pointing to eternity and not to carnal satisfaction.

Coach U

• Choose one of the above practices and think about one way in which you can experiment with that practice.

• Tell someone about your experiment and experience.

• Allow yourself to laugh and have a good time.

Disclaimer policy: All True-Potential publications are written to assist with growth and discovery, the content of this publication should be used according to our disclaimer policy. Please refer to our disclaimer policy for more information.

© 2024 Ivan Venter, All Rights Reserved.

#truepotential #coachivanventer #christiancoaching

Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash