Do you know someone who is bragging about their stress level?
They may say “I thrive on stress” and so on. I want to let you in on a little secret, it’s not the truth. Instead, do you want to live your life stress-free?
(Podcast note: My with my guest Georgia starts at -18.41)
When someone perceives stress as something positive, it’s a result of how our modern life has normalized living in stress as something we strive for.
It’s not natural for humans to live under stress for an extended length of time.
Stress is a primal instinct.
We are naturally stress-free, but we are conditioned to believe that stress is something positive.
It is designed to arise only when we need to be mobilized to action, not to be present in our lives at all times.
It’s a myth that stress is something positive. We can’t thrive on stress long-term.
Life can get complex when it comes to balancing life with work, family, commitments, etc.
Stress makes you see yourself as separate from your true self.
Sometimes stress also contributes to the feeling of separation between work and personal life, and that sensation of separation will disrupt your natural flow of energy and how you experience your life.
If you feel out of sorts and stressed, your natural flow can be restored. You can get out of the feeling of constantly running the rat race and return to your own balance, to feeling energized and stress-free.
I remember coming home from a long workday to three young kids.
I served everyone their dinner first, feeling hungry and tired, pushing my own natural body signals away and tucking away the frustration.
At the end of the night, I was the absolute last one to take a bite of what was now a cold dinner.
Been there, done that? For a number of years straight…
One thing is true- Whether we connect to it or not, the big picture will always be steps ahead of us.
The universe simply won’t support our human perception when it comes to glorifying stress.
The universe throws us back again and again so that we can realize what we are doing and realize the effect of our choices.
What would a small shift in self-awareness of stress in your everyday life mean to you and others?
If we care for our own energy first in every daily situation, we also care about the energy of others.
What would it mean to you to show up for your families and friends energized and refreshed, even after a long work day?
It’s within the moment of self-awareness in everyday situations that the shift can start towards a stress-free life.
So how can we start shifting the conditioning that stress is being positively rewarded, to stress being something we want to move away from and don’t want?
When the stress is felt in every limb at the end of the day, how can we start listening to our bodies?
The key to living a stress-free life is to transform the stress energy into stress-free energy.
Stress-free energy is a supportive, healing energy. Stress is not the problem, it’s the relationship to the stress-energy that is the problem, and what we DO as a result when we are stressed.
Start using these 3 universal tools to shift to stress free energy:
1. Stress-free tip: Shift from thinking about competition to a win-win attitude.
Even if the work environment is competitive, we all want the same thing. At work or anywhere else, we all want to be appreciated and loved. Relationships with colleagues at work can be stressful.
Think of someone that annoys you at work, or you feel competitive with. How often do you get upset about that person at work?
Here is another way to handle it that would protect your own energy and shift from a negative to a positive effect.
Energy attracts like energy.
If you give the same negative energy as you get faced with, you will keep fuelling the negative. If you think a positive thought in a negative situation, however, there is the opportunity to shift.
When the people who annoy you are at their worst and upset you the most, send them love and compassion.
The more you can see the opportunity for the both of you the better. Notice the difference in your energy when you are not competing with others.
Leadership for the future is when you can hold the space for the wisdom of others to surface.
2. Stress-free tip: Forgiveness in the present brings you to compassion.
When things that hurt you happened in the past, it’s easy to get dragged into thinking like a victim, and we’re often met with sympathy from others.
Victimhood is not a healing energy.
Instead, see the other person (who said or did something to upset you yesterday or ages ago) for the pain that they were going through and that they had to take it out on you.
The truth is that your life is now, not in the past, not in the future.
Now.
Seeing the innocence in someone brings your energy to a place of compassion.
Another example is if you made a mistake.
Mistakes can be hard to overcome because we run them in our mind over and over. The ego punishes you in thought, you interrupt your own energy flow.
Try this tip: Return to the mistake the way it was made, and give it up in peace.
How do you know if you gave it up in peace?
You will feel at peace about it. If you feel you are not OK about it, you can make another decision.
As an adult, you are allowed to change your mind about something that you have been believing in for years.
Allow your compassion and non-judgment (also for yourself) to shine through. Give up trying to control others and what they do or say. Forgiveness is key.
3. Stress-free tip: You are right where you need to be.
All too often stress comes rolling in when we expect ourselves to be somewhere else when we are not.
It may be the desire to be further ahead in our career, earning more money than we do, having more kids than we do, being slimmer than we are, etc.
It’s often external goals that cause stress, but also internal expectations that we have on ourselves.
Trust that you are here now, just where you need to be.
Everything in life you have experienced so far has led you to where you are today.
It’s exactly the way your life is supposed to have evolved for you.
Practice these different ways of transforming your stress energy today and see what you find out.
When you relate differently to stress it’s going to have a different impact on you and others.
So, start today to see yourself as a person who is deciding to transform stress into compassion, trust, and forgiveness instead of absorbing it and aligning with it.
In what area of your life would you benefit from reducing stress?
How can you become stress-free?
Related: Manage stress at work: Stop people please using 5 universal spiritual tips.
Watch here (interview with Georgia starts 8:58)
