When the place where you work and rest are the same, drawing a line between the two can easily become a struggle. How can you unwind without any clear divisions between the place that gives you stress and the one that you go to to recuperate from it all?
Actually, the solutions are not too hard at all! There are many ways to manage your stress that can easily be found away from your work desk but still within the safety of your home.
Everyone experiences degrees of stress daily, so that also means there are already a great many ways of getting some much-needed R&R.
You don’t need fancy equipment or tools to de-stress through these easy methods:
1. Take a warm bath or shower
After accomplishing a hard day’s work, take your mind off of all of those tasks and responsibilities by taking a warm shower. When you bathe or shower in warm water, your tense muscles relax and your body temperature rises. This allows you to fall asleep faster and have better quality of sleep at night.
Just remember that shower time should be around 10 minutes maximum to make sure your skin does not become dry. Regardless of if you took a long shower or not, however, hydrate skin with some lotion or moisturizer afterwards.
If your shower doesn’t seem to be working well, get a water heater replacement service ASAP to make sure that you get a good night’s rest every night.
2. Use aromatherapy
Do you have essential oils or scented candles lying around the house just waiting to be used? It is time to bring them out and make use of them.
You don’t even have to use them only after work. If you are having a particularly stressful day, light a scented candle or use a diffuser for a soothing smell that will relieve the anxiety you may be feeling.
When you light them before sleeping, though, make sure you don’t leave your candles lit or your diffuser on through the night for your safety. Also, just a few minutes of use can fill your room with a pleasant scent for the night already.
3. Drink less coffee
Coffee is a stimulant that can boost your energy levels and help you stay focused for your work tasks. However, too much coffee intake in a day can make you jittery instead. This causes you to feel anxious and makes you unable to concentrate on what you have to do.
If you notice that caffeine may be preventing your productivity instead of supporting it, it could be time to cut back. Maybe you can replace coffee with some tea or juice on some days to make sure you aren’t overdoing the caffeine.
4. Do something that makes you laugh
A good laugh is an enjoyable method of releasing all that pent-up stress in your system. It improves your mood and allows you to let go of the tension in your muscles.
One way to do this is to take quick breaks in between work to do something that brings out the laughter in you. After finishing a deliverable, take five minutes to watch a funny video. When you log off from work, have a virtual call with your friends or watch a few episodes from your favorite TV show—anything fun that activates your humor will do!
5. Talk to someone or keep a journal
The most important thing about dealing with stress is processing it—the causes and your capacity to manage it daily. One way to do this well is to talk to someone you trust and can be honest with. It can be a close friend, a family member, a mentor figure in your life, or even your therapist.
Before telling someone about it, it could help you to first write your thoughts down on paper or to keep a digital journal. This way, your thoughts will be more organized when you talk to someone about them.
Alternatively, aside from writing your thoughts down, how about keeping a gratitude journal, too? This lets you stay aware of the good things in your life and helps you be more appreciative of what you have and, more importantly, the good people who are here to support you.
You can reduce the stress in your life through these easy practices that honestly don’t take too much effort to do! As you go through your next work days, remember to log off when it’s time to log off, and to keep looking at the brighter side of life.
