We can’t ignore the pace of life or the volume of information our minds attempt to process every day as potential causes of stress. In the digital world we now live in, we are fast becoming checkaholics and it is getting in the way of our peace, sanity and quality of actual real life. If your smartphone has become the third person in your relationship, the additional child that you focus your energy on, or the extra workload in your day job, then really think about whether it’s worth it.
Have you thought about the amount of extra work your brain has to do just to filter through all of that relentless scrolling? Have you thought about the lost time? I ran a lunchtime session in an organization a few years ago and we were talking about exactly this. One of the participants had said how stressed she was with having too much work to do. When we came onto the subject of smartphones interrupting productivity, someone brought up their screen time app, which this particular participant hadn’t realized she had on her phone. When she checked it she had already been on social media for three hours that day! Now, I doubt very much she had actually sat at her desk for three solid hours on social media. More likely, from the moment she had woken up until this session started, she had been checking her phone in between everything she was doing, or trying to do. By lunchtime she had put in three hours of scrolling.
The constant scrolling that many have become addicted to can leave a feeling of anxiety or dissatisfaction in life. While it is easy to blame work for feeling overwhelmed, we can’t ignore this voluntary overload of mental processing. Keeping up to speed with everything that everyone is doing is wearing us out. We have to question whether this addiction to being connected to everyone in our online world is robbing us of real-life connection. I am not saying it is, but it might be. Becoming addicted to ‘just checking’ creeps up on us until we are filling every spare moment with checking something. Before the emergence of mobile technology, those extra moments were an opportunity to be momentarily still; to pause, to take a breath, to process things happening in the day. If you want to significantly reduce the stress in your life, try going a few weeks without having your phone attached to your every move. After the initial withdrawal symptoms, you will likely feel space and peace opening up in your life that you hadn’t realized were so readily available.
I should also mention emails here too. Detox your emails by unsubscribing to everything that you don’t open or read. Keep your communication succinct when emailing, and don’t forget you have the option to pick up the phone, which can turn ten emails into a two-minute conversation.
# The hack
Pay attention to how much time you spend scrolling on your smartphone. Pay attention to what you spend your time, energy and focus scrolling through. Is it worth it? Do you need to do it? Does it add quality to your life? There’s no right or wrong here: it’s your choice.
Detox your emails.
Whatever means of transport you use, journeys can be stressful. But they needn’t be. It doesn’t seem to matter which way we travel; we are all going to meet busyness and delays sometimes, and that will mean we will at times be late. We have a choice in those moments – to get frustrated and anxious, or to remain calm and make the best of our journey.
When I mention the term road rage, people often get a glint in their eye and appear quite happy to be part of that club. I mean, idiots need telling, right? But think about this for a moment. Road rage is a classic symptom of chronic stress. It makes no logical sense at all to get irate with a stranger that you have likely never seen before, nor will again. It makes no logical sense to further endanger your life by getting right up behind the person that has just pulled out in front of you. No logical sense at all, other than to the stressed-out ego which feels totally justified in its rage.
So the question is this – do you let your frustrations and rage get the better of you or do you choose to own your state of being and do something about it to restore calm? Which is better for your overall sense of peace in life? You honestly don’t need to get involved in anyone else’s driving ability, other than to drive safely yourself and keep out of harm’s way. We don’t need to battle with anyone on our journeys – only our stress does that. In the words of Elsa from Frozen again, next time you get tempted by road rage, see if you have the ability to ‘let it go’. Honestly, it’s transformative, as I have learnt myself.
So here’s my advice on making your journey one that doesn’t add to your stress:
1. Allow more time than you think you need. People often create their own stress by not doing this.
2. If you can avoid peak traffic times then maybe that’s a better use of your time. I always prefer to get somewhere an hour early and work from there rather than sit in traffic. It’s not always possible I know, but if it is it’s well worth the extra effort.
3. Go out of your way to be generous to others when travelling. Seriously! This will transform your journey, let alone theirs.
4. Music? Podcast? Audio book? Silent thinking time? What is the best way for you to enjoy your journey? I have to say I am not an advocate of listening to anything engaging or of chatting on the phone (hands free) while driving, particularly in heavy traffic, because I believe focus is best spent on driving. That said, road and traffic condition depending, enjoy your ride!
5. If you get stuck in traffic, or your means of transport is delayed, try not to be in resistance of this fact. It is what it is. The best you can do is stay cool, calm and collected so that when you do eventually arrive at your destination, albeit late, you are still cool, calm and collected. Best to arrive in that state, ready to be effective and fully present, than to arrive as a frazzled mess that is completely mentally scattered. It’s obvious I know, but how often do you arrive somewhere late in a totally stressed-out, scattered state? Late and calm is way better than late and stressed.
# The hack
Your journey is your choice. Own your state of being and do everything that you can to make your journey a stress-free one. Breathe. At the very least, your journeys can become non-adversarial, and at best they can be a really enjoyable part of your day. Even if you don’t like travel, you don’t have to be at war with it.
If you have been doing the essential hacks in Part 1, you have started to create positive momentum. You have been breathing a bit of space into your life. Every time you feel anxious, depressed, stuck, hurt, lost or stressed, continue to say to yourself the three essential words from Part 1: this can change.
Part 2 is about taking back control. It’s about recognizing how stress affects you personally and identifying your default fight, flight or freeze response, along with what you can do about it. It will help you to look the cause of your stress in the face and give you the tools to start dealing with it. You will start to take charge of your diary, stop getting sucked into other people’s stuff and learn to navigate any awkward conversations that might be long overdue. Ultimately, it’s about getting your life back.
The theme of Part 2 will be to ask yourself:
What needs to change? What can I do to change it?
Let me just put this out there now – not all stress is bad. In fact, we actually like some of it because, as humans, we enjoy overcoming challenge. Stress is created when there is a gap between the challenge we face