Managing Everyday Stress: Tools for a Calmer Mind

As I enter into my final month of graduate school, I find myself sitting in the stress differently in this season of life. At one point in my life my narrative would have been “I can’t, I can’t, I can’t. This is all too much and I am not going to make it.” The narrative these days is more of “I will. It’s going to be hard, but I will make it.” This change of narrative doesn’t make the stress disappear, but it does shift I how navigate it and changes how it sits within my body.

In recent years, I’ve learned to sit in the discomfort of my stress rather than letting the stress dictate my life. We will never rid our life of stress. That is not the goal. And a little bit of stress in life can be helpful. It can motivate us to grow and drive us to do the unimaginable. It’s when we allow the stress of life to spiral us into our worries, fears, and anxieties that results into the narratives of “I can’t” or “this is too much” when stress becomes unhelpful and cumbersome.

Sitting in the discomfort of stress looks like accepting not being an overachiever and doing the work anyways. Sitting in the discomfort of stress looks like piles of papers, laundry, and dishes because I’d rather spend time with the animals and humans in my life than the expectation of chores. Sitting in the discomfort of stress looks like finding time to exercise or move my body while eating frozen pizza for dinner. It is about finding balance and accepting that it is okay to not do it all and sometimes, not even come close to doing it all. It’s about being in the present and noticing the stress that is around while not letting it control our life. In this shift, our brains and our bodies become more comfortable in what we once saw as discomfort.

Navigating this new version of stress allows more space for calm. It allows our bodies to relax in spite of what is left to do. Once we accept that stress will come and go and that stress does not have to be the one calling the shots we are more equipped to mitigate that stress into a more neutral state within its daily occurrences.

Below are a few tools I have found to bring a calmer mind and body into this stressful season. Rather than treating them as a checklist of things I must do for a stress-free life, I have found myself turning to them as a support rather than a fix all.

· Inviting sunshine into my eyes and onto my skin first thing in the morning. Sunshine and vitamin D boosts energy and wake up the body while also lowering depression and anxiety. Be sure not to look directly into the sun! For an added bonus stand outside barefoot in the dirt to further ground your body to the earth.

· Do something first thing in the morning that you can look forward to. Enjoy your favorite warm beverage by the window or on the patio, connect with your partner before you both leave the house, play fetch with your animal, or enjoy a chapter from the book you are reading just for fun. This creates something for you to look forward to at the beginning of the day rather than forcing yourself to wait until after everything else has been completed.

· Spend time in a sauna to reduce cortisol, body tension, and to regulate the nervous system. Dry saunas can offer time for the body to relax away from distractions and reach

a calmer state in the midst of anxiety, depression, and burnout. Be sure to drink plenty of water and consult a medical doctor for any personal health concerns.

· Set down what is not yours to carry (i.e. other people’s expectations of you, problems that are not yours, the embarrassing moments from high school, things that are happening down the road in the future, etc.). Identify what needs to happen now and what is capable of happening now. Find ways to share the load with those around you and write down everything that needs to happen so that it doesn’t pop into your head during inconvenient times. That way you can learn to trust yourself to take care of what needs to happen in the time that it happens, all the while knowing that you are able to do this.

Growth doesn’t come from eliminating stress, but from changing our relationship with it. The shift from “I can’t” to “I will” is not about perfection or having everything under control, it’s about trust: trusting in our ability to move through hard things, to prioritize what truly matters, and to let go of what doesn’t. Stress will always be present in our lives, but it doesn’t have to define them. When we choose to sit with discomfort, to soften our expectations, and to care for ourselves in small, intentional ways, we create space not just to endure this season, but to live fully within it. And maybe that’s the real goal, not to push through and do it all, but to be present enough to recognize that we are, in fact, capable and enough.

Renee Reimer, MSW Intern