1. What are you responsible for?
1. What are you responsible for?
- Know the limits of what you are responsible for. Did you cause the problem that you are worrying about? What is your role? No one is responsible for every situation and its outcome. Identify and write down what you are personally responsible for. This will help you limit your anxiety.
2. What can you control?
1. What are you responsible for?
- Identify the outcomes you can change and identify those you cannot. Know the limit of your own sphere and what you can and cannot control. Can you control the outcome? No one alone can change the world. What part of the outcome can you control? Focus only on actions that change your part of the outcome and this will help reduce stress.
3. What actions can you take to change things?
- Write down any action that you could take to improve the situation that you are worrying about:
- Immediately,
- in the medium term,
- in the long term.
- Identify the actions that will make a difference. Focus only on those and on what you can do now. Take the immediate actions now. Move to the medium and long term actions later.
4. Know your own strengths
4. Know your own strengths
- Understand what your personal strengths are. Write down what you are good at, and what you are not so good at. Use your strengths to solve the problem
5. Understand risk
4. Know your own strengths
6. Manage your behaviour
- Understand the statistics. Fear-filled headlines or even work gossip can distort the actual level of risk to any one individual in any one situation. That does not mean you should ignore guidelines or advice, but it does mean keep things in perspective.
6. Manage your behaviour
4. Know your own strengths
6. Manage your behaviour
- When you are feeling stressed it is important to plan moments of relaxation, even if these are just short breaks. You may not have time to lie on a sun-kissed beach but even taking a tea break or having a chat with a friend or colleague can help.
