Stress Management: Part I

When coaching leaders how to respond to stress, I use a framework from Stanford health psychologist Kelly McGonigal’s book The Upside of Stress. The book is excellent and I recommend a full read, but if you’re pressed for time this is the key insight: What is physically and emotionally debilitating about stress is NOT the stress itself but, rather, how we think and feel about the stress we experience. When people are able to confront stress with an increased sense of hope, agency and meaning -- they can both navigate the stressful time more effectively and experience more long-term growth as a result of the stress. 

Since learning about this research, I use this approach when coaching my clients and in my own life. I even have my own “stress mantra” that I turn to when things get hard for me. I am going to walk you through it step-by-step so you can imagine how you’d apply it to your stressful situations. 

I start by trying to say this out loud: 

I feel hopeful.

I have choices.

There is meaning in this stress for me. 

And if I can’t say it because it’s not authentically true for me yet, then I take steps to get myself into a place where I can say it. 

First up -- not feeling hopeful? I ask myself: what can I do to generate authentic feelings of hope? 

Remember that ambivalence is totally okay here. The point is not to eradicate feelings of worry, concern, fear, anger -- but rather to add hope into the mix. This isn’t naive or blind optimism---it’s a sense that alongside all these other compelling reasons to feel afraid or gloomy there are also reasons to feel hope---it’s just a matter of intentionally scanning for or focusing on them. 

Second -- I take a step back to consider the choices I (always) have. 

Sometimes we experience stress when we sense a narrowing of options, when we have lost choices. Those losses or narrowing may be true, but what can also be true is that we still have other choices --- we just have to look for them and remind ourselves that we have them. Sometimes our fear blinds us to creative options that are just out of view. Other times, we have to make choices between bad outcomes, but we still have choices in how we reach those decisions and what version of ourselves we bring to those tough calls. And finally, if nothing else, we always have the ability to choose the stories we tell ourselves about what is happening around us. We always have the choice to re-frame or to see things from a different perspective. 

Third -- I look for the personal meaning in this stressful experience. 

This isn’t the annoying platitude that “things happen for a reason” --- that’s often experienced as an invalidation of the struggles you’re facing. Instead, it’s about connecting this stressful situation to something meaningful for you. This could be a relationship you care about; a personal value or identity you cherish; or a mission that is larger than yourself. Making this connection doesn’t make your stress “worth it” -- but it places your stress in a larger context that has value and meaning for you. This is a time to connect with who and what you value. How does the stress you are experiencing connect to that? How will those same values and relationships help lift you out of stress? 

A recent example from earlier this year (Spring 2020 when the Coronavirus pandemic first arrived to where I live in California) Like millions of people had been doing worldwide, I spent the first few weeks of quarantine trading parenting “shifts” with my husband so that one of us could be present with our girls while the other one was working. Seemingly overnight, we had lost contact with our childcare support team (grandma and our babysitter).  It was stressful to context-switch in this way. It was stressful to figure out how to become an elementary and preschool teacher overnight. Over lunch one day, my 7-year-old confessed to me, with tears forming in her eyes, that she was feeling extremely nervous about her new distance learning program. I was able to talk her through those unsettling feelings even though I didn’t know how homeschooling was going to work either. I couldn’t reassure her with the clear plans I know we both craved, I just had to show up and be present with her in that uncertain moment. 

As she wiped her tears away and seemed to be feeling better again, I paused to reflect on the stress my husband and I had been facing trying to figure out new apps, homeschool schedules, and how to safely teach preschool gymnastics in the living room. I thought to myself: This is the meaning in this stress for me...I’m glad my husband is working and that I “got” the lunch shift today -- so I could hear her express this anxiety and help her with it. That had meaning for me because my daughter is a relationship that is precious to me, but it’s also meaningful because one of my reasons for being is helping others (I am a coach after all!) and I particularly relish any opportunity to help someone with scary or overwhelming feelings. It’s why I’m writing this post right now. (Taking on incremental stress when I already feel stretched thin, but the meaning is deep for me.) 

For an outline version of this post that is organized as a series of questions you can use almost as diagnostic or self-assessment tool for you to use on your own or with teammates→ check out Managing Stress & Practicing Self-Care Questions