At least, based on how it looks to me.

But after 13+ years of taking grenades in the trenches in my banking job, then finding a way to turn down my stress levels to an all-time low, I’d like to think I’ve got a good read on what works and what doesn’t.

Without further ado, here are the 5 stages of de-stressing at work:

1. Get stressed

At the risk of pointing out the sky is blue, there’s no need to de-stress yourself if you haven’t started to stress yourself out in the first place.

If you’re one of the lucky few who’s been wired for calm from the get-go and stressful events are like water off a duck’s back, you’re already golden. Keep doing whatever you’ve doing.

Otherwise know that stressing yourself out is par for the course and hop straight to Stage 2: 

2. Get more stressed

This stage is optional.

But in my experience, once stress has reared its ugly head, the next step is to dig in deeper and build your defences as a way to manage or overcome your stress.

When that inevitably doesn’t work, it’s more of the same.

i.e. putting on an extra layer of armour, building those defences stronger & tighter, then digging even deeper until you’re boxed in and there’s no room to push any harder.

This stage can last anywhere from 10 minutes to 10 years or even longer.

It was 13 years for me.

So it’s by far the stickiest stage and lots of doing what you’ve done before, trotting out the same old party lines like “I guess this is helping me get more work done” or “well, I need SOME stress in my life”. 

All while your patience wears thinner by the day, your energy levels nosedive and your mind races at 100mph.

Until maybe you clock it’s time to try a new approach.

Which takes us to Stage 3: 

3. Explore the nature of stress

This means asking questions like:

What is stress? Where does it come from? What role does it play? How much say do we have in how stressed we become?

As you might’ve gathered, this is a radically different approach to Stage 2.

It’s not about managing your stress any more. It’s about understanding stress.

Not even your stress. 

Just stress.

When you're wrestling with your stress, you're the main character in a horror movie. But when you're exploring stress in general, you become the scientist studying the monster.

And what I’ve seen is that the more we put that monster under the microscope, the more we stop feeding it and the more it shrinks back into the shadows.

Hence Stage 4: 

4. Get calmer

You'll begin to notice that previous sources of stress are no big deal any more.

Which might lead to some suspicion about the situations which ARE still a source of your stress until they start to lose their bite too.

And on it goes, like a serenity snowball.

Until we end up at the final stage: 

5. Pretend to be stressed

Not all the time of course.

Not even most of the time or some of the time. 

But if you make it to stage 4, there will absolutely be times when you look and feel so laidback that it starts to make your colleagues feel uncomfortable.

Your lack of stress might even make your colleagues feel more stressed!

I was in a high stakes meeting a couple of weeks ago when my spidey sense started to tell me that an air of calm nonchalance was NOT what the doctor called for. So I tensed my shoulders, furrowed my brow and let out a sigh in a performance that De Niro himself would’ve been proud of.

You might think I’m yanking your chain.

But it’s no different to looking thoughtful when you get asked for your opinion on something that has all the interest of a damp tea towel or acting surprised when you hear big news you’ve known for 3 weeks.

It’s just good manners.

Anyway, there we have it. The 5 stages of de-stressing at work.

If you’d like 1 on 1 support with turning the dial down on your own stress, look no further than here:

https://waitinglist.followingfulfilment.com

Acting lessons are not included.