We all have our own fair share of stress or worries in life. Many that are in our control and sometimes just as many that are out of our control. For today’s post I want to do a little excise. I want us all to look at our troubles and stressors.
Now make a list of everything that is stressing you out making you anxious or making you angry. Once you have written down all of these things. Categorize them in two sections in my control and out of my control. (This is not any therapeutic work it is just something I do sometimes to help me call myself)
Feel free to use my little template.
Sometimes it is difficult to identify these things especially when you are someone like me who loves to have everything under control. So you might be telling yourself but everything that upsets me is in my control or maybe you are the complete opposite, and you feel like nothing is in your control, But in life there is a balance in everything.
What I personally do is I categorize the things in the following way:
In my control:
- MY sleeping habits
- My relationships (being in relationships specifically)
- My hobbies.
- My conflict management
- My stress management.
- How I chose to react to certain things.
- What I do with my time.
- How you treat people.
Out of my control:
- Other behaviours.
- Others’ opinions.
- How other people react.
- The weather. (This might seem silly but sometimes if the weather changes your lans its disappointing)
- Natural disasters.
- Literally every negative thing happening in the world.
Then I write a list on how it affects me and what I can do to change it both in my control and out of my control. This is though sometimes as you might really not know what you can do to change it. The beauty and unfortunateness of this is everything doesn’t need to get sorted now.
After I write all my list I want read through it and pick one or two things that I want to slowly improve. And I try and remind myself of it everyday for a bit. You would be surprised how much just thinking of something and bring it up even for a few seconds can change your brain.
Then I safely store my list safely away in my fanny pack (Moon bag for most) and I keep it with me for later to see my one or two things when I get overwhelmed. I will take it out remind myself of what I am working on and ground myself.
Although I say I write these lists sometimes its not possible but even making mental notes and list help to improve these stressors. So ill even keep my notes in my mental fanny pack.
(I just really love fanny pack/Moon bags)
Please note like I said this is not therapeutic advise and it works for me so I encourage you to give it a try but if your struggles are really bad please seek Professional help and assistance.
