How to Reduce Anxiety Before Work and at the Office

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A recent survey found that over 40% of people feel nervous about their jobs – and many people deal with the Sunday Scaries on a regular basis, too. So, if you feel stressed about your place of employment, here are some ways you can reduce anxiety before work.

Learn to Recognise When You are Stressed

People who are stressed, nervous and anxious often don’t know they are. You may just feel terrible without really knowing why.

However, there are many tell-tale signs that you can teach yourself to recognise. For example, self-stimulatory behavior, or “stimming,” is when a person moves or makes noises over and over again or in strange ways. People with autism often have it. But neurotypical people also stim.

Common examples of stimming include tapping fingers, rapid knee movements and rocking back and forth when feeling anxious about something.

Listen to Music When You are Getting Ready

Music is a great way to help you relax, concentrate or feel better in the morning. Local radio is a great way to start the day because you can find out about traffic and other things that can slow you down on your way to work.

So try listening to music, especially songs that make you think of good times or make you feel happy.

Both the mind and the body can feel calmer after listening to music, and this method can work even if you just have a few minutes to yourself. If you commute to work, try playing the songs you really love to make you feel a little better.

Reduce Anxiety Before Work by Addressing It

When things are bad, you might think you are all alone. But everyone has anxiety, even those who seem to have it all together.

When people feel stressed, they often feel anxious. Stress can come up at any time and for the smallest reasons, especially if it has to do with your job or your career.

So, when it comes, let it in and accept it instead of trying to get rid of it. Most of the time, bottling it up will make you feel more overwhelmed.

Give yourself room to worry. Anxiety is your body’s way of trying to bring your attention to something.

Spend a Few Minutes Outdoors

You probably know how good it is for you to get some fresh air. So try to get some fresh air every day, whether it’s in the morning before work or while you’re at work.

Getting out of a stressful place and going for a walk can help you feel better. For instance, you can get your heart rate back to normal, stop thinking too much and look at some greenery.

You can also use it as an excuse to go outside and get vitamin D and other benefits from the sun. You might find that eating breakfast or lunch outside makes you feel much less stressed every day.

Give Yourself Enough Time in the Morning

Time is a valuable thing. It’s the only thing you can lose forever. Too often, though, you might feel like you don’t have enough time. And this can make you feel more stressed and anxious in general, especially before you go to work.

But there’s an easy way to fix it. Change your morning routine so that you have enough time.

This might mean you have to go to bed earlier than usual so you can get up earlier. Don’t forget that you need that eight hours. It can be hard at first, but once you get used to it, the benefits are great, such as having more energy.

Get to Work Early on an Important Day

Like giving yourself enough time in the morning, getting to work early can be helpful. This is especially true on important days, like when you have to meet with your bosses.

If you’re nervous about going to a meeting but you still want to go, get there early so you can get used to the space and look over your notes.

This can help you picture what will happen before it does, so you can be ready for what might happen. When you get ready in this way, you’ll feel less anxious because you’ll be sure you can handle the day and anything that it throws at you.

Use Apps to Help You Manage

The prevalence of apps these days means you can find one for pretty much anything. And help with stress and anxiety is no different. All you need is a compatible smartphone or tablet, and you’re good to go.

Some of the best apps for anxiety reduction include the following:

• Calm: excellent for guided meditation, breathing techniques, and monitoring sleep.
• Colorfy: an adult coloring app that has been shown to increase focus and reduce stress.
• What’s Up?: provides resources and exercises for learning to cope with anxiety.
• Nature Sounds Relax and Sleep: provides relaxing audio, such as gentle rain storms.
• Shine: an app developed by women of color to help manage specific racial anxieties.

All of these apps can provide some assistance in helping you manage and deal with anxiety. Alone, they are excellent. But using multiple apps together can provide a powerful positive energy in your life.

Of course, not all of these apps are free, but they generally cost very little to purchase.

Be Mindful of Yourself

Mindfulness is something you may have heard of but not really know what it is. Mindfulness means staying aware of your thoughts, emotions, bodily sensations, and the world around us, moment by moment, with a gentle, caring eye.

You can lessen some of the more obvious effects of your anxiety by being more aware. It can be so helpful that even big companies use it to help their workers feel less stressed at work.

Mindfulness can be anything from taking a few minutes to meditate somewhere quiet to writing down how you feel in a conscious manner to address it.

Try Some Relaxing Exercises

In addition to being mindful, you can do some simple exercises to focus your energy and reduce stress. These are exercises that will calm your body and mind.

You can try things like breathing techniques, muscle relaxation, or even tai chi and yoga. Any of these will help both your mind and body feel more relaxed. Many of these activities can be hard to describe.

But sites like YouTube, TikTok and even some Facebook groups have a lot of videos that show you exactly what to do. You can even search for beginner videos for a thorough explanation.

Reduce Caffeine in the Morning

Most people in the west drink coffee more than any other hot drink. People in the US are known for drinking coffee, but it has recently passed tea as the most popular morning drink in the UK as well.

But coffee is indeed not your best friend when it comes to getting rid of anxiety. Caffeine has some benefits, but it can also make you feel more stressed. Studies have shown that caffeine raises your heart rate right away, which makes it harder to calm down.

Because of this, some of the usual signs of anxious behavior get worse when you consume caffeine.

Stay Off Socials to Reduce Anxiety Before Work

According to a recent survey, more than 200 million people are addicted to social media. But even if you don’t have a problem with social media, looking at it in the morning can make you feel more anxious.

This can happen if you read bad news or if you think someone else has a better life than you do. That’s not what you need before going to work. So, don’t use social media first thing in the morning because it can also make you feel worse about yourself.

And the same is true when you use it before bed. Doom-scrolling at night will cause sleep issues.

Talk with a Trusted Friend or Colleague

You might have friends and coworkers you can trust, or you might not. But if you are lucky enough to have a close friend you can talk to, then do so. Any good friend will be happy to talk first thing in the morning. And having this friend work with you can be a huge plus.

Having social support is a key part of coping with stress. Because of this, it’s important to keep in touch with family and friends. Over the course of many years and thousands of studies, it has been shown over and over again that talking to other people can help a lot.

Talking it through can help.

See a Mental Health Professional

Even if you have a lot of people to help you, you might still have a lot of anxiety. In this case, you can talk to an expert. Talking about mental health in the workplace might seem like a no-no, but it makes for a more open culture where people can give and receive support more easily.

Because of this, many places of work now offer help at work. And stress and anxiety are starting to be seen as common problems in the workplace that should be dealt with instead of being ignored.

You can look up private clinics by typing “counselors near me” into Google.

Summary

Feeling stressed and nervous in the morning is common. So it helps to reduce anxiety before work. You can learn to recognize the signs, use smartphone apps and talk to someone about it.