How to make stress to be tolerable? 

We live in this world nowadays, stress is inevitable. Stress from your work, from your family, from your friends, from yourself, from the environment, you name it. How to make stress to be tolerable? Let’s share a bit below.

• Remind yourself that you are human and not totipotent. Thus, you do not have to know what to do all the time. Responsibility for solving problems does not rest with you alone. There will be some questions that have no answers.
• Recognise your own feelings of helplessness and acknowledge them to yourself.
• Ask for help when you need to. This is a sign of wisdom rather than failure or useless.
• Allow yourself to make mistakes and still feel OK as a person. Mistakes nearly always lead to new learning when you acknowledge them and review what actually happened.
• Try to stay with the present rather than catastrophising about the future when something strange or new to you happens. You may need to work through your fears in some cases and come up with some strategies to deal with them.
• Keep your expectations realistic. It includes expectations of yourself, of the colleagues you work with, and of the family members and friends of your own.
• Develop life-giving relationships. You need to have people you can talk to, who will listen, who care about what happens to you and will be prepared to tell you when you seem overstressed.
• Value the relationships you have. Say the things that are important to say and express the feelings that are important to share. These relationships are your life blood.
• Take time off and get adequate rest and do not feel guilty about it. A change of environment can be very restorative. Personal space is vital to maintain.
• Ensure a regular supply of hugs or physical contact. Hugs do wonders for the human spirit.
• Have a variety of interests and ways to relax that are pleasurable and enjoyed by you.
• Set aside some time to appreciate and value the good things in life.
• Give your sense of humour a frequent airing.
• Get to know your own strengths and resources so that you can feel comfortable with yourself. By knowing what you have and trust your inner experience, you will be more effective and confident.
• Define what your limits are, e.g. the kind of situations you can cope with, your level of competence, the boundaries you need to draw, how available you want to be, separation of your personal and professional life, when you have had enough and need time out.
• Be aware of your different feelings and how you experience them. Then you will be able to allow the others their feelings of anger, hurt, sadness, etc., without rushing to comfort, challenge, change, defend or retaliate.
• Become familiar with your own signs of excess stress, and develop strategies to deal with them. Signs may include physical signs, e.g. fatigue, headaches, and emotional ones like irritability, confusion, boredom, decreased social contact, loss of interests in the activities you enjoyed in the past, increased work but decreased achievement.