Ways to Reduce Stress through Self-Care

When people are struggling with anxiety, burnout, and compassion fatigue, they are way beyond needing “quick fix” type self-care strategies like bubble baths or massages.

And let’s face it…many of us are there.

Pre-pandemic, I often taught my clients and other mental health professionals a two-pronged approach to self-care that involves:

1. Intervention, which focuses on repairing a recent or current situation that sends us over the edge
2. Prevention, which focuses on ways to prevent, or minimize, extreme reactions to stressors

Intervention strategies often focus on things we can do in the moment to calm ourselves, feel better, and get back to a place where we can access the rational part of our brain. These can involve activities such as:

• Breathing techniques
• Grounding skills
• Mindfulness
• Meditation
• Visualization
• Being in nature
• Movement

Prevention strategies focus on more long-term ways we can re-wire how our brains and bodies react to stress. These can involve things like:

• Healthy nutrition
• Hydration
• Regular exercise
• Good sleep hygiene
• Challenging negative thoughts
• Adapting a positive mindset
• Practicing gratitude

Often the same strategies we use for intervention can be used regularly on the prevention side as well.

Since March 2020, I’ve noticed that the same self-care approach isn’t working the same way it used to for a lot of people. So I coined a phrase “self-care on steroids” and have been teaching people this modified self-care model, which involves:

• Re-evaluating your self-care practices, looking for what is working and what is not
• Making adjustment to what you are already doing which may look like more or less of something
• Adding new things to both the prevention and intervention sides of self-care

It’s often not necessary to start over with your self-care strategies, but it can be helpful to  follow the steps above (pandemic or not) to get the most out of what you are doing.

Here are some tips I seem to be repeating over and over in the last couple years:

• Limit your exposure to the media
• Take more frequent breaks throughout your day
• Implement transitional routines, especially if you work at home as it’s important to transition from work to personal time and vice versa
• Stop doing things that keep you awake even earlier before bedtime (i.e. looking at screens, caffeine, sugar, and alcohol consumption)
• Practice mindfulness and meditation regularly throughout your day

If you would like some help updating your self-care routine, sign up on my email list where I share regular tips as well as news about upcoming workshops, classes and retreats to help people manage stress.