How to Manage Stress When You’re Not in Control

“Into each life, some rain must fall.” Henry Wadsworth Longfellow said that in 1842, and it’s still true today. You aren’t always in control of when the rain comes into your life, or how much you get. But it helps to know that there’s always something you can do to make things better, even if you can’t stop the rain. Knowing how to manage stress is the first step. 

I’ve been through many storms in my life, and I’ve learned that there are many ways you can turn a situation to your advantage. When you are feeling stressed out, it usually means you don’t know what to do, or you don’t have confidence you can do it right. I like to think of stress as a loss of focus. 

Today I want to talk about how to regain that focus and develop a sense of peace and serenity. Keep reading to discover the skills that are most helpful when you are dealing with situations that are beyond your control. 

Learn How to Stay Calm

When big events happen, the ability to remain calm is a tremendous asset. One way to conceptualize stress is to see stress as blocked energy with no place to go. When you find yourself caught up in an event or situation that is beyond your control, it’s easy to lose your focus. Things start to pile up, and this transforms your energy into distress. Keeping your mind calm is the key to managing these situations.

Now this may sound funny, but smiling is therapeutic. It’s also cheap and easy. If you surround yourself with things that make you smile or laugh, it will help you learn how to manage stress. It’s surprising how quickly a smile can calm a tense situation. 

Just having a pet around can also make your life more calm. There are many health benefits of pets. So if you don’t already have one, consider getting a low-maintenance pet.

Meditation and mindfulness are additional stress reduction techniques that foster a sense of peace and calm. Everybody is different, so explore different ideas on how to manage stress and collect the ones that work best for you. If you practice them regularly, they’ll help you out, even when times are good. As you practice, you will find your foundation grows more calm over time. You will find less distress in the unexpected, and you will be a strong support for others around you who may need your help.

Practicing gratitude can transform stress in powerful ways. It can be done as a part of meditation or separately.

These techniques are usually enough to keep me calm and optimistic. When I need a little extra peace, I retrace my steps and turn my focus inward. Even if the problem cannot be solved, regaining inner peace reduces my stress and makes it easier for me to be happy.

How Self-Mastery Can Help Manage Stress

When you know how to manage stress, you will feel better and can learn how to be more productive. This may sound surprising, but not all stress is bad. The state of flow is what some people call this good kind of stress. Psychologists call it eustress. Learning how to differentiate eustress vs distress is a powerful tool you can use to create a better life.

Stress is just a kind of energy. When you sharpen your focus and unblock your stressful energies, you can transform negative distress into positive eustress. Learning this form of self-mastery will help you harness more of your energy productively.

The most common forms of self-mastery that people practice on are diet and exercise. Some of my friends use cleaning as exercise, and I’m amazed at how much better they feel after just a few hours of work. Cleaning is a productive way to manage your stress. It helps you stay in control of your personal environment and burns calories, too. If you’re stressed out and your house is messy, the clutter may be a blessing in disguise. You get three benefits from just one activity.

My personal self-mastery routine focuses on my diet. I will often start with a 24-hour fast to cleanse my mind and reassert myself. This makes me feel good about myself and helps me focus. I then find little things I can tweak and improve in my diet. This gives me the energy and motivation to look at other parts of my life to transform stress into positive energy.

As I get more productive and my confidence rises, my distress falls. Managing the things I can control, and focusing my energies there, gives me the peace of mind to accept those things that are beyond my control.

How to Manage Stress and Refocus

Whether your crisis is big or small, building healthy habits is the best way to manage stress. The stronger your good habits are, the more automatic they will become. This is useful when the unexpected happens because you’ll be able to focus all of your energy on the task at hand.

Spending time with people you love can have enormously positive benefits on your mood and stress levels. Something as simple as a phone call or video chat can make a huge difference, not just for you, but for your loved ones, too. I can’t tell you how good I feel when I am Skyped into a birthday party or an important event. It’s not as good as being there in person, but the value is real.

There are supplements that can help you on your way. CBDistillery products are a good method to get the positive benefits of CBD oil in a convenient and reliable way. If you think you need something stronger, your primary care provider is a great resource who can give you more information.

You have all the tools you need to create your personalized plan for stress management. It is not a destination, but an elevation of the wonderful journey we call life. Learning how to transform stress into a constructive focus is one of the secrets of my success.

I bet you already use some of the stress management techniques I’ve talked about today. Hopefully, I gave you some valuable new ideas to try. Which method is your favorite? Practice one of these methods today and learn how to manage stress in new ways. It will not just make you feel better right now; it will make you stronger and more resilient in the future.