According to statistics, nearly 80% of Americans have reported feeling significant levels of ongoing stress due to the global pandemic.
While this may not be the most harrowing statistic of the past year, ongoing stress can have negative effects on your physical, emotional, and mental health. Managing life during the pandemic requires more than just hand-washing and mask-wearing.
You have to keep your stress levels in check by finding places of calm and relief in your everyday life. If you're not sure where to start, this wellness tip guide provides an array of ideas on how to create a stress-free home life.
Identify Stress in Your Life
The first step in overcoming stress in your life is to stop ignoring it.
Many external stressors in life can feel out of your control. However, getting bogged down by stress is more a result of how you respond to your circumstances.
If you simply point a finger at the reasons you feel stressed, nothing is going to change. Shift your outlook by analyzing how you react in moments of stress. Try implementing some new habits that can help you feel your best no matter what life throws at you.
Get a Full Night's Sleep
Prioritizing a good night's sleep is integral to maintaining a healthy immune system and a clear mind. Going through every stage of your sleep cycle will support your immune system and prepare you to take on the challenges of a new day.
Negative reactions to stress are often more triggered if you don't get enough sleep. You can become more irritable and be more prone to over-reacting to small stressors throughout the day.
Maintain a Healthy Morning Routine
We've all heard the cliché advice to start your day off on the right foot. But what does that actually look like?
A healthy morning routine is not a one-size-fits-all checklist. Think about things that put you in a good mood. Waking up and taking time for yourself will set the tone for the rest of the day.
Find relaxing activities that you enjoy and implement them into your morning routine. You'll be in a better mindset to take on the demands of life if you make your happiness the first priority of each day.
Take Short Breaks Throughout the Day
Research shows that taking frequent breaks throughout your workday can actually lead to higher productivity.
In fact, the ideal work schedule involves about an hour of work, followed by a 15-minute break. It all has to do with how your brain functions best. With bursts of focus, you can utilize your brain's peak activity.
However, in order for this method to be effective, you need to respect your break time just as much as your work time. After each hour, completely disconnect from work by moving away from your computer and engaging in something unrelated to work.
This could be chatting with a friend or going for a short walk. Whatever you choose to do in the downtime, you'll feel more motivated to give your all when you get back to work.
Get Your Body Moving
Staying active doesn't have to mean breaking a sweat every day. The important thing is to get your body moving. With more time spent inside, it's important to relieve tension and stiffness in your muscles and joints.
Additionally, exercise releases endorphins that improve your overall mood and increase your energy. If you're struggling to sleep at night, exercising can help you become tired enough for a restful night.
For a mindful exercise routine, try yoga! Yoga links movement to breathing and connects your body and mind. Breathing exercises throughout your yoga practice will ground you so that you can avoid a spiral of stressful thoughts and emotions.
Make Time for Creative Fun
Finding a creative outlet is a great way to release thoughts and ideas that build up over time. Journaling once a day can clear your mind of clutter to help you focus on the task at hand.
You don't have to be an eloquent writer to use a journal. The less you focus on making the perfect prose, the more effective this habit will be. Additionally, if there's something in your life that continues to cause stress and anxiety, writing can help you process it and work through it without any pressure or judgment.
Stress often comes from feeling overwhelmed. When you're able to create something and express yourself, you build the confidence to take on your to-do list. Make sure you choose something that you find fun! This might take some experimenting but it's well worth the trial and error.
Create a Calming Space
Clutter can be mental and physical. While journaling can help you de-clutter your mind, a clear and calming environment helps relieve stress in a physical way.
Your home is likely where you spend the most time and it's often a reflection of your personality and lifestyle. So if you aim to have a stress-free life, clear your home of anything that doesn't add positivity to your daily routine.
If you have the time to redecorate your space, try to use calming color schemes and add plants to bring life into the home. Create a space dedicated to work so that you can leave it behind at the end of the day. If you work from your bedroom or couch, you will start to associate these spaces of relaxation with stressful deadlines and negative emotions.
Connect With People
Although we can't see all of our loved ones in person, technology has made it easy to keep connected through this isolating time.
Don't expect your community to solve the stressors in your life. Instead, see interaction as a way to focus on deepening the relationships you value. When you spend time working on your relationships, you'll realign your priorities and shift away from letting unnecessary stress control your emotions.
Expressing your feelings will help you release the stress and get it out of your mind. Find people you can confide in to talk to every day. Everyone experiences stress, so talking to someone and hearing about their experiences will help give you perspective and provide a community of support.
Fuel Your Body With a Healthy Diet
A healthy diet contributes greatly to lowering stress levels. To decrease stress, avoid eating foods that cause a spike in blood sugar. These are generally foods with a lot of refined sugar and carbs.
If your diet consists of a lot of junk food, your mood will be constantly up and down. In order to regulate your mood and boost energy, eat foods like avocados, berries, leafy greens, and whole grains. These superfoods contain loads of nutrients that help to maintain a balanced diet.
Although caffeine can be helpful for a boost in energy, try to limit your coffee and soda intake so you don't crash after riding a caffeine high. If you're tired or lethargic, the tasks you have to do will feel more difficult to conquer.
Make Time for Play
Sometimes the best way to relieve stress is to act like a kid again. The ability to laugh and be silly without feeling insecure helps to remove the pressure of everyday life.
Crank the music and dance around in your home. If you feel ridiculous, allow yourself to laugh about it instead of criticizing yourself. Laughing lowers the body's stress hormone and releases endorphins that make you feel good and boost your mood.
Focus on Self Care
If you don't already have a self-care routine, now is the time to make one! Self-care can be anything you want. For some people, it's a nice bubble bath and a book. For others, it's a couple of episodes of their favorite TV show after work.
The key to self-care is figuring out what puts you at ease and feeds your soul, then make those things a regular priority. Remember self-care goes beyond your basic needs. Practice giving yourself a little something extra as a reward for getting through the day.
If you've never practiced self-care, here are a few examples of ways to treat yourself that can lower stress.
Have an at-home spa night with products that feel luxurious and soothe your body.
Relax your body and mind with delta 8 products that use THC, CBD, and other cannabinoids to promote restful sleep and wellness.
Treat yourself to aromatherapy with essential oils that are proven to lower stress.
If you struggle to remember self-care or feel like you never have time for it, try setting a time in your calendar. Treat it like a meeting or an appointment. Honor the time you set aside for yourself by showing up instead of rescheduling.
Shift Your Mindset
While you can't control every life circumstance, stress can be managed by shifting your mindset. Try to look at each problem you encounter from a different perspective. What do you like about the situation and what can you change?
Control the Input
Often, when people become overwhelmed by stress, they still neglect to change the things they can control. You may not be able to change the state of the world, but you can take a break from reading the news.
Setting boundaries is a healthy way of deciding what input you allow in your life. If there's a relationship that causes you to stress, create a healthy distance from that person. Your time and energy belong to you! That means you get to decide who and what you spend it on.
Practicing gratitude may seem silly at first but it makes a world of difference in shifting your mindset by forcing you to focus on the positive.
Practice Gratitude
Keep a journal of things you're grateful for. Each day add a few more things. Then, when you're feeling negative and bogged down by stress, look at the list to remind yourself of what really matters in life.
Gratitude can go beyond the things and people in your life. Try writing daily affirmations that speak to things you love about yourself. Say these affirmations every day as a part of your morning routine to remind yourself that you're capable of overcoming whatever challenges are ahead.
Make Achievable Goals
You may have things on your to-do list that seem impossible. Tasks without a clear path to success will cause stress and anxiety. Start each day by setting achievable goals.
Schedule your time realistically. If you cram your day with more than you can do, you'll feel like a failure because you weren't honest with yourself. Start with a few achievable tasks and clearly map out how you will get them done.
If you know exactly what you need to do, there's no stress of figuring it out as you go.
Use This Wellness Tip Guide to Create a Stress-Free Home
We hope this wellness tip guide has given you some ideas on how to lower your stress and escape a pattern of negative thoughts and feelings. It all starts with taking care of yourself.
If something doesn't work for you, try something else! Use these tips as a framework that you can personalize to fit your interests and routine. Remember that these wellness tips on how to stay well work best if you do them regularly.
Start with one small change and make it a part of your daily routine. Don't wait around on living a stress-free life. Get started today by trying one of these tips to relax and lower your stress.
Interested in learning more wellness tip information? Visit the Frugal Fitness, Healthcare, and Lifestyle sections of the Frugal Finance Blog to learn more about wellness, relaxation, and stress management on a budget.
