Dear Losing it,

Work, school, relationships, and daily hassles can often serve as sources of stress, known as stressors. Before you think about stress reduction, it may be most useful to start by identifying the particular stressors in your work. What, specifically, is it about your work situation that makes you feel anxious, angry, frustrated, burned out, depressed, moody, and so on? When you come up with your list of answers, you can think about how to address them one at a time. Managing stress is a slow and measured process, like eating a pie one slice at a time, rather than trying to shove it all in your mouth at once.

Stress commonly manifests itself as difficulty sleeping and concentrating, muscle tension, headaches, migraines, ulcers, sexual dysfunction, and irritability, among many others symptoms. Job-related stress often stems from deadline pressures and conflicts with colleagues. For these dilemmas, time management and effective communication skills might work to your advantage. However, no matter what the causes of your tension on and off the job may be, inoculating strategies like aerobic exercise, yoga, and meditation can help protect against the ill-effects of stress. Social support from family, friends, and colleagues is another way to work out stress-induced emotions, instead of holding them inside where they can put wear and tear on your organs and immune system.

Here are several tips for managing stress in your work environment:

• Try asking your human resources department at your workplace for stress management resources.
• Reconsider the expectations that you and your supervisor have for yourself at work. Are they realistic?
• Discuss you concerns, workload, or expectations with your supervisor.
• Try involving a friend in your attempts to generate positive options for thinking and behaving differently in your work environment.

Foremost, it is almost always more beneficial (and stress reducing!) to change your own outlook and actions, rather than trying to change others who we may deem the causes of our stress. Students at Columbia have a number of resources for learning to manage stress, including the Alice! Health Promotion Program's group workshops for where a variety of stress reduction strategies are taught. Columbia students who feel like they may be headed toward "losing it" (or who simply want some positive stress-management strategies) can contact Counseling and Psychological Services (CPS) for an appointment at x4-2878. If you're not a student at Columbia, check with your school or workplace to see what they offer for support. For further reading, try Coping with Everyday Problems from Mental Health America.

For more information on stress in general, see check out Number One Cause of Stress. Although it may seem difficult to ask for help, stress is quite common; in fact, many of your colleagues may share some similar stressors and may be able to provide support. It is better to address workplace woes, and other sources of stress, sooner rather than later. Best of luck,

Alice

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