How
to handle stress, worry & fatigue generated by your
business ambitions
Some
worry can be useful. Worry about your health may make you
eat less or go to see a doctor. Worry about your slim bank balance,
may make you earn more or spend less.
But
worries may also just nag and distract you, getting you
nowhere. With most people this happens all too often. They worry,
but do not act to remove the worry. So the worry grows, and gets
out of control
When
stress and worry hurt you.
Such
worries cause illness. Worry sends up your blood pressure,
which causes headaches, fatigue, and loss of appetite. Worry strains
your heart, which may cause a heart attack. Worry causes indigestion,
heart-burn, and stomach ulcers, and interferes with your breathing
rhythm, your blood then gets less oxygen so that you get tired
faster. The list goes on and on.
Worry
affects you mind as well. The worried man thinks of nothing
but his worries, he finds it hard to concentrate, his memory fails
him. He has trouble falling asleep at night, and trouble getting
up in the mornings. He cannot plan, or think up new ideas. He
does not laugh heartily, and finds it hard to enjoy himself and
relax. In the end he has a nervous breakdown.
All
of us worry from time to time. The wise ones learn how to use
worry to goad them into action. How to do this is the subject
of this reading.
Don't
invite worries.
If
you do not want to worry you must make sure that your way of life
does not invite worry. So do not tackle tasks for which you are
not equipped. You will fail, and failure will lead to worry. Do
not desire things that are out of your reach, this will lead to
worry. Do not worry about things you can do nothing about. You
will grow old, you will die one day, these things are set and
fixed. Learn to accept them. Worry only about those things you
can do something about. Finally, build up strong defenses against
worry. The main defense is to ensure that you have enough energy.
Worry
and fatigue.
Relaxed,
you cannot worry; worried you cannot relax. Most people are
more worried by late afternoon, when they are tired after a day's
work, than they are when they wake up, refreshed in the mornings.
The lesson here, is to see to it that you never allow your batteries
to run flat. Charge them before you are left without power.
Rest
before you get tired?
The workday at schools and universities is divided into periods,
with short breaks in between. In the Army, too, there are 5 minutes
rest breaks every hour to enable military trainees to relax briefly.
Workers in mines and steel mills are given regular periods off.
The aim of these breaks is to prevent people from becoming tired.
Five
minutes' rest every hour is better than 15 minutes every three
hours; this, in turn is better than half an hour every six hours.
The reason is that short breaks prevent fatigue. And prevention
is better than cure.
Research
has shown that if you sleep for an hour or so around 5, 6, or
7 o'clock in the evening, you can do with 2 hours less sleep at
night. A 10 minute nap after lunch will make you feel fresher
the rest of the afternoon. You can do with half an hour less sleep
at night if you sleep after lunch.
Sir
Winston Churchill was in his seventies during the Second World
War. Yet he worked twelve or more hours a day while he directed
the British war effort. But he rested often. He worked in bed
each morning until around 11.00 am, holding conferences, making
telephone calls, reading memos, dictating letters. After lunch
he went to bed again and slept soundly for about one hour. After
a hard afternoon, he slept for another two hours before going
to dinner at 8.00 pm.
President
John F. Kennedy had a swim in the White House swimming pool every
day at noon. He then worked for 2 hours, through a light lunch,
and left his Oval Office at around 2.30 p.m. to sleep upstairs
for two hours. Mr. Kennedy knew how to prevent fatigue by relaxing
before he become tired.
Relax
as you work?
Mental
work by itself does not make you tired; physical work does. The
blood of someone who has done manual labor for hours, is dirty.
It is full of fatigue toxins, impurities that make us feel tired.
But blood passing through an active brain comes out clean on the
other side.
The
fatigue the office worker feels after a day at his desk is caused
not by the work his brain did, but by emotional factors. Main
amongst these is, boredom, anger, worry, stress and tension.
You
can decrease fatigue by decreasing your boredom, anger, worry,
stress and tension. Remember that a tense muscle is a working
muscle. You can save energy by seeing to it that your body is
not tenser than it needs to be.
Have
you discovered, on some days that you were totally tensed up,
your jaws clenched, your shoulders hunched, your mouth pursed,
your forehead wrinkled, your back stiffened? Perhaps you were
able suddenly to let go, to relax all those muscles? What you
should strive for is to "let go" the whole time.
Make
it a habit to un-tense every hour, on the hour perhaps. Close
your eyes for 15 or 20 seconds, and feel the muscles around the
eye relax. Stop straining, stop frowning, and don't squint. Just
imagine that there is a tiny pool of cool water lying on top of
each closed eye, and relax that eye. If you can relax your eyes
you are winning, as they burn up about 25% of the nervous energy
consumed by the body. If your eyes are tired, you are tired.
On
falling asleep?
Your
body knows how much sleep it needs, and under normal conditions
it will take what it requires.
Some
people do not need much sleep. In the World War, Paul Kern, a
Hungarian soldier, received a bullet in his brain. He recovered,
but could not sleep. No matter what the doctors did, he could
not sleep. He would lie down at night and rest, but he did not
sleep. Yet he took a job and lived a normal life for many years.
The
well-known South African authoress, Mrs. Sarah Gertrude Millin,
claimed that in over 50 years, right up to her death in the sixties,
she never once enjoyed a half hour of unbroken sleep. She did
sleep at night, but she was never asleep for more than a few minutes
at the longest. Despite that, Mrs. Millin wrote many novels, as
well as biographies of Mr. Cecil John Rhodes and General Smuts.
So,
do not worry if you get little sleep. You probably require little,
as the conductor Toscanini did, and he managed on five hours,
and Napoleon, who said he needed four hours per night. Nor need
you feel ashamed if you sleep a lot. You probably require it.
A former president of the United States, Mr. Calvin Coolidge,
slept eleven hours each day. If you have trouble falling asleep
at night, here are some hints.
-
First,
don't worry about it. If you worry, you get tense and you drive
sleep even further away. You body gets almost as much good out
of your just lying there, relaxing, than it would get from actual
sleep.
-
Second,
get a good position, preferably on your back, with legs slightly
apart and arms at your sides. Put a pillow under your knees
to relax tension, if you wish, tuck small pillows under the
arms if that helps.
-
Third,
relax your muscles. One way to do this is to talk your body
asleep. In fact, an American medical writer, Dr. David Fink,
states that this is the best way. When you cannot call asleep
at night, so says Dr. Fink, it is because you have talked yourself
into thinking that you can't. So you have to talk yourself out
of it again. You have to tell your body, limb by limb, to relax.
You may start with your feet, telling yourself in a whisper
that you can feel them growing limp and heavy and relaxed; then
work up through the legs, arms, and torso to your head. If you
train yourself, says Dr. Fink, you can learn to fall asleep
in less than 5 minutes, even if it takes an hour now.
- Fourth,
set up some bedtime habits. It helps if you go to bed at the
same time every night, and do the same things in the same order
before retiring. For example, you go to bed at 11.00 p.m. each
night. Before you retire, you put out the cat, take a breath
of fresh air outside, lock up, have a glass of hot milk, read
for 10 minutes, and then turn out the light. The regular routine
helps relax you and invites sleep.
Worry
and money.
Most
people worry about money because they do not have enough. Usually
the worry comes from having spent too much in the past, and now
having to find money to pay for that extravagance. A Gallup Poll
in the U.S. found that most people believed that their financial
worries would be over if only they could increase their income
by 10%, and most people would no longer worry about money. They
may still wish they had more, but they would not worry.
The secret of stretching money.
If
you feel that you cannot manage on your income, there are two
things to do.
-
First,
cut your expenses and save more.
-
Second,
increase your income.
Now
most people do not want to spend less; they just want to earn
more. Unfortunately it is usually more time consuming to earn
more. You can spend less as from tomorrow, and your budget will
reflect it immediately. But you cannot immediately earn more;
this takes time.
We now look at 3 money-stretching ideas.
-
Write
down your expenses.
-
Write
down at the end of each day what you have spent, and on what.
Be precise down to the last cent.
-
Then
look at each item and see whether you really needed it, couldn't
you have done without this new-fangled razor? Whether you paid
the lowest price for it, isn't this brush cheaper at the supermarket
than at the chemist. And whether you could not have spent the
money better, wouldn't that $8.00 spent on the cinema ticket
have given more pleasure if you had bought a soft-cover book?
Your
written record will tell you exactly where your money went. In
most cases, you will be surprised at the waste.
Decrease
your expenses?
You
can enjoy more things, and spend less, it you give thought to
a few simple points. These points form the basis of cost management
in all good firms. Here are 3 simple recommendations.
-
Buy
fewer things. Do not buy a new item if the old one can quickly
and cheaply be repaired; do not replace something that still
gives good service simply because it has gone out of fashion;
buy only things that are well made and will last. Look after
what you have by cleaning it regularly, repairing any defects,
and using it in the way the manufacturers recommend.
-
Before
buying anything, ask yourself, can I really not manage without
it? Look around your house. How many things are there that
you have used only a few times, or never at all?
-
Buy
cheaply. Find out where the cheapest places to buy food,
appliances, and clothes are, and buy there only. Can you not
save by buying a dozen instead of two of their units; do you
buy at sales and from discount offers when possible?
In
this connection; a word about hire purchase. Hire purchase
is expensive, you pay up to 24% interest on the money you owe.
And the items can be taken back the moment you default. Rather
save your money in a savings account, where it will earn interest,
until when you can buy what you need for cash, and walk off with
a cash discount at the same time.
Use
what you have. Waste not, want not.
If
you look after your clothes, they will last longer and continue
to look smart. If you are a housewife, do you use all the money
saving tricks to save costs on food, furniture, and home appliances?
If you don't know what these tricks are, go to your library. Your
librarian should be able to recommend good books on the subject.
If your have your own business especially watch for waste caused
by your staff.
Never
throw away anything before you have made certain that you cannot
use it in some other way.
Increase
your income.
This,
of course, is what all of us want to do. And this is the hardest
thing of all. Or is it? Perhaps you should start off in all modesty.
Do not think of doubling your income within a month. It can be
done, and has been done. But it calls for hard work and luck.
Rather
look around to see whether there are ways in which you can increase
your income by 10% or 15% per month. This is a solid enough increase.
Basically
there are four ways as an employee, in which you can increase
your income. They are:
To
show your boss that you are worth promotion calls for better work,
more energy, new ideas, and an ability to learn and improve.
So,
the above points are your tools to deal with worries about money.
If you use them you will not worry about something that is not
worth worrying about.
Of
course if you start you own business you will, if you plan correctly,
definitely earn more. The old adage reminds us that you never
get rich working for someone else.
Analyze
your worries.
In
the previous paragraphs we have seen how you can steel yourself
against worries by keeping your body rested and your mind alert.
We have also looked at how to deal with the main source of worry
and stress, and worry about money
Let
us now try to find out how to deal with unpleasant things that
are inevitable.
Life
takes strange turns. We do not always get what we expect; we do
not always receive what we want. Good things turn out; the unexpected
event is always around the corner.
When
their plans don't work out, most people become unhappy, and then
worry. This is understandable. But it is foolish. One true test
of a great man is not how many successes he has, but how he deals
with those disappointments that he cannot avoid.
There
is a simple way to stop worrying about a misfortune that you cannot
avoid. It is this, accept it. Accept what cannot be avoided and
you banish worry from your mind.
Yet,
simple as it is, it is not easy to put into practice. At least,
most people do not find it easy. You need to train yourself in
this. But with practice comes skill. Whenever you are worried
about something that you cannot change, accept the fact. Here
is a simple three-step plan in which to do it. It works.
Try it for yourself:
If
it is something that you fear may come to pass, ask yourself what
is the worst that can possibly happen. If it is something that
has already happened, ask yourself what is the worst result that
can possibly flow from it.
-
Prepare
yourself to accept the worst. Think about it as if the worst
has happened.
-
Then
spend your time on thinking up plans to improve on the worst.
-
Worries
disappear when they are analyzed. Worries loom as vague
threatening outlines, dark shapes that steal around in the twilight
zones of our minds. Capture these worries, measure and weigh
them, decide where to put them and they won't know where to
attack you.
-
-
How
can you handle panic or anxiety attacks? Click Here!
There
are three steps in problem analysis.
They
are, collection of facts, analysis of facts, and reaching
a decision. After the decision comes action. This gives
you a four-pronged approach to capture and tame or skin
any worry monster that prowls around in you mind. Here is your
plan of attack.
-
Collect
the facts. Worried about something? Yes, but about what?
Define your worry: write down what you fear. A problem well
stated is a problem half solved. Then collect the facts that
have a bearing on your problem. Do not do a thing before you
have all the relevant facts before you.
-
Analyze
the facts. Decide what each fact implies; pick the important
ones from the unimportant ones. Write down different solutions
to your problem. List the advantages and disadvantages of each;
compare them and see which will serve you best.
-
Reach
a decision, but do not rush it. If necessary, go back and
collect more facts. But reach your decision as soon as you can
and make it a firm decision. Act, do not delay. Do not fret
about whether the decision was right.
-
Keep
busy. In the heat of the Second World War, Sir Winston Churchill
was asked whether he was not distraught with worry. "No",
he replied, "I am too busy. I have no time for worry."
Being busy leaves no time for worries. The reason? It is impossible
to think of more than one thing at a time. Try it out. Close
your eyes, and see if you can think of Table Mountain and what
you are going to do tomorrow. You'll find that you could think
of either, one after the other, but not of both at the same
time.
This law applies to all your thoughts. You cannot think about
one thing and at the same time worry about something else. So,
whenever you worry, get busy. Do things that you should have
done long ago; tackle jobs that you have been meaning to do
but for which you have never had the time. See to it that you
do not have idle moments. Become idle, and you invite worries.
As the great British dramatist George Bernard Shaw wrote: "The
secret of being miserable is to have the leisure to bother about
whether you are happy or not. Give yourself no leisure for worrying."
The power of positive thinking.
The five words above form the title of a book by an Amercan
minister of religion, Dr. Norman Vincent Peale. The book made
Dr. Peale famous the world over. It says that we can achieve
great results by thinking positive thoughts. In fact, Dr. Peale
believes that the thoughts make the man. This is how he put
it, "You are not what you think you are but what you
think, you are."
This
is not a new idea. Many thinkers have come to the same conclusion,
long before Dr. Peale. Two thousand years ago the Roman Emperor
Marcus Aurelius wrote: "Our life is what our thoughts
make it." Two hundred years ago Ralph Waldo Emerson
said: "A man is what he thinks about all day long."
If you think happy thoughts, you will be happy. If you think
cowardly thoughts, you will be a coward. What you think, you
are.
How
does this help you to deal with worry? It is simple. Be positive
in you thoughts. Enjoy humor, notice the good in others, banish
hate and resentment. Fill your mind with the images of love,
strength, and generosity. This is what positive thinking means;
and its power is very, very great.
Worry
can help you achieve the best in life, if it spurs you on to
action; but it can wreck you, if you allow it to become your
master.
Worry is like a great force of nature, such as a river. As long
as the river flows within its banks, it can irrigate lands and
drive power stations. But when it spills over its banks it destroys.
Use worry to supply you with energy for action. Never allow
it to overrun and destroy you.
Here are some tools, tried and tested, for helping you to create
a healthy, anxiety-free life.
Click Here
The above information formed part of a lecture
based on notes kindly provided by the University of Stellenbosch,
Cape Town South Africa, and given each year to the final year
students at Cape Town Academy undertaking the course in Small
Business Management.
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