Does unwanted workplace related stress have a negative impact in your life?  If you are reading this then the likely answer is, yes, it does. This article is to help you to recognise what may be happening in your life.

Stress is defined by ISMA UK as, “the adverse reaction people have to excessive pressure or other types of demand placed upon them.”

Workplace Related Stress – Whilst many companies are aware and vigilant to the signs of stress in their employees and even have procedures in place to help cope with and prevent stress – it has to be said that some companies do not.  A further problem is that many employees deliberately hide the signs of rising anxiety levels due to fears that their stress may be negatively interpreted as an inability to manage their workload. This includes hiding the truth from loved ones and friends.

Do you know someone suffering stress? The Health & Safety Executive’s 2016 Statistics conclude that work related stress accounts for 37% of work related ill health and 45% of days lost in the period of 2015/16.

Some of the main issues people report regarding workplace stress include: –

• The perceived pressures linked to workload, deadlines and expectations
• A belief in insufficient support from line management and colleagues
• Fears of change, pending mergers and acquisitions and new leadership styles
• Conflicts between personal beliefs and corporate culture demands

The physical symptoms of stress may vary from person to person (and are discussed in my earlier article); they can include – raised heart rate, palpitations, perspiration, feeling a rush of adrenaline, irritability with colleagues, poor sleep patterns and tiredness, stomach upsets, headaches and migraines.

When excessive pressure goes ignored or unnoticed over an extended period it can have a serious impact on a person’s health and wellbeing. For some it can lead to depression and more serious physical conditions.  Stress can also affect us psychologically and in our changing behaviours.  The behavioural aspects that increase pressure include lack of assertiveness,  procrastination and absolutism – perhaps these sound familiar?

The anxiety of constant worry about past or future events can lead to unwanted habits and addictions, sometimes in a misguided belief that they help us to cope, for example, the use of alcohol, caffeine, nicotine, chocolate etc.  Some people engage (often unconsciously)  in habits such as nail biting, skin picking, mouth chewing, teeth grinding, hair pulling without realising the link to their anxiety levels.

Managing Workplace Related Stress – In managing your workplace stress – A stress audit will help you to develop a plan to enable you  to recognise and identify problems and to make suitable behavioural changes to help you regain a sense of control in your daily routine.  It is also about how we believe we interface with ‘our world’  the ideal of course being in a satisfactory and productive way in which we are supported and can complete our tasks and achieve our goals… and find time for the importance of  work/life balance.  

Effective stress management – increases our self belief in our ability to cope and to develop ‘resilience.’ In simple language, resilience can best be achieved and built on sound foundations, when we have recognised and moderated our emotional self demands to a new understanding in harmony with our values and a position of control.

Sara Howard has designed and delivered large scale training programmes in stress management and resilience to leading multinational companies.  She also works with private individuals as an executive and lifestyle coach and hypno-psychotherapist.

Sara is available to see private clients in Wheatley Oxford, Kings Langley Herts. and Aston Clinton Bucks.

Workplace Related Stress – Please call to discuss how Sara may help you with your stress management plan.  Tel – 07827 505389.

Hypnotherapy for beneficial change has helped many people.  You may be considering whether to try hypnotherapy to help improve an aspect such as confidence and public speaking or maybe you want to gain control of unwanted stress or old habits like smoking or comfort eating. Are you wondering what to expect from the hypnotherapy experience?  Sometimes people have preconceived ideas such as, “will I fall asleep …will I remember anything … will I lose control”. Let’s demystify the process a little. The object here is both to discuss and to clarify a few points.

With Hypnotherapy for Beneficial  Change, the object of hypnotherapy is to use suggestion as a means to assist the client towards their desired goal and to a beneficial outcome.  The client doesn’t lose control and is not placed out of their comfort zone or into a state of sleep.  Suggestion is often undertaken during the general course of conversation when a person is fully conscious, or during a more relaxed state of trance when our consciousness is resting and suggestion can be made to our unconscious.

In turning to why people seek hypnotherapy, it is fair to say that when people are presenting with pain or severe levels of anxiety and stress, they are actually more focused towards accepting suggestion; their desire is to reduce unwanted symptoms to enable them to enjoy freedom and gain control over their daily life. Many of my clients present with anxiety symptoms sometimes related to an unwanted habit like smoking or comfort eating. These clients will also learn stress management techniques such as progressive relaxation and mindfulness; such techniques enable them to experience a peaceful relaxed state in the knowledge that they can replicate this daily for themselves. Therefore, the hypnotherapy and coaching process is an enabling one.

Hypnotherapy for Beneficial Change. Most people enjoy this pleasant natural state of trance relaxation. I find the best way to enable someone is to allow them to watch the process for themselves. I will always demonstrate the techniques – allowing my clients to watch and to feel personally enabled and in a position of choice and control.

Therefore, to recap now, hypnotherapy can be directed from therapist to client during general conversation – through forms of language pattern during an open dialogue exchange. It can also be effective through trance which we’ve just discussed, (facilitated through progressive relaxation and induction). From this calm and peaceful state of being, certain key words may be used like triggers to deepen the relaxation process;  I often use language patterns within a form of pleasant imagery (rather like a walk in a beautiful park or by the sea) with sights, sounds and feel along your journey. During this journey there are various integrated approaches which may be used to benefit the therapeutic process – all of which just seem to the client as part of one enjoyable calm and peaceful journey towards their goal of desired and beneficial change.

I hope you have found this information helpful and if you would like any further information about Hypnotherapy for Beneficial Change, please contact me at www.inspiredforchange.co.uk.  If you would like to engage in hypnotherapy I can offer a free telephone consultation of up to 20 minutes.

Warm regards, Sara

Tel – 07827 505389

Hypnotherapy Consultations – Aston Clinton, Kings Langley and London