Wherever you work it is vital to take regular breaks. If you work at a VDU you should take a break every hour to walk around and it’s worth doing a few exercises to stretch your muscles.
If you have a job where you are able to control your own workload you can help yourself by learning to prioritize or put first things first. Writing down the things you have to do, planning how long they are likely to take (usually double what you imagine) and marking them in order of importance can help you keep control over your work. It can help to consider which time of day you are most alert and do jobs requiring the most concentration then, saving routine tasks for times when you feel less on the ball, such as after lunch.
Even in a job over which you have little say in your working conditions you may be able to exert control over some aspects such as the working environment. If you work in an office, for instance, you could try to make your working area more homely by placing plants and flowers on your desk, having pictures or photos of your friends and family in a place where you can see them and so on. Incidentally, keeping your desk tidy is less stressful than having unruly piles of papers that you have to rustle through every time you need to find anything.
Some people in boring or repetitive jobs such as some kinds of factory work may not be able to do much to change them, but there are ways to make work more tolerable. Talking to colleagues, listening to music while you work, taking a walk in your lunch break or simply using the time to daydream or plot what you will do during your time off are all ways of doing this.
If your job is unsatisfying, changing the way you think about it and seeing it as part of, rather than your whole life, is a useful way to reduce stress. It helps if you have to find things you enjoy doing outside work to preserve a balance between work and play. Doing something creative such as taking up painting or drawing, doing a dance class (you’ll get some good aerobic exercise too), or joining an evening course provides interest and stops work being the be all and end all of life.
Clive, a civil servant, admits: ‘My job doesn’t interest me much but I refuse to let that get on top of me any more. I get by but the important things in my life are elsewhere. I plan my annual leave a year in advance and every three months I take some sort of break. Living in London is very stressful. I enjoy walking, so every three months I take a break in the Lake District, North Wales, Ireland, Scotland – anywhere so long as it’s remote.’
