Stress Management Strategies For A Stress-Free Life

Welcome to Living Simply,

A guide to mindful living and mindful parenting with your host,

Dr.

Gina.

Hey,

Everybody.

Welcome back to Living Simply with Dr.

Gina.

Dr.

Gina,

I'm so excited.

Today we are talking about stress management strategies.

That is something that you and I both definitely need right now.

Totally.

So I thought we'd talk about that today coincidentally.

And as you know,

Stress management requires a lot of steps.

We're in a society with people who are overly stressed.

So hopefully we'll get some information that's a bit useful for everybody.

For sure.

Everybody seems stressed about everything right now.

Honestly,

And maybe I'm seeing that more because I feel it,

But why do you think that there's more of a prevalence right now in stress and anxiety and specifically stress?

Do you think that people are more stressed out now than they ever have been or that we just notice it because we've named it?

I think we're actually more stressed.

And if I do the general reasoning of why,

And when we'll look at the steps how not to be stressed,

Basically the opposite is why we are stressed.

But if we look at the general reasoning is,

And I might've mentioned this on other episodes,

But what hasn't changed in the last hundred years,

Thousand years is we still only have 24 hours in a day and seven days in a week.

But the difference now is we have so many choices and options and we have the fear of missing out and society's pressures and self-imposed pressures.

We want to do it all,

Yet we still only have 24 hours in a day and we need to remember to sleep,

To eat,

To cook,

To clean.

That doesn't leave many much hours when you also count,

You have to go to work,

Yet our to-do list keeps getting longer and longer.

So there's no wonder people are overly stressed.

Oh,

I have a question for you.

Do you keep a to-do list?

There's a big debate like online,

I guess,

About to-do list versus living off of a calendar and whether or not a daily to-do list is a good thing or a bad thing.

Do you keep a to-do list?

I have a to-do book.

Let me specify.

So I have a little cute little workbook and it's divided in sections.

Example business,

Personal care,

Health,

Child,

And each section has a list of things to do.

But it's a book that's on a shelf.

I don't look at it every day.

I set the intention that one day I will get to these.

And so that's one list that I have.

So it's almost like a wish list,

But because it's in a book and on a shelf,

There's no pressure.

I don't look at it every day.

I set intentions for the day,

The night before,

And sometimes the same morning.

Do you write those down?

Yeah,

I do.

So I try not to have more than three because if I have more than three,

I get frazzled and overwhelmed and I never get to finish it.

How macro are the intentions that you set for the day?

Are they specific?

Are they micro intentions or are they like have a good day or work on this or make sure I spend time with my daughter?

You know,

Like what are,

Are they big or small?

So there's the ones that I write are things that are not supposed to be done every day.

So to me,

Self care is supposed to be there every day,

So it's not on my list,

Right?

Just like I don't put breathing on my list or eating.

So on my to do list will be things I really shouldn't forget if there's a call I need to make.

But when you mentioned the calendar,

So I'll put in my calendar days I want to work out,

Let's say.

But sometimes my list is simply work,

Rest,

Read a book.

So I really trust myself how I feel that day and sometimes I'm in production modes and my list will be very specific.

Right?

Write a blog post or pay my bills,

Walk the dog.

So it's very general.

I don't have a system.

Maybe I should,

But I don't.

No,

I think that that's great.

I like that.

So the things that you need to do every day,

You know,

And the things that you want to set out time for you,

You know,

You,

You address in your calendar and then you keep a to do list very short and you frame it as intentions for the day,

Which I think is,

Is I think it's really beneficial to frame it as having an intention for the day rather than a to do list because a to do list makes it feel like you have to do these things for the day and an intentions list is these are the things that I choose to choose to do.

Yeah.

So I have my to do list for today alone and it doesn't have the stuff that I do every day.

I just looked at it.

It has,

I use the to do app on my phone and I have 17 things for today.

So I assume you're stressed.

Three,

Four,

Five,

Six of them are done.

Oh,

That's pretty good.

Well,

Five of them are done.

One of them is,

Is going to be taking the next couple hours right now but you are on the to do list.

So but I like your strategy.

I like the setting intentions for the day,

The night before.

I think that that's important.

One thing that I know that you talk about a lot of,

You know,

A way to help stress and manage stress is to stay in the present moment or to find the present moment.

Can you talk a little bit about that?

Yeah.

It it's,

It's easier said than done,

But it's really something you have to do intentionally because part of what causes stress is when our mind travels to the future or the past.

So if we spend a lot of time thinking of our to do list,

We're no longer present doing whatever it is we need to do right now.

So suddenly,

Not only are we doing,

Who knows,

Cooking for our family,

We're also thinking,

Oh yeah,

After I'm done cooking,

I have to do this,

I have to do that.

So we've just added stress to whatever we're doing now.

So so to reduce stress whenever possible is try to be in the present moment.

So be fully immersed in what you're doing right now,

Whether it's relaxing,

Whether it's working,

Cooking,

It doesn't matter what it is,

Is just be fully present in what you're doing right now.

And I think,

I think one of the very first episodes when you were talking just generally about mindfulness,

You,

You,

You talked about,

Because I know that you've also mentioned that meditating can help reduce stress.

But if you're stressed out,

It's hard to find a time to meditate because you have 17 things to do on your to do list for the day.

And some of them take a long time and some of them were 30 minutes away from each other driving distance and stuff.

So it's hard to do that stuff.

But it reminds me of you talking about in one of our first episodes about like,

If you're in the shower,

Practice just being in the shower,

Like feeling the water.

And so,

So I,

I'm,

I'm often reminded of that about using things to be,

You know,

I had a I had a thing like a pinched nerve in my wrist last week.

And the tip of this finger was a little numb.

And it was like a carpal tunnel nerve that got pinched from sleeping.

Weird.

And my,

My trainer,

I went to see my trainer that day and he was like indomitable truths.

Like,

You know,

I can feel this wall.

The wall is hard.

Like focus on what's present,

Focus on what's here,

Focus on what you know is true.

Like if you're in the shower,

Like you were saying,

Like,

The water is warm,

The what like,

You know,

I think that that's a great stress manager.

Yeah,

Because if you're in the shower,

Let's say you're in the shower in the morning before you go to work,

And you're already planning your day and being overwhelmed,

You're not gonna have enough time.

Well,

You're gonna be activated and stressed.

But if you come back to the water and the warmth and the smell of the soap,

It's gonna calm you down for whatever length your shower.

And if you and if you do,

If you are able to schedule the time or you know,

Say it's a constant stress.

You know what I mean?

Like if you're if you feel like you're constantly living in stress,

Then implementing some form of meditation,

I would assume would be would be a huge help.

Well,

Research shows that even if people start doing just two minutes a day of meditation,

They've seen benefits to it.

So you can choose to do two minutes just before you get up in the morning.

And or just after as you go to bed,

Or just before you leave work,

You're in your car,

You take two minutes,

And you literally try to just focus on your breath or the sounds you close your eyes and the sounds like right now it's super windy of the wind.

You're teaching your brain to focus on the here and now.

So as you practice that you'll get better and better in being present.

And meditation is basically exercise for the brain.

You can call it focused attention,

Right?

So meditation will help you be more mindful to see if you're overloading yourself and making yourself stressed.

You talked about your self care routine a little bit earlier when we were talking about scheduling.

How important is maintaining self care or making time for self care to manage stress?

Self care and I think we should have a whole episode or 20 on just self care.

Self care is as necessary and should be first on your list on your to do list as much as breathing basically.

People take care of other people,

Make it a priority,

Make sure their cars get oil changed and tires get air,

Put gas in their cars.

Yet so many people do not take care of themselves.

So self care is the fuel that will keep you going.

And yes,

When people are young,

They don't realize it.

But at some point when people reach their 40s,

50s,

They burn out because they didn't take care of themselves.

So self care,

I always work on that first with my clients,

Young adults,

Older adults,

Retired adults.

I make sure they at least get a morning self care routine and an evening self care routine.

So self care,

I think is key to stress management as well in the foundation of it.

Something that a lot of people that I'm close with,

Including myself sometimes for sure,

Like I'm not just throwing other people under the bus,

For sure me too,

Are when you label something,

When you put importance on something that maybe doesn't need to be there,

Like your perspective on something is that you're holding it too high of a regard or there's a lot of emphasis on it and you want it to be perfect.

So that perfectionism thing comes out in you because you've labeled this thing as important and you're judging it as important.

And because of that,

You want to be perfect in the thing.

You want it to go perfectly.

How do you maintain?

How do you not maintain?

How do you manage,

Like,

I don't know the word I'm looking for.

How do you put like a stopper on that level of the craziness,

The pressure?

How do you stop the pressure from labeling something as really important and the perfectionism that comes along with that?

Yeah,

So if we even use the word labeling in the big sense of the word is the minute we label something,

We judge it,

Whether it's saying this is important,

This is not important,

This is good,

This is bad,

This is pretty,

This is ugly.

The minute we place labels on things,

We limit our perception of that thing.

So perfectionism is one of them.

Well,

The thing with perfectionism really when you look at it,

It's a trait that's highly present in people who are anxious.

It's not necessarily that you want things to be perfect is you want,

You don't want to be criticized.

You don't want to be judged for whatever you're doing.

So you'll,

I'll see it in little kids.

They're making a drawing.

It's not nice.

They're munching it up,

Throwing it away.

You see it pretty early and often you'll see it because of society.

We look at their drawing,

Oh,

It's so pretty what you drew.

Well,

Then that means the flip side exists.

If this drawing is pretty,

That means another one has the potential to be ugly.

So you put that pressure for your drawing to be pretty or good looking.

When really we should observe things without labeling them.

So if we start with children,

It's if we look at their drawing saying,

Oh,

I love the color you picked.

Tell me more.

What made you make daddy's hair purple?

Tell me about your drawing.

Tell me the story behind it.

And that way we're not labeling something as good or bad from the time they're little.

And when you're asking me,

How do we stop doing that always comes back to the same thing.

If we're more present,

We'll be more self aware.

We'll be more aware of the dialogue that happens in our head,

The thoughts,

The self talk.

And if we can notice we're labeling,

We can go there I go again,

I'm labeling and we let it go.

And we reframe it in a way that's not labeling but could be descriptive.

So instead of important or not important,

We could say,

This thing really means a lot to me.

I really like this or it means a lot to me.

I'd really like to get this done.

And then it becomes a choice and not a judgment.

I like that.

When you want something to be perfect,

Or when you're putting a lot of stress on yourself for something to be a certain way,

Not even necessarily perfect,

But a certain way,

Especially when it's not,

When a situation isn't going the way that you want it to,

Or whatever that may be,

I feel like we fight against it a lot and that raises our stress level instead of just accepting things as they are.

Our mutual friend,

Glen Ambrose always says,

Our suffering is resistance to what is.

And I think about that a lot,

Especially when it comes to stress,

Like when you're not accepting.

I know that I personally have a lot of stress when I'm not looking at something as what it is.

So what role do you think acceptance plays?

I think acceptance plays a humongous role.

When I speak to my clients,

The way I word it,

I don't know where I got the wording from,

So I don't want to take credit for it,

But I tell them,

You're living in the gap,

Meaning the reality gap between what is and how you wish things would be.

When you live in that gap,

Not accepting how things are,

You suffer.

And I often use the weather as an example because it's so easy.

If you're expecting today to be warm and sunny because you want to go to the beach,

Let's say,

And you look outside,

It's cold and windy,

It's going to put a dent on your plans.

So you can accept that it's rainy and cold and acceptance doesn't mean you have to like it.

Acceptance just means you see things for what they are and then you redirect your plans.

Oh well,

It's rainy,

It's cold,

I guess I'm not going to the beach.

You can spend your time in the gap being pissed off that it's not sunny or you can redirect your choice and see,

Okay,

What's good about today?

It's not sunny,

It's rainy.

What else could I do instead?

So the more we accept things as they are,

The quicker and sooner we will know what to do,

What actions to set in place.

When we're stuck in the gap,

The reality gap,

We're spinning our wheels.

So we get stress,

Anxious,

Regret,

Angry,

And that increases stress because you're resisting what is and what you resist persists.

Very well said.

You guys have Mr.

Rogers?

Yeah.

Okay.

There's a great,

I think that the resistance to what is and acceptance of a situation and being able to move forward for that,

I think that children are a great mirror for that because we see children not accepting that they can't have a cookie before dinner and freaking out.

But we do that all the time.

We do that with our own things all the time.

And the reason why I brought up Mr.

Rogers is there's a book,

Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood,

Which is the current preschool.

If you have little kids,

I'm pretty sure you know what I'm talking about.

Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood is the animated continuation of Mr.

Rogers.

And there's a little book that we read,

Brayden,

Called How Is Daniel Feeling?

And you just made me think of it because there's a whole episode and there's a part of the book where they want to go to the beach and it's raining and they're mad at first and then they accept that it's raining.

They have to do something inside and they make a little inside beach.

And those are in reality,

In real life,

When it's not a cartoon,

Those are some of the best memories.

When you just accept what's happening and you move on and you find something else to do,

That's when some of the coolest stuff in the world can happen.

Yeah,

Surprises,

Magic happens sometimes when things aren't planned.

Yeah,

Absolutely.

How about slowing down and simplifying?

Yes.

Slowing down.

I know that those are two of your favorite things.

Slowing down,

That's totally related to the to-do list.

If we realize,

Like I said at the beginning,

That we only have 24 hours in a day and at least eight of those we should sleep.

For some people,

Another eight is spent at work.

Well whatever is left,

We're human beings,

We're not human doings.

We don't need to do,

Do,

Do all the time.

So it's okay to slow down,

Not always be scheduled and do,

Do,

Do.

It's okay to relax and rest and snuggle if you have a pet,

A partner,

A kid.

So slowing down is important because our nervous system needs to slow down.

And the other one you mentioned was simplifying?

Yeah.

Yeah.

There's a whole,

It's not new,

But this whole movement on minimalism,

There's a reason behind it.

You know,

If,

If we declutter our lives,

There'll be less stress.

Like it's been shown that a house full of clutter is,

It is stressful.

It impacts our wellbeing.

The extreme of it is hoarders,

But people do see a lifting of pressure and energy when they declutter their closets,

Their bedrooms.

So simplifying is important and not only it's good for stress,

It's good for the environment.

It's good for our health.

We don't need 20 pairs of shoes.

We don't need the latest iPhone all the time.

You know,

Unless something is a tool for work,

Obviously that's different,

But we're in a society that's overly consuming and it's hurting our children.

It's hurting our environment.

It's people are going in debt.

So simplifying will reduce spending,

Which will reduce the debt load,

Which will reduce stress.

So simplifying is very important,

I think.

So something that you just talked about,

Spending,

Reducing spending,

Simplifying by that.

I feel like something that causes a lot of stress today because of social media,

Which we've talked about a lot on other episodes,

And it's not necessarily because of social media.

Like I think that that's a mirror,

Like I said earlier,

Of people,

Like it's just a bigger version of what's always been happening of,

You see other people's curated lives and you think,

Oh,

They have more or they're doing this or they're at this level.

There's like comparing yourself to other people or other situations or other things or comparing situations to other situations.

That is just a huge,

Huge stress inducer.

What do you do when you are constantly comparing yourself?

Because the world is seemingly like forcing people to compare everything now.

So how do you stop yourself from comparing yourself to other people in a way or other situations in a way that is stress inducing?

People will stop comparing.

And that's another big thing I work with clients who have a lot of anxiety is coming back to center and realizing that me comparing to comparing my insides to someone else's outsides makes no sense and is hurting me.

So if you first know that comparing is not going to help you is the first step to wanting to stop comparing.

So it makes no sense even from a parenting point of view to compare example,

Your two children because they're two unique human beings.

So it's,

We don't compare apples to oranges.

Why should we compare two individuals to each other?

So whether it's two work colleagues,

Your couple compared to your neighbor who's another couple who looks happier than you comparing takes you away from your center,

Meaning what are your values?

What matters to you and determine what matters to you and guide your choices and your behaviors based on that as opposed to comparing to other people.

And you'll reduce a lot of your stress because if your neighbor has a nicer car than yours,

While you're placing a judgment that their car is nicer than your car.

So you're realizing comparing starts there because you're placing a judgment of value on the neighbor,

Let's say.

And then you're realizing who cares if my neighbor has a Mercedes and I have a Dodge.

If you can afford a Dodge and you can't afford a Mercedes,

Well it goes back to acceptance.

You know,

If so people,

A lot of them compare because they have more money,

Right?

If you look on social media,

People who travel have a nicer car and bigger house,

Cuter girlfriend,

Just come back to you and what matters to you.

And I think if you compare less,

You'll be less stressed because your to do list will be different basically.

Is that a boundary that you would set for yourself that you're not going to compare?

Like what kind of,

And if not,

Like,

Cause you're obviously,

You do a lot of work with boundaries,

Setting boundaries with your clients.

What sort of boundaries,

If not that,

What sort of boundaries would help you reduce stress?

So I always start from within.

So if you can't set boundaries with yourself,

It's harder to set boundaries with someone else.

So I start with the easy,

So with the self care,

Right?

And I always connect boundaries to values,

What matters to you.

So your boundaries will be unique to you.

So what that means,

You have to go within what matters to me.

How do I feel about something?

So first self care,

Am I doing,

Doing,

Doing for everybody else except me?

If the answer is yes,

I have to set boundaries for self care boundaries for learning to say no.

Boundaries for people that say who I allow to take advantage of me.

So if that will cause stress,

Right?

If someone's not treating you with respect or the way you wish to be treated,

It will cause a dissonance and you'll be stressed by that.

So boundaries with other people,

What will you allow other people to do and not do to you?

Are you going to say yes to and no to boundaries for how to fill your own cup,

Whether it's spirituality,

Hobbies,

There's boundaries that way,

Boundaries with your kids.

Do you let your kids walk all over you?

Boundaries with your partner.

So boundaries I think are very important because they're a form of self care basically.

So if you have healthy boundaries,

You'll be less stressed because you'll be making yourself come first.

Speaking of boundaries,

We have a little bit of a boundary of a time constraint.

And I'm not,

Not really,

I mean,

We can,

We can keep talking if we wanted to,

But there's a,

There's one more thing that we haven't covered and that you wanted to cover on stress.

And it's also how we end every show.

So before you give your moment of gratitude for this episode,

In what ways can practicing gratitude help reduce stress?

And then let's talk about what we're grateful for.

So gratitude allows us,

Helps us be accepting of what is.

So I'll give you an example.

Yesterday was Halloween and there was a kid complaining because you know,

You walk with a lot of kids that,

Oh,

This person is not giving us a lot of candy because you know,

You go from house to house.

Some people give a handful,

Some people just give one lollipop.

And I said,

Well,

Let's just be grateful that they're actually giving us something because right now someone's knocking on my door and I'm not home and I'm not giving them anything.

So this person opened their door to us and actually gave us candy,

Whether it's one or two or 20.

They gave us something out of the kindness of their heart by choice.

It doesn't matter how many.

So and I kept hearing that child come complaining.

So that's a form of stress,

Right?

Not accepting,

Not being grateful.

So when you know,

If,

If you're not grateful,

Like I said,

Your car,

You hate your car,

You look at your neighbor's car,

Well,

You live in nonacceptance,

Non gratitude.

Well,

You could not have a car and that would be a lot more stressful if you need a car to get around.

So I find when you start being grateful for what is there as opposed to complaining for what's not there,

Which is living in the gap of the reality,

Then you'll be less stressed,

I think.

Absolutely.

What are you grateful for?

Oh yeah,

So,

What am I grateful for this week?

Actually I'm looking at it.

This is a good one.

I,

When we moved into this new house,

Which was two and a half years ago now,

Something like that,

My room,

Which I'm in right now is cavernous.

Like it's too big.

It's,

This is an old house,

So it's a huge house,

But the rooms are like,

The rooms are large and like,

There's not a lot of usefulness in them,

Which is weird.

And but there are built in drawers in the wall in this little like thing that used to be a closet,

But there are two,

There are only two of them and they're deep and they're huge and they're horrible for putting clothes away.

So I like should have bought a new dresser at some point in the last two years and I didn't.

And my best friend's mom was cleaning,

My best friend unfortunately lost his dad earlier this year and his mom was going through things and this old beautiful dresser that was his dad's for like 30,

40 years they were gonna,

They didn't have room for anymore.

They were turning where it was and do a different thing.

And she asked if I wanted to have it and I do now.

And it's great.

It smells like their house,

Which is,

Which is very nice.

Yeah.

So it's really cool.

I haven't put anything in it yet,

But just literally looking over and seeing it makes me smile.

And she also gave me to,

I like to learn things all the time,

New things all the time.

And so I've been learning Italian on Duolingo and I'm horrible at it,

But it's just fun.

And he also was horrible at it,

But like to,

He was,

He's full blooded Italian.

He was full blooded Italian.

And he also liked to pretend like he knew how to speak Italian and he had two baseball hats and she gave me those.

And that was really nice.

So,

So I have these,

These nice things to remember him by.

Nice.

Yeah.

You?

I have a few,

So let me just pick one.

I'm grateful I got to spend Halloween with my daughter yesterday and her dad invited us to his house for a dinner first before we would trick or treating.

And her dad just had a baby boy.

He's I think just six months old and I adore babies.

Oh,

I got to hold them,

Be in the presence of a little baby.

My daughter adores him cause she has a little brother now.

So the whole,

Just spending Halloween together cause she's growing up so fast and being around little children that I love,

It was just awesome.

That's so nice.

That is so nice.

Also I'm glad that we're doing this podcast.

I,

My ignorance,

I was unaware.

I had never thought about if Halloween was an international festivity.

Yeah,

I just saw someone's Facebook on,

She's in Spain and she was dressing up for Halloween.

That's amazing.

That's awesome.

I didn't know if it was like a North American thing or just a United States thing or yeah.

So cool.

Yeah.

All right.

I'm a lot less stressed now that we did this episode.

Cool.

I feel good.

It grounded me.

I hope you're good.

Check out the show,

Subscribe,

Leave a comment.

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Check out drmadrigrano.

Com for everything else that you would need.

Everything's in the show notes.

Gina,

Thank you so much.

Thank you,

Ben.

For more information or to book an appointment with Dr.

Gina,

Go to drmadrigrano.

Com or click the link in the description of this episode.