Teachers in Transition

Teachers in Transition - Episode 69 - Easy and Low Cost Stress Relievers

July 20, 2020 Kitty Boitnott
Teachers in Transition
Teachers in Transition - Episode 69 - Easy and Low Cost Stress Relievers
Show Notes Transcript

Everyone is feeling over-stressed these days. Between the pandemic, financial pressures, and racial unrest, no one in the country is unaffected.

In this week's episode, Kitty shares specific tips on how to lower stress with an eye toward free and low-cost solutions that are relatively simple to implement. The suggestions come from an article posted on Healthline. The article is entitled, "16 Simple Ways to Relieve Stress and Anxiety" by Kerri-Ann Jennings, MS, RD (August 28, 2018).

Check it out. Remember that you need to take care of yourself emotionally and mentally as well as physically during these challenging times.

#pandemic #coronavirus #COVID-19 #stress #stressrelievers #anxiety #stressmanagement

Kitty Boitnott:

Are you a teacher who's feeling stressed out and overwhelmed? Do you worry that you're feeling symptoms of burnout or are you sure you've already gotten there? Have you started to dream of doing some other kind of job or perhaps pursuing a whole different career, but you don't know what else you're even qualified to do? You don't know how to start a job search. You just feel stuck. If that sounds like you, I promise you're not alone. My name is Kitty Boitnott. I'm a career transition and job search coach and I specialize in helping burnt-out teachers just like you deal not only with the stress and overwhelm of your day-to-day job, but to consider what other careers might be out there waiting for you. Join me for"Teachers in Transition." In some episodes, I'll be speaking to stress management techniques and how you can manage your stress on a day to day basis. In other episodes, I'll be talking about career transition. What tools do you need to be successful in a job search when you're moving from one career into a totally different track? These are questions that you need answers to and I can help you find those answers. My name is Kitty Boitnott. Welcome to"Teachers in Transition." Welcome back to another episode of"Teachers in Transition," the podcast and the YouTube channel. My name is Kitty Boitnott the owner of Boitnott Coaching, LLC, and the founder of TeachersinTransition.com. If you've listened to me at all in the past, you know that I alternate topics. One week, I will talk about stress management and stress relief strategies. Uh, at this alternating week, I talk about career transition because the main focus of my business is helping burnt-out teachers who are ready to make the leap into some new kind of job or career, but I'm also a certified stress management coach. And that's why I offer the alternating topics this week. The topic is stress. And what I would like to do is share with you some of the strategies that I ran across in an article that I'll share the link to this is from Healthline. And the author actually wrote this particular article a couple of years ago in the August of 2018, Kari Anne Jennings, M S R D from Healthline. The title of this particular post is 16 simple ways to relieve stress and anxiety. And I'm thinking that even though this is summertime and generally a time when teachers in particular are enjoying some time off some time with friends, perhaps taking a vacation this summer is certainly not typical and not something that you probably have ever experienced before, because no matter where you live in the country, you've been impacted in some way, shape or form by coven. Uh, all of us have been impacted whether we are subject to having the virus ourselves or knowing someone or simply following the guidelines in an effort to avoid picking it up, that we've all been impacted. And some of us have been impacted in greater degrees than others. Uh, teachers certainly were impacted when schools shut down and almost overnight went to remote learning. And now that we're past July 4th, there's a lot of conversation all across the country about how to start school back, when to start school back, what does it look like? How to colleges and universities get back up and running after closing down in March. And there's just a lot of uncertainty, a lot of things we still don't know about how to navigate in this world of COVID. So the reason I wanted to talk about this particular article today is that it offers some very important and basic strategies for managing your stress, whether you're feeling high levels of stress and anxiety, or whether you just experienced a low level of, you know, you're just not sure exactly what's going to happen come this fall. And some of these strategies are simple and I've talked about many of them before, but it's always good to remind people. So first of all, exercise is probably the number one thing you can do to help relieve your stress. You need to be able to, um, work off some of the stress. It will help you to sleep better. It will help you to, um, relieve the stress that builds up over time, uh, manage the stress hormones that are probably high right now. And it can also help to build your confidence. If you develop an exercise routine that you can stick to, it certainly helps to build your sense of self esteem. So exercise is extremely important, even though that may feel like a contradictory piece of advice when you're feeling so stressed out, you do need to do something every single day. And if you're in good health and able to, you know, walk every day or to go to the, you know, going to the gym as a problem for some folks around the country, but you can always find a workout routines that you can do at home, uh, including strength, exercises, and yoga for stretching and stress relief. So exercise is the number one thing that this particular article recommends that you consider. Uh, she also is recommending some supplements that might help, and she mentions in particular lemon balm, a mega three fatty acids, uh, ashwagandha, which is an urban green tea. And I drank lots of green tea each day, valerian can be useful. And she also mentioned kava kava, which I admit I'm not familiar with. She says, it's a psychoactive member of the pepper family long used as a sedative in the South Pacific. It is increasingly used in Europe, in the U S to treat mild stress and anxiety. So you might want to check out those and learn more about them as with anything else. What I would recommend is before you start taking a supplement check in with your doctor to make sure that it's not contradictory to some medication that you may be taking or two, that it wouldn't hurt you in some way that you might not be familiar with. Uh, I believe in supplements, but I also believe that you need to, um, let your doctor know when you're taking things. She also recommends aroma therapy, including lighting a candle or essential oils. And some of the sense that are soothing, especially soothing include lavender Rose, um, Roman camomile, frankincense, and geranium. So you might want to check some of those out. She recommends that you reduce your coffee intake. And that's a hard one for me because I love my coffee in the morning, but reducing caffeine can be an important step to take. If you are experiencing high levels of stress, write it down, journal about what you're going through, how you're feeling, getting it out on paper sometimes can help to relieve the stress. And I'm a big believer in journaling during times of stress, she recommends that she might even chew gum to help relieve some of your stress spend time with friends and family. Now, remember this particular article was written in 2018. So before the time of COVID and the need to social isolate, you can still keep up with family and friends. However, whether they are able to be in the same way with you or not. Uh, I've been keeping up with my circle of friends through virtual happy hours, um, attending virtual Toastmasters meetings each week. Um, I just had a zoom chat with my brother and sister yesterday, uh, because we're spread pretty thin distance wise. And we've decided that traveling together to, to be together in person is not really essential at this particular point in time. So it's still possible for you to spend quality time with your family and friends through zoo face time, all the other platforms that are available, um, stay connected with Facebook and, um, Twitter or Instagram, whatever your preference is. She recommends that you don't forget to laugh. You know, we need the stress relief of good healthy belly laugh. So watch a funny movie or find someone that I particularly like some of the folks that I've found to follow along on Twitter and Facebook. So find somebody that tickles your funny button and follow them so that you can laugh on a regular basis. She recommends, and I'm, I'm a big proponent of this one to learn to say no. When people ask you to do things that you really don't have time for, are you really not interested in doing, instead of giving into a sense of obligation or trying to be a people pleaser? Just say, no, you'll learn over time that the world doesn't come to an end. If you decline and an offer to do to take on something else said, learn to say, no, that's an important one. Setting healthy boundaries is a particularly healthy habit to develop, learn, to avoid procrastination. There's some people wait until the last minute to do things simply because they can, and they can get kind of an adrenaline rush by waiting till the last minute, you know, taxes come to mind or turning in, you know, some important paperwork, but you can avoid the stress by going ahead and handling those details earlier and getting them done sooner rather than later, she recommends to that. You might enjoy taking a yoga class again, you know, with social distancing, that might not be as easy to, to find an in person group, but you can always find things that are available on TV or your computer DVDs, not DVDs anymore, I guess, but streaming, uh, yoga classes, practice mindfulness, mindfulness is becoming more and more accepted as a practice that we all benefit from. And in fact, there are many teachers who are learning about teaching mindfulness to their students. Uh, it can help students to self monitor themselves to self regulate themselves and help them to manage their emotions more. Um, in a more healthy manner. If you have a child to cuddle with or a pet to cuddle with, she recommends cuddling. If you have a partner, the cuddle with cuddling hugging personal touch is important. Listening to soothing music can also help you to reduce your stress, remembering to breathe, breathe deeply all the way into your diaphragm. And I think I've mentioned this in a previous episode, but I worked with, uh, a breath expert not too long ago. And the recommendation was instead of breathing in, through your nose and out through your mouth, which is what we've generally been taught. You should breathe in through your nose and out through your nose, not out through your mouth. It has something to do with oxygenation. So in, through your nose, out through your nose, here's a pet therapy. The final recommendation is mentioned cuddling with the pet, but spending time with a cat, a dog, I had a friend long time ago that had affair it. Whatever is, is your cup of tea. If you have a pet spend some quality time with that pet, they will love it. And so will you, the bottom line is you need to find what works for you to help you minimize the stress that you may be feeling with everything that's going on in the world right now. And let's face it. There's a lot of stuff going on. The pandemic would be bad enough, but then there's the financial stress. And a lot of teachers, I suspect have lost jobs that were second jobs that were helping to supplement their salary like waiting tables or bartending, or, um, you know, any of the retail jobs, the many of the jobs that teachers take on as a second job to supplement their income. If those jobs have gone away, then there's financial stress that's going on in addition to the pandemic stress. And then there's the social unrest, the, the race, the racial unrest, the uncertainty around racial relations. And, you know, I've been reading this summer that a lot of teachers are requesting more training so that they can avoid making some of the mistakes in the way they speak about race. That would unintentionally hurt a child of a different race or a colleague of, for different rates. We need to become more literate about race. Um, and that's whether you're whether you're white or not, you need to know about how does, how to talk about race. I recently read the book quite fragility, and I'm really grateful that I did. So if that is an interest of yours and something you want to become more knowledgeable about, then I highly recommend white fragility for you. So that's it for today, I will post the link to the article that I referred to in today's message. And I will also offer a link to the white fragility book that I've just mentioned. What I want to say to you is take care of yourself, whatever works for you that helps you to relieve your stress, do that for yourself. We're in this pandemic business for the long haul. I have a feeling, um, and there's not going to be going back to normal. We need to adapt to the new normal, and I know that stressful, but we need to each one take care of ourselves so that we can continue to take care of each other. So stay well. The safe, thank you for listening. If you have questions or would like to comment on today's session, please feel free to do that and leave a review. If you have a question, email me at kittyboitonott@gmail.com. I'd love to hear from him, have a great week and we'll be back next week.

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So there you have it, an episode of"Teachers in Transition." I hope you enjoyed the information and I hope you'll plan to come back. Please subscribe to"Teachers in Transition" so that you can be alerted of future episodes. And let me know if you have any questions or topics that you would like me to specifically cover in a future episode. I'm more than happy to help with individual questions as well. So email me at KittyBoitnott@BoitnottCoaching.com. If you are interested in finding a new career or just enjoying your life more, this is the place to start. Hi, I'm Kitty Boitnott and this is"Teachers in Transition."