Managing Your Emotions at Work
In today’s post-pandemic life, learning how to manage your emotions, stress, and burnout, especially at work, is essential in today’s career landscape.
We’ve all been there too: being frustrated at a coworker, worrying about your presentation, angry about the new budget, disliking a new policy in place, and just not getting your way at work IS incredibly challenging, especially in an already fast pace and high expectations work place environment.
On top of that, with the Great Resignation growing + burnout being at its peak, it seems like we are on this chronic and consistent roller coaster of emotions in the world right now.
Learning how to separate, manage, and compartmentalize your emotions at work is essential to building your Executive Presence and Personal Brand too.
Knowing how to fuel your soul, manage your energy, and relieve your stress is critical right now.
Emotions are unavoidable — but manageable
Pro Tips on Managing Your Emotions at Work:
1. 3 R’S: Recognize, Reverse, & Resilience. Recognize that emotions will come up. Be aware of them when you feel them coming on. Learning how to reverse the negativity and flip the script to something positive. Build resilience on how to manage the frustration & negative emotion when they come up.
2. Journal it. Whenever you are feeling frustrated at work or something negative pops in your head, start writing it out. Create a daily habit of writing down your frustrations and letting them go into your notebook. This is a therapeutic exercise that can help relieve some of the burden of this emotions.
3. Work it out. Get out your frustrations on the treadmill or on the weights. Instead of yelling or screaming at a coworker, hit the gym. Get out your emotions by getting your blood pumping through your body more.
4. Have a good cry. I am not sure this one is scientific, but having a good cry always helps me express myself. Whether you cry in the bathroom, your car, or hiding under your desk, sometimes a good cry allows you to let go of the heavy emotional burden you are feeling.
5. Get a coach! Invest in an objective person in your life to express your feelings with. A coach is there to be your sounding board and safe space to get out ideas (good or bad ones too!). Instead of running your mouth at work and gossiping, turn to a safe space, like a coach or a therapist. Someone who can listen to your issues without judgement.
6. Use your PTO. Burnout and exhaustion are not a badge of honor. Use your time away from work to recharge.
7. PAUSE. If you feel emotions coming up, immediately pause what you are doing. Take a beat, whether it is one-minute or ten minutes, remove yourself from the situation and take some deep breaths. Return back to what you were doing when you sense your blood pressure coming down and pulse returning to normal levels.
8. Treat everyone like they were your boss. Being kind to everyone is a policy that we should all implement. Whether it is the CEO or secretary, we need to be able to adjust our expectations on the fly and treat everyone with equal respect.
9. Create goals outside of work. When we have big goals outside of work, it allows us to take the pressure off inside of work. Place your energy wherever it is reciprocated; not where it is one-sided. This is the best way to beat burnout.
10. Don’t be a Karen. Perception is almost more important than the competency of your skill. If people think you have a behavior problem, you are much more likely to be under the radar than if not. Learning to let go of some of the things outside of your control is the best way to beat negative emotions at work.
Overall, if you think you need help the first step is always COURAGE to ask for help.
We all have to deal with negative emotions at work sometimes, and learning how to cope with these feelings is now more important than ever. After all, negative emotions can spread, and no one wants to be around a person who adds negativity to a group. The longer you wait, the harder it will be to pull yourself away from negative thinking.
If you need help during a crisis in your life, please reach out to your therapist, clinician, coach, or friend.
You are never alone.
XX
Ash