Surviving Stress Vs Completing Stress

Did you know?there's a difference?between surviving stress vs completing stress?

Stress has become the modern-day badge of honour.

Truth is, the way we deal with stress?isn’t?honouring ourselves (or each other) at all.

We’ve learned to?‘cope’?with stress.

To?‘survive’?the hard days, weeks, months and years.

We’ve made it the norm to?‘endure’.

‘To?get on with it’… ‘To?push through’

And in some cases, even brag about it.

We’ve lulled ourselves into a false sense of security, thinking we’re letting go of stress and doing everything we can to get through it.

But in reality, when stress persists it’s because we’ve been stacking up coping mechanisms instead of completing the healing process to relieve stress for good.

Continue Reading or?Watch the video on Youtube here.

Life’s stressors can be relentless.

And over time they add up?(learn more about stress stacking here)

Every stressful event, moments big and small compound over time.

Unless we complete the stress relief process in full, there’ll forever be stress residue left within us… which over time wears us down and affect us deeply.

If you’ve ever experienced any of the following:

• Being anxious and feeling out of control of emotions.
• Thinking negatively and overthinking.
• Snapping at others and being easily frustrated.
• Being overwhelmed and procrastinating.
• Feeling tense with pent up energy causing pain and other physical issues.
• Being affected by other people’s stress.
• Feeling tired all the time and withdrawing from others.
• Being inconsistent in commitments.

Then you’ve been on the receiving end of stress survival instead of stress completion.

To overcome these issues once and for all we need to learn how to complete stress.

And it can be tricky because when we’re stressed up to our eyeballs it can be tough to see a solution that’ll create lasting change.

It’s safe to say we can’t see the picture when inside the frame.

And that’s only natural, so please know if you’ve been surviving stress,?it’s not your fault.

Let’s zoom out and understand what’s really going on.

Here are the 3 Levels:

Life Level

At the life level, we’re juggling our careers, relationships, finances, environment, personal growth, impact, life experiences and our spirit. We’re spinning the plates, striving to keep it balanced through our responsibilities and actions.

If we’re ‘surviving stress’ at this level, we’ll likely find ourselves constantly putting out fires.?We’re busy being reactive to life’s problems. We find it hard to step back and gain perspective of our situation as we’re so consumed by our problems. We constantly feel like we’re ‘in’ the problem. Rarely feeling empowered or at peace. Relationships suffer. Work stress builds. Zest for life wanes.

It’s common to see maladaptive behaviours here (aka unhealthy coping mechanisms) like;

• Drinking alcohol to take the edge off
• Exercising and/or working to excess
• Withdrawing from social situations
• Eating too much or too little
• Compromising on sleep
• Procrastination to name a few.

Unfortunately,?people start to live within their coping mechanisms?and start to lose track of who they are without them.

On the other hand,?if we’ve ‘completed stress’ at this level, it’s a much healthier picture. We’ll likely feel balanced and centred. We have a sense of confidence, feeling purposeful and grounded. Life flows easier and it feels aligned. Relationships are founded on deep connection. Work life feels meaningful. And zest for life is in full swing.

It’s common to see adaptable behaviours here (aka healthy coping mechanisms) like;

• Observing challenges from a distance
• Learning from experiences
• Making congruent decisions
• Thinking resourcefully with healthy outlets for excess energy
• Becoming solution focused.

Ask yourself, are you operating from a place of completion or survival at the life level?

Health Level

At the health level, we’re managing our internal environment. Our physiology. The home within ourselves. We’re influencing and being influenced by our breath, how we move, our nutrition and hydration, sleep, quality of thinking, emotional states, our energy and our ability to move into action.

If we’re ‘surviving stress’ at this level, we hold onto tension in our mind-body.?Often our body feels heavy and tight. It can be hard to sleep at night and we feel tired all the time. Stress builds up inside and leads to all sorts of chronic pain, weight fluctuation and a general feeling of low energy and fatigue.

It’s common to see,?inconsistent and/or excessive behaviours?here. For example:

• Emotional eating
• Excessive exercise
• Low energy
• Poor quality of thinking
• Emotional highs and lows
• Poor self-regulation
• Lack of motivation to act on healthy habits.

However,?if we’ve ‘completed stress’ at this level, we have a well-balanced approach to wellbeing.?We’re attuned to what we need. We feel energised and well, sleep soundly at night and know how to navigate challenging times through self-care.

It’s common to see holistic behaviours here. For example, an adoption of 8 pillars of wellness and the ability to self-assess what’s needed and when.?Here are the 8 pillars:

These 8 areas are?highly effective ‘outer healing strategies’ anyone can adopt?to move from survival to completion of stress.

When adopting these, stress starts to dissolve. Life may still feel like a rollercoaster; however, you’ll start to feel resourceful and balanced here. You’ll able to respond to life’s challenges without feeling the heaviness that life can bring. Instead you’ll start to feel light, confident, resilient and happy.

If you’re operating from a place of survival here, take a look at the free diagnostic tool we made, that’ll help you assess how you’re performing at a health level.?It’ll focus on showing what’s going well and what can be done to improve quickly.

It’s a scorecard with 24 questions to help you relieve stress fast and it takes less than 7 minutes to do.?Take the Stress-Free Wellness Scorecard.

Root Level

At the root level, we’re revealing the conditioning of?who we are at the core.?This is the foundation of lasting change. Everything at this level is influencing the health and life level. It’s often hidden behind layers of life’s distractions and?rarely gets looked at until stress becomes a bigger problem.

It involves taking a closer look at unresolved negative emotions, our belief system, our sense of identity, core values, habits and patterns, inner child integration, attachment injuries, past trauma, our life’s purpose and our survival, psychological and spiritual needs.

If we’re ‘surviving stress’ at this level, it’s hard to stick to wellness practices and it’s easy to become emotionally triggered.?Often described as feeling like drowning, like wanting to explode or give up all together. It’s likely there is compounded stress from past experiences which need to be resolved.

It’s common to see survival mechanisms here, like:

• The need to control outcomes
• The need to protect self and others
• Avoidance patterns
• Co-dependency
• Seeking external validation
• Lack of vulnerability.

If we’ve ‘completed stress’ at this level, we have a greater awareness of ourselves.?We’ve embodied who we are and integrated our shadow selves. We have a deep sense of knowing all is well and experience heightened states of contentment and peace.

It’s common to see highly efficient behaviour here and high performance. The ability to regulate ourselves becomes second nature. Of course, life will still have its challenges but the solutions will be anchored in a place of resource.

It’s easy to get tangled up in these 3 levels which creates a viscous cycle that’s hard to get out of.

Here’s what to do start untangling the 3 levels and complete your stress.

Ask yourself:

Which level resonates with you the most?

Which areas do you feel needs your attention?

It could be one or many, what matters now is that you highlight it and become aware of it.

It can be overwhelming to find out where we are on the stress pyramid which is why we recommend to start with the easiest win.

For example, if you recognise your health level needs attention, you can take the assessment scorecard and see how to improve the areas of concern. You’ll receive practical and tactical videos on each of the 8 areas and you can get started right away.

For others, the easiest win could be to dive into the root level and start learning more about who you are and where your behaviours, thoughts and feelings are stemming from.

Often when we’re feeling stressed, especially long-term stress. We just want it to go away.

We want the fastest solution. The quick fix.

Unfortunately, lasting change doesn’t work like that. It requires you to explore the whole stress pyramid, recalibrate and master each area.

It can take time, energy and patience.

But it’s totally worth it.

Many believe that our life’s work is to be happy, find peace and be of service to those we love and the greater good.

We can never achieve this if we’re constantly ‘surviving’.

Surviving will leave us burned out, forever needing more, full of regret and never satisfied.

We must complete our stress in order to thrive and perform at our highest levels.

Our peace lies in the journey ahead.

It’s common to not know where to start but following the steps above will get you on the right path. Notice what struck a chord with you the most from what you’ve learned here today and start there.

The key is to?make sure your road to stress completion doesn’t fuel stress anymore, if it feels like your stress is stressing you out (yes that’s a real thing!).

We suggest you seek out support from an expert in this field. In honor of stress awareness month, we’ve opened up extra spots for our free discovery calls to help get you on the right track.?You can book in here.

Lastly,?it can be scary to think about who we are and what our lives would look like without the stress.

You might be surprised to hear that, surely, it’d be great right?

And I can assure you it will.

But as human beings?we can get comfortable in our own pain, the safety net of our suffering can become familiar and easier to stay where we are.

Yet that’s one of the biggest lies we can tell ourselves. Staying in our own survival state of stress will take its toll in the long-term and can lead to even bigger problems in the future. Problems that affect our health, our loved ones and our livelihoods.

The fact that you’ve made it through life this far shows how resilient you are, it shows your courage.

And the fact you’re still reading this shows you’re hungry to thrive. You’re ready for the next level. You’re ready to complete your stress and live a happy, healthy and meaningful life.

We need to become aware of how we're doing in our stress pyramid so we know what to improve.

The most common mistake we see people make is to try and change things in the life level, like a new job or new relationship for example. But they’re still wildly unhappy or experience the same stress over and over again.

But the reality is,?each level is interlinked and it's essential to look at yourself as a whole?to be able to live and achieve what you want.

Learn more about how to overcome stress on all levels, here.

Until next time,

Be Well, Mean Well, Make a Difference that Lasts,

Love Charlotte and Jonathan