Focus on Values of Self Care Through Stress and Time Management
Andrea M. Redling
Denver School of Nursing
Each individual possesses individual strengths and weaknesses when it comes to school, work, as well as life in general. It is important to be able to be able to identify those weaknesses in order to work on strengthening them, which ultimately will lead to lessening of the negative effects that influence daily life. For me personally, with nursing school, work, homework, family, friends, and other daily stressors, I struggle to adequately manage it all. Specifically when looking at how I manage my time, as well as how I manage my stress levels, I see a correlation with very negative effects. I am going to work on
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these specific weaknesses of mine in order to improve the way I care for myself and to make me a better, more professional nurse in the future. According to Carolyn Cooper, PhD, RN (2001), “foundational to caring for others is caring for oneself” (as cited in Black, 2014). Ultimately I want these weaknesses to become strengths in order to provide optimum care to patients. Focusing on better time management is more of a proactive approach to reduce the amount of anxiety and stress I feel when overwhelming events are occurring around the same time.
Stress management can be defined as “a physical, mental, and emotional response to a challenging event—not the event itself” (Mayo Clinic, 2014). That is why I feel that working on time management will correlate to how I react to stressors, instead of the stressors themselves.
There was a study conducted by Gibbons, Dempster, and Moutray (2011) that addressed stress, coping and satisfaction in nursing students by taking a deeper look into how different stress sources and coping resources affected the stress and psychological well being of the students. The findings suggested, “initiatives to promote support and self-efficacy are likely to have immediate benefits for student well-being”(Gibbon et al., 2011). The most helpful finding when applying the study to myself was considering eustress, instead of negative stress as an important way to encourage and support self-efficacy (Gibbon et al., 2011).
The next step after acknowledging and being aware of my personal weaknesses would be to take action to create a goal that applies to these areas. By creating SMART goals for stress, and time management, I will have a structured goal to bettering the way I care for myself.
SMART
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Goals: SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Action Oriented, Reasonable, and Timely. Specific is the goal being broken down into who, what, when, where, why. Measurable is important in order to monitor the progress of the goal. Action oriented is designed to break up what small, or large, actions will be taken in order to accomplish the goal. Reasonable is making sure that this goal is attainable, and there are considerations as to how or why this isn’t unreasonable. Last the goal needs to be timely, this means a start and end date in order to maintain the commitment to this goal. SMART goals are helpful in order to lay out specifically what the achievable goal is and what work needs to be done in order to accomplish it in a specific time frame. Stress Specifically my goal is to set aside one hour on Sundays at 5:00pm to plan my weekly stress reduction activities for the following week, in order to help me better understand what the causes of stress are, identify personal eustress, as well as stress relieving techniques. I will measure this goal by keeping track of completing these stress reduction activities I plan through the week on Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays at 7:00 pm after work and rating the successfulness of stress reduction. The action I will make is to learn meditation and relaxation techniques that I can apply to these time slots, helping me reach my goal of reducing the amount of stress I feel throughout the week. Realistically I want to reduce my stress by understanding what the underlying causes are, what alleviates some of the stress, as well as differentiating the beneficial stressors from the distresses. I will mark my level of stress throughout the next three-month period, every Sunday during planning time, as I will be closely focusing on stress management. Time Management Specifically my goal is to create a more organized schedule every Monday at 8:00 am, that allows appropriate time for all of my daily responsibilities throughout the week in order to reduce my stress, become more organized, and take care of my daily tasks in a timely manner. I will measure this goal by marking how successfully I follow the schedule that I planned for the week, and making appropriate adjustments where it is needed. The action I will take, will be to allow time slots based on priorities in my life on a well managed weekly planer, beginning with classes, work, meetings, and appointments. I will then add in more time flexible responsibilities such as homework, meals, cleaning, and time to relax. Realistically the schedule should be organized at an achievable level, but there may be some fine-tuning involved as needed. There may be accommodations if more time is needed, or an unexpected event comes up. The time frame for this goal is three months, to see if it coincides with the stress goal mentioned above. Conclusion Between researching relaxation techniques, and following my SMART goals, I feel that there will be an improvement in my stress levels all around by the end of three months.
Both of these goals will help better my the way I care for myself by allowing me to identify eustress, personal stressors, stress relievers, and proactive approaches that lead to better maintenance of balancing stress levels. Having a better overall understanding will hopefully allow me to perceive innocent stressful situations in a much more calm, non-threatening way, and aware that there are many things within my control that I can do to better myself. By discovering more specific helpful patterns, techniques, and tricks, I will be able to use those for a wider rang, long-term oriented goal, directed more specifically towards a profession as a
nurse.
Stress Management is how to manage our own stress reactions. Two of the physiological methods of stress management are Biofeedback and drugs.
The nurse who chooses to return to school is secure, is not afraid to face change, and views education as preparation for the future (Altmann, 2011). Nonetheless, returning to school can cause disruption, which may lead to feelings of self-doubt. Developing coping strategies helps to alleviate these concerns. Personally, the decision to continue my nursing education revolves around my job. As an advocate for the mental health population, I want to become a leader who influences the future of mental health services in our region; education will help me achieve these goals.
Because Stress can cause widespread damages to the body, it’s vital for one to know his/her limit. But how much is too much? This really depends on the people who deal with it; it differs from person to person. Some people favors high level of stress and seem to thrive on the excitement and challenges it brings. People’s ability to tolerate stress depends on many factors, including the health of the relationships they are in, the general outlook appearance of their life, their emotional intelligence, and family genetics. (Help Guide)
It may seem impossible to juggle many things in life at one time; such as trying to get all the assignments completed, and studying done in a short amount of time to make it to work on time. If that was not stressful enough there is also the pressure of making sure to spend time with family. It can be extra stressful when someone has a very big and close family, and a variety of events are to be attended, making sure assignment are completed in order to join the family. Sometimes it may seem that there is simply not enough time in a day to balance school, work, and family which requires a lot of effort, this can seem like a very daunting task because no one ever wants to fail, it is difficult trying to please everyone, and there seems to
BITS Embryo is a project to foster strong collaboration of BITS students and BITS faculty with the alumni and friends of BITS Pilani through lecture series and collaborative projects. This page of the assignment includes the procedures used in ...
According to McIntosh and Sheppy, (2013) stress is not always harmful and can have some positive effects on an individual (McIntosh & Sheppy, 2013). Some stress can serve as an intrinsic motivator and enhance an individual’s performance and productivity. Stress becomes a problem when it begins to decrease an indivi...
Villani, D., Grassi, A., Cognetta, C., Toniolo, D., Cipresso, P., & Riva, G. (2013). Self-help stress
Time management is essential in the workplace and it can help eliminate many other problems that could arise if time is poorly managed. By using the various time and stress management techniques available it is possible to reduce or even eliminate stress. A person who manages their time well can benefit from an organised, manageable workload with enough time to complete the jobs and tasks that are of any importance. Time management can have a direct effect on a persons stress levels and it is important that stress levels are kept to a minimum to ensure optimum performance, efficiency and general well being.
Stress is something that everyone has to deal with in life, whether it is good or bad stress. Stress management techniques are a great way to deal with stress. Some of the stress management techniques that I learned from this course are prioritization, scheduling, and execution. Using these techniques has effectively helped me deal with my own stress. When it comes to dealing with stress I still have many strengths and weaknesses that I will explain. Some stressors I have in my life that I will discuss are psychointrapersonal, social, life events, and daily hassles. Next, I will give my opinion on my post-course survey, and compare and contrast it to my pre-course survey scores. Finally, I will explain my last goals for this stress management course.
Stress by definition is; any circumstance that places special physical and/or psychological demands on a person such that an unusual or out-of-the-ordinary response occurs. No one is immune to job related stress, making its existence a serious problem for employers and employees alike. Stressful jobs span an organization’s ladder from the bottom rung to the very top.
You often think that everything boils down to deadlines. If only the tick of the clock is much slower and if deadlines don’t exist, everything would be much easier. Sometimes you blame your failures to somebody or to a circumstance where in fact, the real problem is just the way you perceive stress.
People are always at risk when it comes to stress because it is something they deal with on daily basis. Stress can be defined as a psychological or a physiological reaction that happens when an individual comes in contact with a stressful event. When people think of stress they tend to think that stress is only bad meanwhile there can be a good reactions when it comes to stress. People need a certain amount of stress to work well and have the energy and willpower to achieve goals that they have set up for themselves. If life was not stressful we would all be bored and we would not give our 100 percent when we worked. Bad stress can lead to complete shot down. Someone being exposed to stressful events on a regular basis can result to having mental health problems. There are many different ways to deal with stress such as hobbies and exercise. Some people are not well educated when it comes to stress disorders. This subject should be more elaborated because if untreated stress can lead into bigger or worst mental health problems. Having poor education on the subject can interfere with getting the proper kind of help someone would need. This research essay will be talking about all the different kind of bad stress that can be harmful to a person. This research essay will also talk about all the information a person would need in order to be educated on the subject. (Allard)
Stress is defined as “any circumstance that threatens or is perceived to threaten one’s well-being and thereby tax one’s coping abilities” (Weiten & Lloyd, 2006, p. 72). Stress is a natural event that exists literally in all areas of one’s life. It can be embedded in the environment, culture, or perception of an event or idea. Stress is a constant burden, and can be detrimental to one’s physical and mental health. However, stress can also provide beneficial effects; it can satisfy one’s need for stimulation and challenge, promote personal growth, and can provide an individual with the tools to cope with, and be less affected by tomorrow’s stress (Weiten & Lloyd, 2006, p. 93).
Stress is an ongoing dilemma that occurs in each and everyone’s life. It is a factor that is undoubtedly a part of daily living. Due to the trivial problems that occur in people’s daily lives massive amounts of stress can arise. People perceive and manage stress in many different ways. The causes and effects of stress are numerous and one’s ability to manage stress is vital in maintaining healthy living.
Time management cause major stress because half of the time it feels like there is not enough time to do anything that I enjoy or things that need to be done. I try to manage my time. The more I try to manage my time wisely I get stressed when things don 't get done according to the schedule or plan that I have planned for myself. Most people see it as controlling but I perceive it as working effectively. There are never enough hours in a day. Extracurricular activities, school, family, friends, church all take up time and it is very difficult to balance everything when there are only twenty-four hours in a day.