In this day and age, it’s easy to get stressed out about one thing or another. Maybe you’re anxious about your finances, or perhaps you’re wondering if now is the right time to make that career change you’ve been putting off. Mix this in with the ever-growing mental health crisis, it can be stressful to even think about how to go about managing your anxiety. How will you pay for it? When can you make time to go therapy? What good will it actually do?
Before we dive into how to deal with different sources of stress and anxiety in the modern world, it’s essential to understand what is triggering these feelings in the first place. From an increasingly tenuous economic climate to an uncertain job market, it’s no wonder that the stress and anxiety of our modern world can get fairly heavy.
Economic concerns
With trouble in the banking and financial industries (that we haven’t seen since 2008), high inflation, and an overpriced housing market, concerns about the economy are undoubtedly contributing to our stress and anxiety.
We worry if the savings we have are safe. We stress about how long it will take us to feel secure enough to invest in a home. And, of course, with a swift end coming to the Covid-era student loan pause, 3.75 million millennials (who owe between $20,000- $40,000 on average) have yet another payment to factor into their budgets.
While there is a lot about these economic circumstances that we can’t control, there are ways to decrease this source of stress and anxiety. Get in touch with the places that you have a monthly payment with (think car loans, mortgages, medical bills, etc.) and ask about a deferment option or any hardship clauses available.
Worries about work
Whether you were hoping to pursue a new career or are concerned about the continuous mass layoffs, job security is definitely something that might be keeping you up at night.
But even if you’re planning on staying put at your current company, with the rise of working from home, it’s getting harder to navigate the expectations for when work stops and being at home starts. If you worry about finding the balance between your work life and home life, you aren’t the only one.
There are several ways to help ease these stresses and anxieties. Start off by making sure there is clear communication with your manager and team at work. You might assume they have certain expectations that aren’t realistic for you (even though you work remotely), but that might now actually be the case. After clearing up the expectations, it’s time for you to set and enforce boundaries. For example, if you’re off of work at 5 pm and you’ve clarified that the expectation is to log off at that time, resist the urge to send just one more message or respond to one more email.
What can you do?
Our modern world has made leaps and bounds in technology, healthcare, and the way we do life and business. But even better than that, in this day and age, society is accepting that mental health is health.
While there is still much to be done by advocating and educating about mental health conditions, the fact that people are willing to have these conversations makes a major difference. And even though millennials are diagnosed with mental health conditions more and more often, some of that is related to the fact that more and more people are seeking help.
Feeling stressed out and living with anxiety is a common experience, but that doesn’t mean you have to live the rest of your life that way. Focus on the things that are in your control, like making self-care a part of your daily routine or even seeking support from a therapist or mental health counselor.
Our therapists here at Let’s Talk Psychological Wellness are committed to helping manage your stress and anxiety. Learn new coping strategies and how to set boundaries. Call, text, or email us.
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