Entrepreneurs Manage Stress to Improve Performance
Entrepreneurs, like all of us, feel the stress of everyday life but unlike many of us use it to improve their performance.
In recent decades stress is often associated with negative factors such as ill health, high blood pressure and heart attacks.
In previous decades stress was associated with positive factors such as creativity, innovation and enhanced performance.
Many groups of people such as actors, athletes and stage performers welcome a level of stress as it gives a positive edge to their performance.
But to the majority of people their everyday feelings of stress simply highlight negative aspects and can lead to ill health.
There is little doubt that as our personal and professional lives become more uncertain our level of anxiety increases.
The solution it seems is not to look for a stress free life but to learn how to manage the anxiety we feel and our response to it.
One way of improving our response is to understand that from an evolutionary perspective it is good to feel a little stress as it helps protect us in the face of danger.
Yet, there is a need to get the balance right between feeling stressed and able to cope and feeling stressed and unable to cope.
Experiencing situations when we feel stress and are still able to perform helps, as it builds our confidence and ability to manage uncertainty.
Remembering, regardless of our level of stress, that we always have a choice about how to react in any situation also helps, as it gives us a greater sense of control.
Other simple ways to manage stress include taking exercise, improving our diet, and spending time doing things we enjoy.
SO, while we all feel the stress of everyday life the entrepreneurs around us have learned to manage it as a way to improve performance.
What do you think? Do you manage stress to improve performance? Get in touch we would love to hear your views contact Nick on 028 8224 9494 or via Twitter @nick_oec.
