Recovering from a Lack of stimulation that Causes Stress on the Job
Many times, employees find themselves in routines that become so mundane that the employee’s brain becomes muddled with static noise and tension where everyone’s voice sounds like the teacher’s voice in Charlie Brown sounding like “wa wa wa wa.”
In other words, your brain is saturated with boredom, stress, tension, and a significant lack of stimulation resulting in your brain going foggy and you feel like you are losing your mind. But what happens to us? Why does this happen? Well, a lack of creativity, reward, or feelings of accomplishment make the prefrontal cortex stagnate as a lack of blood flow to the brain. For children in schools in the United States, parents and pediatricians have resorted to giving stimulant medicine like Ritalin or Adderall.
However, as adults, we find ourselves downing ourselves with energy drinks coffee and other stimulants to trying to achieve the same. Just like high school students may skip classes that are perceived as not motivational, inspirational, and ultimately boring. As adults, we find ourselves drinking unhealthy energy drinks, coffee, and eating carbs to try to manipulate our frontal lobes without even realizing what we are doing and why we are doing it. To combat this experience and learn to cope responsibly, I recommend for employees to take short walks where you can focus on your breathing as you implement breathing in through your nose for 3 seconds and out your mouth for no less than three seconds.
Half way through your walk, the goal is to get your breathing three seconds in through your nose and breathe out your nose for 3 seconds as well. Over time, I recommend you attempt to achieve 3 seconds in through your nose and out your nose for 6 seconds. By extending your exhale at a time twice as long as you take air in, allows your cortisol (stress hormone) to reduce and allow healthy stimulation through increased blood flow travel back into your frontal lobes where you will benefit from increased attention span, creativity, excitability, and sustained motivation.
Download my FREE worksheet for Coping and Accountability for Individual and Team Management
