Stress is that one nightmare every entrepreneur will have to deal with from time to time. Employees are not left out as well. For entrepreneurs, it gets when they have to combine work stress with family life especially for founders whose companies are at the nascent stage.
But even veterans are not completely free from the pangs of work stress and mental clutter. It’s just that experience has helped them find unique ways to keep heart, body and soul together amidst the hectic back and forth of the corporate world. For instance, Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffet, one of the world’s most renowned investors, plays the ukulele to calm his nerves. Amazon’s Jeff Bezos finds laughter an effective remedy for work stress while Facebook’s COO, Sheryl Sandberg simply turns her phone off and most of her stress is gone. The list goes on. In this article, however, another entrepreneur shares a particularly interesting strategy that has severally proved effective for him.
Spread the Energy and the Problem is Half Solved
For Sir Chigozie Chukwudi Okafor, CEO of Dynatech Group of Companies, stressful days at the office should not necessarily be handled by holding one’s jaws with both hands in solitude. The Nnewi born real estate maven believes focusing too much energy on stress or a stressful situation might not really ameliorate stress quickly. He believes stress is a negative energy which is better off dissipated than hoarded.
(Sir Chigozie Chukwudi Okafor in his Lagos Office)
As he likes to put it “I find people’s company extremely effective in managing work stress and for good reasons. First of all, most episodes of work stress can be traced to certain problems. If an entrepreneur or employee can discuss these problems with smart, trusted peers, they’ll likely be able to solve the problem. It therefore makes sense that if the problem is completely solved or significantly tackled, the stress will be gone or reduced“.
From the input above, it appears Sir Okafor obviously employs a taproot approach when dealing with stress and with problem solving in general as he nips issues in the bud.
He would go on to make another salient point which many people may not have taken note of.
“Secondly, people distract you. While this may be a well-known fact, what is not well-known is the fact that not all distractions are bad. There’s certain types of distraction I like to consider good distraction. For instance, by having basic discussion with your team members or peers or family, perhaps over a cup of tea or coffee, you would be inadvertently taking your mind away from stressors. In the best case scenario, you forget about the stressful situation but even in the worst possible scenario, you’d be buying yourself some quality time and peace of mind”
What We Learn From This
What I have personally come to conclude on here is that many people combat work stress and generally take care of their mental health in different ways. For some people, medication is the way out. However, some others have a more physical approach to stress management such as swimming, meditation, singing, yoga, writing, among others.
However, business executives and even leaders in the society tend to assume that stress management is something that can only be done alone or must be done confidentially. This is where Sir Okafor lends insight and I pretty much agree. No matter the route you take in the quest to declutter your mind and evict stressors from within or around you, you will get better results when you consider sharing with other people.
“These people would ideally be your family, close friends or business mastermind. You will probably get better results if any of them has related experience having previously dealt with a similar problem” he concludes.