A metaphor I often reach for to describe heavy work stress is that it’s corrosive. Just like an acid or corrosive toxin, it eats away at us, diminishing our life quality and personal well-being. Family life may be impacted, with frustrations spilling over into the home. Personal relationships, between your intimate other and close friends, can become strained. There is less energy left over to be able to contribute to them and maintain them. Hobbies and passions that normally bring joy and contentment can become drained of their meaning, empty of the simple pleasures they once brought.
Relief from work stress is a very common reason to seek psychological support. There can be a multitude of overlapping causes at the heart of things. It is of course arguable that dealing with work stress should be something for HR and your organisation to help you with. The way we’re made to feel about acknowledging it however might not feel like the right way to go. The privacy and discretion of a psychologist may feel like a safer place to work things out.
Here follow some brief thoughts on how we might work together to ease its effects. Restoring your general sense of well-being, back to what you might have lost touch with, is the overall aim. We don’t want to just survive at work, we want to thrive.
Our work, and who we are
A very famous quote from Sigmund Freud goes thus… “Love and work… work and love, that’s all there is.” In essence, he was pointing to the real sense of contentment that can be drawn from being meaningfully engaged in our work. This is especially the case when it aligns with our values and core sense of self. It forms part of our public-facing persona, features prominently in how we present ourselves socially. There is a well-observed tension between working to live, and living to work. Some of us love our jobs so much, it fills our life, we live it 110%. And, that’s wonderful, something to be celebrated, where someone is drawing so much purpose in life from what they do.
Sometimes however, this ‘all-in’ approach becomes problematic where the meaning suddenly, inexplicably starts to drain away. Where this occurs, it can be helpful to create space for exploration — about values, about parts of you that are perhaps getting neglected and need some ‘air.’
Rethinking and managing your workplace’s culture
The culture that emerges within organisations, within businesses and institutions, they are funny things. Each is entirely unique. They’re shaped by factors like overall output aims, the rate of change in a sector, the attitude and expectations of executive management and how these filter through the organisation, the autonomy people are given within their own roles. Workplaces with unhealthy cultures are places where employees might encounter bullying. You might experience others stealing the credit for your hard work. Unrealistic expectations for overtime can emerge, or mismatch between your contract and on-the-job tasks. Ruthless and unfair processes for promotions can leave many demoralised… the list goes on.
Here, I am describing factors that are legitimately outside of you as a person. You’re just having to face the harsh reality of what this environment requires of you. Or, what you thought was your work culture has suddenly shifted. The psychological work that can be done here can be targeted, once you start to separate yourself out from that culture. It might for instance be helpful to rethink your approach to specific problem relationships (e.g., with a manager or colleague). Enhanced time management or boundary-setting skills might prove useful, particularly in relation to work-life balance. Simple mindfulness or relaxation techniques can bolster your ability to get through tough days. Such interventions are about doing what’s possible within your own degrees of freedom.
“I’m going to get found out…”
Popular culture is filled with references to “impostor syndrome.” Taking more appropriate caution as a psychologist, I would refer to this as the impostor ‘phenomenon.’ It is not a syndrome, there is nothing specifically wrong with you. Rather this is the very common experience of self-doubt within your job role. Think about it — an experience so common, it’s earned its own name. Whatever the cause(s) that triggers this in the workplace might be, the net effect is one of constant anxiety and self-doubt. This can eat away at your ability to be productive and effective.
The roots of this experience are often feelings that go back into the past, and may be something that has followed you for quite some time. There are psychological interventions possible here. Insight into the origins of such feelings can be helpful for understanding what’s really behind them. For example, take the person made to feel ashamed and inadequate for mistakes in school by a particularly nasty old teacher. The residues of those feelings, like an anticipatory shame of what it feels like when things go wrong, can hang about long into our adult lives. Cognitive interventions in the present can also be helpful to combat negative irrational lines of thinking. There are many different angles from which impostor feelings can be approached.
In summary
These are some simple examples of how work stress might be manifesting, and how we might target them. The precise psychological work involved will always be specific to your circumstances, however. For a start, you’re likely to come with your own metaphors that more accurately describe to you what you’re experiencing. We can start there. If you’d like to work together on tackling your work stress, I welcome you to be in touch.
