YOUR JOB

• Admit to yourself when things are getting too much for you

• Learn to say NO

• Try to deter people from making THEIR problem YOUR problem

• Delegate more

• Without being totally inflexible, establish some degree of routine in your working life.

• Allow yourself uninterrupted THINKING TIME.

• Learn to prioritise and keep your list of priorities on display.

• Don't put things off and build up your own pressure

• Try to pace yourself, plan ahead and tackle potential problems before they blow up into crises, impossible deadlines and sheer panic.

• Some you win ... some you lose.  Be philosophical and learn to lose a few battles without losing face.

• Don't give yourself a hard time - be tolerant of your own mistakes.  Will anyone care or remember a hundred years from now - or even a hundred days?

• Try to enjoy your work and the company of your colleagues.  Learn to laugh ... even to laugh at YOURSELF.

YOURSELF

• Listen to your body - migraines, stomach upsets, palpitations, etc.

• Get plenty of sleep.  Nap in the daytime for a few minutes if it helps.

• Exercise helps - choose something you enjoy.

• Find 20 minutes a day to properly relax.  Learn a technique.

• Take regular holidays and forget about work.

• Spend time with your friends and family.

• Cultivate a hobby that delights you.

• Don't get so competitive (either with others or yourself) in your hobbies that they become stressful too.

• Avoid self-pity, drugs or alcohol.

• Make a list of your fears and the possible outcomes you most dread.  Be realistic about the likely prospects that they will happen.  Remember Mark Twain, who said: "I have suffered a great many calamities, but most of them never happened".

• Talk over your fears with a close friend or counsellor.

• If your job gets really too stressful, ask yourself if it is worth it?

• Slow Down!  Walking.. talking.. eating.. driving.

• Enjoy the present - worry less about the future.  Ask "will it matter in ten years time?"