Planning to Manage Stress

Making an Action Plan

Your Stress Diary

In this diary note down your stress levels and how you feel throughout the day. In particular, note down stressful events. Record the following information:

• At a regular interval, for example every hour, record routine stress. Note down:
  • the time
  • the amount of stress that you feel (perhaps on a scale of 1 to 10)
  • how happy you feel
  • whether you are enjoying your work
  • how efficiently you are working
• When stressful events occur, write down:
  • What the event was
  • When and where did it occur?
  • What important factors made the event stressful?
  • How stressful was the event?
  • How did you handle the event?
  • Did you tackle the cause or the symptom?
  • Did you deal with the stress correctly?

After a few weeks you should be able to analyse this information. It may be interesting as you carry out the analysis to note down the outcomes of the jobs you were doing when you were under stress.

This should give you two types of information:

1. You should be able to understand the level of stress you are happiest with, and the level of stress at which you work most effectively. You may find that your performance is good even when you feel upset by stress.
2. You should know what the main sources of unpleasant stress in your life are. You should understand what circumstances make the stresses particularly unpleasant, and should begin to understand whether your strategies for handling the stresses are effective or not.