Knowing how to calm yourself at work comes with multiple benefits. Our inner resources are linked to the state we’re in. To be more exact, the resources we have access to.

When stressed, you’re probably not that smart in those moments because your biochemistry is focused on saving you from imminent danger, real or imagined.

For the mind and body, it doesn’t matter if you’re stressed because a college yelled at you or running from a tiger. When your circuitry is wired to danger, your intellect and physical wellness suffer.

It’s difficult to shine at work when you’re not calm. Your decisions, productivity, flair, and creativity will be altered. Not to mention if your sleep gets affected for more than three nights in a row, you’re heading to a chronicle stress condition, and that’s not an easy cookie to chew.

Only in a regular state of calmness, you can optimally function. Besides, this is what interests you anyway at work. You already know that rewards come from efficiency, good ideas, execution, clarity, problem-solving, leadership, creativity, quick good decisions.

And if you have a leadership role, mastering calmness to gain productivity is key. The long-term benefits over your health will show as well. It’s known today that most illnesses are stress-related.

“Medical research estimates as much as 90 percent of illness and disease is stress-related.” NASD

Let’s see what you can do to calm yourself at work in three easy steps:

• 1. Create a Clear Vision of Your Best Outcome

This is an exercise. It’s both stimulating and pleasant. With your focus, you will create the desired emotional state that is essential for success.

Thoughts create emotions, and emotions determine actions. If your emotional state is positive, in this case, you’re calm, chances are you can reach your desired vision.

If you only see what’s not working at work, or who made you feel hurt, offended you, did something that interfered with your work, your state will turn negative. Your performance will stall.

The good news is that it works the other way around as well.

Start imagining an ideal outcome around any workplace situation. Start small with low stake situations to strengthen your mental routine, and see quick results that will motivate you further.

Imagine that expected outcome, as vividly as you can, while detaching from the stressful sources. You can do this through mental rehearsal, but also by writing. It is very powerful to train the mind in a direction you desire with handwriting.

Throughout the writing process, you will be able to observe how your state changes. Read those notes daily until you reach the desired outcome. If you start small, you can have those wins the same day.

Note! With this quick exercise, not only that you’ll know how to calm yourself in stressful situations, but you’ll start changing yourself. Soon you might discover an improved you who is not only happier but receives unexpected rewards from work and life in general. It’s how the Law of Attraction works.

•     2. Develop a Clear Focus on the Solution

On the same principle, now you’ll seek the solution instead of the problem.

Unproductive people, pessimists, and unhappy ones have a common trait. They see problems in everything. Even if there are many things they could find comforting, peaceful, and even grateful, they’ll be able to find what’s not working.

This is a world where the wrong-minded exist. They might be surrounded by a picturesque world and happy people, but they won’t notice it. They won’t stay that long around too many happy people, or vice-versa, because it’s a vibrational mismatch.

Focusing on results needs a bit of training, as anything else, to train the proactivity muscle.

There are not enough words to explain that it is worth it. From this point on, life changes for you.

The most effective approach is to combine this with number one. In order to visualize the perfect outcome, introduce the idea of finding solutions to your stressful reasons.

• 3. Systematically Eliminate Your Stressful Thoughts

It’s easy to see that all three steps are close friends. So, it shouldn’t be so difficult to get rid of stress once and for all while becoming calmer and more Zen at work.

You might argue that it’s easy to say, but difficult to do. Not quite.

It only takes a bit of discipline to allow the right thought processes to produce positive results.

But controlling thoughts to some sounds like an impossible mission. That’s because the approach is wrong. You don’t need to change your thoughts directly. As you shift your focus and attention toward constructive things, they will change. This creates the emotional changes that create the right states for the proper actions.

If you visualize the outcomes, the solutions, and the final achievements, this will automatically shift your thought patterns, but you must be persistent.

Whether we are calm, successful, happy, worthy, prosperous, you name it, depends on what we focus on. In most cases, you are not stressed by one thought alone but by a bunch of them.

One of the methods to overcome negative thoughts is to expose them and question them as not true. Then, rewrite them with something you want to think instead.

Another quick way to change a negative state is breathing. Breathing exercises are effective in changing the most resilient states in two minutes. Seriously. It’s neuroscience. If you use any of your favored breathing techniques, your state will improve in two minutes.

The right breathing calms you almost instantly by oxygenating your brain and reducing the frequency of those crazy thoughts.

Just inhale slowly “calmness” and exhale slowly “stress.” Do this a couple of times, and you’ll be at ease. Even if you commit to using breathing (nothing else) for two weeks, every time you feel anxious or stressed, the changes after those two weeks will be noticeable, and you’ll become a more balanced person. A better version with better results in everything you do.