I'm Doing Everything I'm Supposed To Do...Why Am I Not Happy All the Time?

You can't be a loving force, you can't be spiritual or a higher vibration if you reject anything that is its opposite. Can you GROCK that? That holding this, "I am so mellow. I only hang with people who are nice and calm..." is a form of repression? Is holding BACK your vibration and growth?


I agree with Jed McKenna (author of "Spiritual Enlightenment: It's the Damnedest Thing") who says if you're being spiritual and practicing spirituality to feel good always...then you are a bliss junkie. You're nothing but an addict! He considers that morally GROSS. I honestly get and LOVE that he blew that lie open.

If you find that you can't TRULY enjoy happy times---you kinda feel it, but not like you imagined---and that you can't really feel PRESENT at things like getting married or having a child (it wasn't as powerful as you were told), that's because you RESIST and suffocate those feelings like sadness, anger, lust, etc.

You can't close off one spectrum without closing off the other.

Worried you might cry for three straight days if you let it all in? Worried you can't get off anti-depressants or you'll start throwing plates?

Well, cry for three days. Throw some fucking plates.

The type of people that can say that to you are the ones you need to seek out now. Stop going to spiritual satsangs and Unity Church and joining groups that give you fluffy bullshit advice like, "Always feel love and be positive..." They are merely uncomfortable with your REALNESS, your humanness. They haven't gone there yet. You're too true. You're scaring them with your courage.


If anyone has read about awakening/enlightenment and wonders why they haven't "gotten it" yet, it's for this reason: You gotta walk through a river of shit---willingly----and then you get the "reward." I put "reward" in quotes, because let me tell you right now: It is NOT eternal bliss. It is NOT.

Are you sure you want that? You may want to stay asleep. You may actually be HAPPIER more often, if you don't push your true nature.

And with this entry, I've decided to launch an entire blog on ANGER. Please click here to see the first entry.


See Stephanie's site Work Stress Solutions for more information like this.

Work Stress Quiz - Check For Burnout

Burnout (now often called "Compassion Fatigue") occurs when passionate, committed people become deeply disillusioned with a job or career from which they have previously derived much of their identity and meaning. It comes as the things that inspire passion and enthusiasm are stripped away, and tedious or unpleasant things crowd in.





This tool can help you check yourself for burnout. It helps you look at the way you feel about your job and your experiences at work, so that you can get a feel for whether you are at risk of burnout.






Take Quiz Now






See Stephanie's site Work Stress Solutions for more information like this.

Color Your Stress Away?

This isn't the first time I've heard it, but it's the first time I've seen such compelling graphics. Coloring books for adults are being recommended as stress-busting tools. Apparently, the blood pressure is lowered as the two sides of the brain integrate.

Check these out:

An article on the website Upworthy has more :


See Stephanie's site Work Stress Solutions for more information like this.

Stress: It's Not Just In Your Head (Using EFT to Combat Stress)

By Dr. Mercola

Anxiety over a project at work… a marital spat… financial trouble… health problems… the list of potential stressors is endless, but wherever your stress is coming from, it likely starts in your head.

An inkling of worry might soon grow into an avalanche of anxiety. It might keep you up at night, your mind racing with potential “what ifs” and worst-case scenarios. Worse still, if the problem is ongoing, your stressed-out state may become your new normal -- extra stress hormones, inflammation, and all.

While beneficial if you’re actually in imminent danger, that heightened state of stress – the one that makes your survival more likely in the event of an attack, for instance – is damaging over time.

The thoughts in your head are only the beginning or, perhaps more aptly, are the wheels that set the harmful mechanism known as chronic stress into motion – and, once spinning, it’s very easy to spiral out of control. As reported in Science News:

“Stress research gained traction with a master stroke of health science called the Whitehall Study, in which British researchers showed that stressed workers were suffering ill effects.

Scientists have since described how a stressed brain triggers rampant hormone release, which leads to imbalanced immunity and long-term physical wear and tear.

Those effects take a toll quite apart from the anxiety and other psychological challenges that stressed individuals deal with day to day.”

Stress: It’s Not Just in Your Head

You know the saying “when it rains, it pours”? This is a good description of chronic stress in your body, because it makes virtually everything harder. The term psychological stress is, in fact, misleading, because no stress is solely psychological… it’s not all in your head.

Let’s say you lose your job or are struggling from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) from abuse you suffered as a child. Excess stress hormones are released, including cortisol, epinephrine, and norepinephrine. Your stress response becomes imbalanced; it’s not shutting off.

Your immune system suffers as a result, and epigenetic changes are rapidly occurring. The stress is triggering systemic low-grade inflammation, and suddenly your blood pressure is up, your asthma is flaring, and you keep getting colds.

That cut on your leg just doesn’t seem to want to heal, and your skin is a mess. You’re having trouble sleeping and, on an emotional level, you feel like you’re nearing burnout.

Stress is very much like a snowball rolling down a mountain, gaining momentum, gaining speed and growing until suddenly it crashes. That crash, unfortunately, is often at the expense of your health.

Stress Increases Heart Attack Risk by 21-Fold

Police officers clearly face amplified stress on the job, and researchers found they were 21 times more likely to die of a heart attack during an altercation than during routine activities.2 This isn’t entirely surprising until you compare it to heart-attack risk during physical training, which increased only seven fold.

The difference in physical exertion between the two circumstances likely doesn’t account for the increased risk… it’s the level of stress being experienced that sends heart attack risk through the roof.

More heart attacks and other cardiovascular events also occur on Mondays than any other day of the week.3 This “Monday cardiac phenomenon” has been recognized for some time, and has long been believed to be related to work stress.

During moments of high stress, your body releases hormones such as norepinephrine, which the researchers believe can cause the dispersal of bacterial biofilms from the walls of your arteries.4 This dispersal can allow plaque deposits to suddenly break loose, thereby triggering a heart attack.

Stress contributes to heart disease in other ways as well. Besides norepinephrine, your body also releases other stress hormones that prepare your body to either fight or flee. One such stress hormone is cortisol.

When stress becomes chronic, your immune system becomes increasingly desensitized to cortisol, and since inflammation is partly regulated by this hormone, this decreased sensitivity heightens the inflammatory response and allows inflammation to get out of control.5 Chronic inflammation is a hallmark not only of heart disease but many chronic diseases.

Continue Reading for info on using EFT





See Stephanie's site Work Stress Solutions for more information like this.

The Essential Guide to Happiness at Work

I'm not sure why Rashida Jones is writing this, except for her role in the sitcom, "The Office," but it's pretty good.

There are four components:

1. Sharpen your mind
2. Optimize your space
3. Upgrade your tools
4. Master your relationships

There are videos as well, and it seems pretty practical and upbeat. Here's a segment from the site (Wired.Com).

One thing does help. I try to remind myself that happiness is not the endgame. If your happiness depends on selling your company, snagging one perfect job, finishing the design for your perfect living room, you’ll never actually achieve it. And now that work and life have merged together, it’s doubly important to remember that you deserve to be happy all the time. Luckily, there are techniques and tools that can help you achieve this total world domination—or at least a smooth day at the office.


This is a online magazine from Wired. Com.

Anyway, I thought I'd pass it along.

The Essential Guide to Happiness at Work



See Stephanie's site Work Stress Solutions for more information like this.

Habits Create Your Life. How to Break The Ones You Don't Want.

From Martha Beck:

If you have a self-destructive pattern in your life, say an addiction or a repetitive thought or procrastination or having the same argument over and over again with the same person.


The important thing is to step back and say, I am going to give myself a space of time to work on this habit.


It’s not something that you can go cold turkey on, generally. So it’s almost like waging some sort of campaign where you gradually are going to defeat this pattern or change it to a different pattern.


And the first thing you want to do is to alter one thing in the course of your habitual patterns.


So for example, there’s a therapist who tells couples who argue a lot – you can have this argument, you can have this argument about money again, you can have it any time you want.


But every time you have it from now on you have to be wearing hats. And so when a couple will start, have an argument and they’ll have to go put on these hats.


The disruption of the pattern breaks some of the sequencing in the neural patterns that have become associated with this havoc and right there you get a disruption that causes a little bit of daylight to come into the habit so that it starts to break up right there.


The second thing I want people to do is if you have a habit and you smoke a cigarette again, or you overeat again, what you want to do is don’t beat up on yourself because it happened again.


Instead, stop and mentally review everything that was happening that led up to the habitual pattern.


There’s a point where you sort of go on auto pilot and that’s where you want to find out where that happened and what triggered it and it will always be something.


It’s almost always some stressor, right? Fatigue, fear, scary news story, bad traffic – anything.


So what you want to do then is after the habit has already taken place you go back to the thing that triggered it and you calm yourself retroactively.

You say to the person stuck in traffic, you know what, a cigarette really isn’t going to help this as much as turning on the radio and singing your favorite song.


Not cruelly, very kindly say, no, no, no, next time we are going to think about other alternatives.


And the next time it happens and it will happen again, you will find that you catch yourself a little bit sooner.


Then there will come a time when you are actually in the middle of your pattern and you are aware right then, oh my goodness, I am doing it again, but you are not quite able to stop the pattern yet.


Shortly after that there will come a point where you’d go in to the pattern and your consciousness breaks through and says, I am not going here. I am not going here again, that’s all that is to it.


So by breaking up the pattern with doing one new thing and then by addressing the triggers each and every time the pattern takes place you can gradually completely overcome your negative destructive habits.



Watch Video.



About Martha Beck:
Martha Beck, Ph.D., is a writer and life coach who specializes in helping people design satisfying and meaningful life experiences. She holds a bachelor's degree in East Asian Studies and master's and Ph.D. degrees in sociology, all from Harvard University. She has published academic books and articles on a variety of social science and business topics.

Her non-academic books include the New York Times bestsellers “Expecting Adam” and “Leaving the Saints,” as well as “Finding Your Own North Star: Claiming the Life You Were Meant to Live” and her newest book, “Steering by Starlight.” Dr. Beck has also been a contributing editor for many popular magazines, including Real Simple and Redbook, and is currently a columnist for O, the Oprah Magazine.



See Stephanie's site Work Stress Solutions for more information like this.

Managing Millennials and Other Human Beings

Recently, I was wandering around the produce section at my local Walmart Superstore. An African American male, about 50 years old, was talking to a couple of the young men working for him. They clearly had a lot of produce to put out and it looked like they might be busy for a while. I couldn't hear his instructions, but at the end I heard him say: Thank you, guys. I really appreciate you.


It took me by surprise. I think I had a few stereotypes going for one thing. Men of that age seem to use the, "Do it because I said so" management technique or "You get a paycheck. Why should I have to tell you that you do a good job?" I have battled those types of managers in my workshops on feedback and coaching. I get push-back to my suggestion that you should give positive feedback to ensure a repeat performance. This suggestion has often met with the response that it seems too hokey or it's pampering the employee. I finally had a stroke of brilliance after being so agitated with this common response, that fashioned a comeback: Well, if that's your reasoning, then why don't you dock their pay when they aren't doing it right and ask them to figure out on their own what they did wrong?


With four generations in one workplace today, we see the parenting style of these generations influencing the response to all authority figures, including management. For instance, Baby Boomers are known for extreme loyalty and team (family) is everything. They like collaboration and group work and will work until the job is done whether there is monetary reward or not (workaholism being the extreme outcome to this type of worker).

The Gen X'ers were raised without a lot of parental oversight. Therefore, they like to work alone. They also don't want management weighing in on their performance as it's seen as judgmental or micro-managing. Authority only really interfered in their childhoods when they had done something wrong (latchkey kids created by two working parents and higher divorce rates).

Finally, the Millennials: they had parents who not only said that they were the most important thing in their lives, but the ONLY thing in their lives. They received lots of attention and lots of praise. Therefore, they expect similar responses from their management.

You don't have to like modifying your management style to accommodate your employees' generation...but this approach does happens to work, should that be of interest. If you are saying to yourself as you read this that this advice is nonsense or only coddles those without a good work ethic, that's really YOUR generational filter talking. We all have one. We tend to think the people born before us are techno-phobes and the people born after us are moving too fast and have bad work ethic. But OUR generation has struck just the right balance.


Uh huh.


I don't know if my produce manager had any formal training or he was just following his instincts. Either way, I was impressed by his kindness and his sincerity and I bet his employees remember him long after they stop working there. What else is there to accepting a management job in the end? Isn't the goal to make those people better employees than they were when you found them? The rest of the job is usually riddled with complications and people problems and customer service escalations. The only "gold" is leaving a little of your value system with someone who is coming up the ranks. If your value system is "Speak Not Unless Someone Screws Up," then I guess your legacy is going to be one of cover-ups and deleted emails and anxiety when you are present. Why? Because perfection isn't possible. The expectation of perfection always creates a culture of deception. Humans simply can't maintain such an unrealistic standard.


Here's my advice. Tell someone, "Thank you, John...I appreciate you..." tomorrow at work. I dare ya. But I bet you will get at least a smile if you do.



See Stephanie's site Work Stress Solutions for more information like this.

MAGNESIUM - FROM MENSTRUATION TO MENOPAUSE

MAGNESIUM - FROM MENSTRUATION TO MENOPAUSE


In just a few weeks, we celebrate motherhood. The work mothers do in raising children – nurturing, disciplining, exercising endless patience or sharing in the excitement of each success small and large – is invaluable.


But the contributions mothers make are also physical. Our bodies do enormous work preparing for pregnancy, building new life inside of us and then helping it get out into the world. And to do this tremendous job, our bodies need specific nutrients. One of them is magnesium. Says practicing naturopathic doctor Kris Somol, ND, "Magnesium has worked wonders with many gynecological complaints I have encountered."1


PMS - THE HORMONAL LINK


You probably already know too well the outward effects of the hormonal swings our bodies go through on a monthly basis – moodiness, cravings, headaches, and irritability. Well, these rude reminders that earn menstruation the nickname "the curse," can indicate hormone-induced nutrient depletions inside the body.

According to a study published in the journal Fertility and Sterility, estrogen and progesterone, the hormones that ebb and flow with our monthly cycle, affect the levels of magnesium in our bodies.2 High levels of estrogen and progesterone are linked to significant drops in magnesium levels – as much as a 30% decrease.3 One reason for this magnesium depletion as Dr. Somol explains, is that magnesium is also necessary in the metabolism or breakdown of estrogen. The more estrogen, the more magnesium used up to break it down.4


And these two hormones peak right around that dreaded premenstrual syndrome (PMS) time, resulting in especially low magnesium levels.


So this explains quite a few things. How about pre-menstrual chocolate cravings? Ounce for ounce chocolate is probably one of the more magnesium-rich foods.5 Yearning for the dark stuff is clearly our body writing its own prescription. Some women also develop a yen for dark leafy greens at this time, another food rich in magnesium.6


HEADACHES, MOODINESS, AND CRAMPS



If headaches – even migraines – plague you right before your period, low magnesium levels may also be to blame. Statistically, more of these sledge-hammer headaches hit women right before menstruation. With hormone levels high, magnesium levels drop in the smooth muscle cells surrounding the blood vessels in your brain. Without adequate magnesium, these muscles spasm and cramp, restricting the flow of blood, causing premenstrual migraines or even increasing the risk for a stroke.7


Even pre-menstrual moodiness may be linked to low magnesium levels, according to one small double-blind placebo-controlled trial conducted in Italy.8 Additionally, magnesium is essential for helping your body make use of another natural mood-buster, omega-3 fatty acids.9


Finally, magnesium continues on to provide relief during menstruation when cramps hit. Explains Dr. Somol, "[Magnesium] is essential in the process of muscle relaxation after a contraction. This is why it is useful for menstrual cramps," as well as prenatal leg cramps and labor.10


MAGNESIUM FOR A HEALTHY PREGNANCY


Unquestionably, adequate magnesium is essential for a healthy pregnancy. Clinical trials have shown that mothers who take magnesium supplements have healthier babies and fewer pregnancy problems.11


GOOD FOR MOTHERHOOD AND BEYOND


Menstruation and pregnancy mark the active phase of our reproductive lives. Yet even with menopause, magnesium can help ease the transition. Dr. Somol uses it frequently to help with hot flashes.15


To get your magnesium, Dr. Somol recommends eating lots of leafy greens, nuts, whole grains, legumes and drinking hard water. Yet with magnesium-depleted soils, these foods may have less than we need. For that reason, magnesium supplementation may be necessary. Says Dr. Somol, "I have used magnesium supplementation with many patients," listing a lengthy number of health issues women face – from gynecological complaints to cardiovascular issues. She notes, "There are many times when magnesium has been sufficient to correct certain symptoms."16


So honor your womanly body – at whatever stage – and care for it. Inside magnesium's simple mineral package lies health benefits equal to at least a dozen hand-picked bouquets and several Mother's Day brunches.



Jigsaw has a slow release formula that is essential to avoid the laxative effective of magnesium as an easy and effective way to get the magnesium the female body craves. Magnesium Tables @ Jigsaw Health

P.S. Enter FREESHIP in the coupon code section for free shipping.


CITED SOURCES

Personal interview Kris Somol 4/21/09
Muneyvirci-Delale O. et al. Sex Steroid Hormones Modulate Serum Ionized Magnesium and Calcium Levels Throughout The Menstrual Cycle in Women." Fertility and Sterility. 1998 May;69(5):958-62
Muneyvirci-Delale et al.
Somol interview.
Carolyn Dean, The Magnesium Miracle. Ballantine, New York. 2007, p. 136.
Somol interview.
Dean, p. 134.
Facchinetti F. et al. Oral magnesium successfully relieves premenstrual mood changes. Obstetrics and Gynecology. 1991 Aug;78(2):177-81.
Dean, p. 137.
Somol interview.
Dean, p. 142.
Dean, p. 141.
Smyth, RM et al. Magpie Trial in the UK: Methods and additional data for women and children at 2 years following pregnancy complicated by pre-eclampsia. BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth. 2009 April 14; 9(1): 15. and Magpie Trial Coordinating Center. The Magpie Trial follow up study: outcome after discharge from hospital for women and children recruited to a trial comparing magnesium sulphate with placebo for pre-eclampsia. BMC Pregnancy And Childbirth. 2004 March 8; 4(1):5.
Doyle LW, et al. Magnesium sulphate for women at risk of preterm birth for neuroprotection of the fetus. Cochrane Database Syst. Rev. 2009 Jan 21; (1)
Somol interview.
Somol interview.





See Stephanie's site Work Stress Solutions for more information like this.

Magnesium and Stress: The Relaxation Mineral

When you are chronically stressed, you can become magnesium deficient even if you eat magnesium-rich foods regularly. The complex relationship between magnesium and stress explains why many people require magnesium supplements, because even a nutritious diet does not correct their magnesium deficiency.








Magnesium plays an important role in biochemical reactions all over your body. It is involved in a lot of cell transport activities, in addition to helping cells make energy aerobically or anaerobically. Your bones are a major reservoir for magnesium, and magnesium is the counter-ion for calcium and potassium in muscle cells, including the heart.



If your magnesium is too low, you can experience muscle cramps, arrythmias, and even sudden death. Ion regulation is everything with respect to how muscles contract and nerves send signals. In the brain, potassium and sodium balance each other. In the heart and other muscles, magnesium pulls the load.











Magnesium is an old home remedy for all that ails you, including "anxiety, apathy, depression, headaches, insecurity, irritability, restlessness, talkativeness, and sulkiness."




In 1968, Wacker and Parisi reported that magnesium deficiency could cause depression, behavioral disturbances, headaches, muscle cramps, seizures, ataxia, psychosis, and irritability - all reversible with magnesium repletion.



Stress is the bad guy here, in addition to our woeful magnesium deficient diets. As is the case with other minerals, stress causes us to waste our magnesium like crazy.



Magnesium Deposits and Stress

Several studies have also looked how stress levels affect magnesium. They found that during periods of extreme stress, magnesium is often used up by the body.


That means that not only is a significant portion of the country magnesium deficient, potentially leading to anxiety – there may also be a high number of people that use up their magnesium reserves as a result of their anxiety, thus contributing to more anxiety and more stress. This creates a loop effect where stress and anxiety are experienced without an external factor of causation.


Doctors know potassium deficiency is a danger for people on diuretics but they don’t acknowledge that magnesium is also flushed out in equal measure. Magnesium deficiency goes undiagnosed and unrecognized because until recently there was no accurate blood test for magnesium.



Magnesium is not as readily available as potassium; it’s deficient in the soil and most fertilizers don’t contain magnesium, so most foods are lacking. Also cooking and processing foods depletes magnesium. It’s found in whole grains, greens, nuts and seeds, but most people don’t eat much, if any, of those foods.


And yet, for some reason doctors think that we get all our nutrients in our very SAD, Standard American Diet and they don’t recognize the need for nutrient supplementation. It all stems back to a medical education that is funded by drug companies that have no vested interest in promoting nutrients. Vitamins and minerals can’t be patented and are relatively inexpensive.


Research shows that all the metabolic processes in the body, ALL OF THEM, depend on vitamins and minerals, which act as necessary co-factors. Magnesium itself is a co-factor and responsible for the function of 325 enzymes; is an absolute requirement for calcium to be incorporated into bone; keeps toxic chemicals out of the brain; dances with calcium to create nerve impulses and muscle impulses; keeps muscles relaxed, including the heart and blood vessels, and triggers dozens of health conditions if it is deficient.


Studies prove up to 70 percent of people are deficient in magnesium. Magnesium deficiency can trigger or cause many health issues including the following:

• Anxiety
  
• Asthma
  
• Blood clots
  
• Bowel disease (from constipation)
  
• Cystitis
  
• Depression
  
• Diabetes
  
• Fatigue
  
• Heart disease
  
• Hypertension/high blood pressure
  
• Hypoglycemia
  
• Insomnia
  
• Migraines
  
• Kidney stones
  
• Musculoskeletal conditions
  
• Fibromyalgia
  
• Chronic neck and back pain
  
• Fibrositis
  
• Nerve problems
  
• PMS
  
• Infertility
  
• Preeclampsia
  
• Osteoporosis
  

Everyone could benefit from extra magnesium. The only problem I encountered, is the laxative effect. If you are unable to absorb magnesium for whatever reason (alcohol, smoking, stress, poor diet, IBS), then you will not get enough of this enzyme and you will be on the potty and still experience all of the symptoms listed above! I found one product that works that doesn't create a laxative effect. It's not really that expensive either. It tastes too salty, if you ask me, so I put it in things that need salt: I put it in my food after I have cooked something that needs a salty flavor or even in a beer! My back pain and anxiety are GONE. And when I get a twinge in my lower back, I know I need to put more magnesium in me!
Here is my favorite caplet form, plus free shipping if you enter FREESHIP into the shipping code section.
Magnesium @ Jigsaw Health
Jigsaw says, "We are not the cheapest. There, we said it. We spend a great deal of our own money to partner with companies whose products work and who do business the way we want to do business. That means only the highest quality ingredients, each carefully researched and hand-selected to ensure the greatest potency, from the most reputable labs and manufacturers. We will not compromise the effectiveness of our products or your health to save a few dollars. This approach is the reason why so many families place their trust in Jigsaw Health. A responsibility we take very seriously."
From Steph: But it's still just $39 and 249 tablets per bottle is .15 per tab! And NO LAXATIVE EFFECT!
PLUS Here's the coupon code for 10% off when you checkout :
10percent

Go to Jigsaw Health.Com for non-laxative magnesium tablets.

The only other magnesium I have found that does not create a laxative effect is a liquid sold by Dr. Carolyn Dean called ReMag. But it's VERY salty and I have a hard time taking the dose because of it. It costs $29, but only lasts about a month. So, the folks at Jigsaw are actually very competitive.

Still not sure it's magnesium you need? Here's an article by Dr. Mark Hyman called "Magnesium: The Most Powerful Relaxation Mineral Available." See Stephanie's site Work Stress Solutions for more information like this.

Females Suffer More in Workplace

Female Employees 1.5 Times More Likely Than Males to Suffer Stress in the Workplace

By Hollie Mantle

A recent data analysis by health and safety consultants, Arinite, has found that workplace stress rates are 1.5 times higher in female workers than in males. This analysis reflects data over a five year period between 2009 and 2014. The number of females reported to be suffering from stress caused or made by worse by work has been substantially higher year on year compared to reported levels of stress amongst male workers.


What Counts as Workplace Stress?


According to Bryan Richards of Arinite, “there is a clear distinction between pressure which can create a ‘buzz’ and be a motivating factor and stress, which can occur when this pressure becomes excessive.” Each year in the UK half a million workers experience work-related stress at a level they believe is making them ill. Despite increasing awareness of the negative physical impacts of stressful working lives on the body, the analysis reveals that whilst the number of other workplace issues such as injuries and fatalities have either declined or remained steady over the past five years, stress levels amongst UK workers is on the increase.


In 2014, for example, 487,000 incidences of work-related stress were reported – an increase of 87,000 since 2011. An illustrative example of this health and safety data analysis can be seen here. Why are women more likely to suffer from workplace stress?


In a report titled, ‘Work, Employment and Society’ by Haya Stier of Tel Aviv University, participants from industrialised countries worldwide revealed that the quality of working environments for women appeared to be significantly lower than for men. The study focused on areas such as feelings of stress, tiredness and flexibility. Male respondents indicated that they felt levels of stress and exhaustion at work that were on average 5% lower than females. Their responses also suggested that opportunities for advancement were perceived as higher in males than females, and male workers also tended to respond more positively than females when discussing their feelings of job security.


On top of an inferior sense of wellbeing at work, women are still subject to a discriminatory pay gap which allows men, on average, to take home an additional £100 per week in the UK. These figures, based on statistics from the ONS, suggest that men can expect to earn on average £5,200 more than their female counterparts per year, whilst maintaining a higher level of mental wellbeing (see below for US statistics on pay gaps between the genders).


Implementing a Stress Management System


Overall, female workers experience higher levels of exhaustion, have less job security and earn lower salaries than male workers in the UK. This may go some way to explaining why the ratio of female workers suffering from work related stress or anxiety is 1.5 times higher than males.


Health and safety consultant Bryan Richards suggests that this issue is one that must be tackled by employers. Richards says, “Employers need to acknowledge this gender gap and make a point of addressing it when implementing a stress management system in the workplace. Where possible, employees should be given control over the pace of their work. There should also be a system in place so that employees are able to raise concerns about the working environment as and when they arise. “Considering females appear to suffer more when it comes to workplace stress, there needs to be a sufficient support system in place to provide help to this demographic. Employees should be able to raise concerns privately or anonymously, and then employers should brainstorm with workers as to how these issues can be dealt with. Bringing a neutral party to assist with these exercises can ensure employers are being fair.”


Tackling Gender Inequality


Stress is one of the biggest causes of sickness absence in the UK, with those suffering averaging a total of 30.1 days off per year. Considering sickness absence costs employers a whopping £495 per year per employee, it’s high time business started taking stress management seriously. Tackling gender inequalities in the workplace and ensuring female workers are fully supported is one step in the right direction.


Check out Arinite's Health and Safety Tracker Here:

http://www.arinite.co.uk/arinite-health-safety-tracker-infographic



Hollie can be reached via email at h.mantle@accuracast.com.




*Women in the US are paid .70 on the dollar to their male counterparts. Obama enacted the Fair Pay Act as one of his first bills once elected to office, but there is no current process for rectifying this gap.


See Stephanie's site Work Stress Solutions for more information like this.