5 Helpful Tips for Staying Healthy When Facing Event Planning Stress
“Did I forget to invite someone important?” “Why are they not answering my calls?” “Have I done everything I planned for today?”
These are just some of the questions that can overwhelm your mind daily and fire up your anxiety. When you are planning a big event, stress usually becomes a permanent resident in your body.
But does it have to be that way?
No.
Making sure that everything goes as planned is relevant, but not as much as your mental and physical health. Overstressing about your event planning duties can affect your health long term. Chronic stress can lead to anxiety, depression, and insomnia.
What you need to do is to recognize the importance of taking care of yourself. If you are ready to do something about the harmful effects of event planning stress, here is what you should do.
Write Down Your Thoughts
You know that feeling when you feel like your head is going to burst from all the thoughts? Prevent this from happening by doing this little helpful exercise.
Get yourself a notebook where you can write your thoughts daily.
The way this helps is that it clears your mind from negative thoughts. Like you are transferring all those emotions to paper.
University of Rochester Medical Center claims in their article that “it can help you gain control of your emotions and improve your mental health.”
The best time for this is in the morning and the evening. In that way, you’ll begin your day with a free mind and end it in the same manner. If you're feeling fancy, you can even build a creative infographic to map out your workweek.
Be Realistic and Prioritize
Planning an event is a complex process that demands you deal with a ton of obligations. As much as you would like to do everything as soon as possible, you need to be realistic about your capabilities.
Prioritizing your tasks will help you manage your obligations more efficiently.
You’ll stress less.
First, create a general list of tasks. Once you have an overview of your responsibilities for this event, create weekly lists. These weekly lists will help you single out your daily responsibilities based on their priority.
Even if you don’t handle all the tasks you prioritized that day, that is okay. You won’t stress as much because you’ll know that you’ve handled the most important obligations that were on the top of your list.
Be Mindful
Peace and event planning can seem like a completely incompatible match. However, mindfulness can show you that everything is possible even being peaceful during such hectic times.
As Mindful.org defined it, “Mindfulness is the basic human ability to be fully present, aware of where we are and what we’re doing, and not overly reactive or overwhelmed by what’s going on around us.”
Practicing mindfulness exercises can’t bring you constant peace but they can help you to calm yourself down in a stressful moment.
Besides, they can make your daily obligations less overwhelming.
Amanda Perry, an event planner for TheWordPoint gave as an example of the type of mindful exercise that she practices, “Everyone has a different way of practicing mindfulness but what works for me is to pay careful attention to my movements. For example, when I am washing dishes I am completely aware of every move I make. I ignore and dismiss any thought that comes up and just focus on what I’m doing.”
You can see that mindfulness doesn’t even demand some extra time. Just surrender yourself to the moment and clear your mind of thoughts.
Introduce Healthy Eating Habits
Chaotic and fast-paced life has a harmful effect on our bodies. Which is why you need to make some changes and start to eat healthier.
The reason I say healthier and not healthy is that no one is expected to turn their eating habits upside down. Your busy schedule may not allow you to eat healthy at all times, but you can at least introduce some healthy habits.
Here are some examples of simple healthy life hacks:
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Always have breakfast
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Prepare a healthy snack for the day the night before
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Carry a bottle of water so you won’t forget to hydrate
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Drink green or black tea instead of coffee for a dose of caffeine
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Resist the sweets and eat your favorite fruit instead
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Pack a home-cooked meal or a salad for lunch in the food container
Exercise Regularly
Doing some type of exercise daily can benefit both your mental and physical health. Yes, getting yourself to make some room in your busy schedule can be hard.
But isn’t your health worth it?
When you do any type of physical activity, your body releases endorphins. These chemicals act as a sedative, relaxing your mind from stress and helping you to sleep better.
Even a 10-minute cardio exercise or a 20-minute walk around the neighborhood can do the job.
Not to mention that studies have shown that exercising improves alertness and concentration, and enhances overall cognitive function. What a perfect way to reduce stress and improve concentration that is so badly needed for event planning.
Are You Ready to Commit to Your Health?
Taking care of your well-being should always come first.
Especially during stressful occasions such as event planning.
You may feel like you don’t have enough time to work on your body and mind, but you need to set your priorities straight.
These tips won’t take much of your time, but they will help you reorganize your life and introduce some healthy habits.
Simple things like that can completely transform your life. Think of it as an investment. When you invest in your mental and physical health, it will pay out in better concentration, organization, and improved competence.
Author: Erica Sunarjo
Erica Sunarjo is a professional writer with more than five years of experience. In addition to writing, she is also an expert in translation, localization, and proofreading. Helping writers achieve more with their content is one of her passions, so she frequently publishes guides on writing for the web for beginners.
