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Job Stress: How to Keep Your Cool

Summary & Participants

For many people, "work" and "stress" are virtually synonymous. But stress can have negative effects on your body and mind, from muscle stiffness and insomnia to hypertension and general unhappiness. How can you keep your productivity maxed while staying relaxed? Join our panel of experts for some work-time de-stressing tips. Viewers are encouraged to submit their questions in advance, or during the live program.

Medically Reviewed On: June 19, 2008

Webcast Transcript

PAUL MONIZ: I'm Paul Moniz. Thanks for joining us today. Today's topic is something most of us have experienced, stress on the job. It can effect a lot more than just job performance. It can color your whole outlook on life, affecting your personal relationships, even your health, contributing to heart disease, memory loss and loss of libido. Tight deadlines, a demanding boss and concerns over job security can make that trip to the office a dreaded task.

Here to explain how this stress develops and what you can do to control it are two clinical psychologists who work together. They are Dr. Fran Massino and Dr. Willy Wiener, both of the Institute for Performance Advancement which deals with stress and anxiety in the workplace.

Dr. Massino, let's talk about stress with you first. How would you define stress?

FRANCIS MASSINO, PhD: I think stress is how our bodies react to some kind of change in the environment. So it could be having additional tasks at work. It could be getting into a disagreement with your wife or husband. So how your body reacts is interpreted as some kind of stress.

PAUL MONIZ: This is a tough one, but why is it that one person will act one way toward the same event, and another person will act completely in a different way?

WILLY WIENER, PhD: Because they think about those events differently. That explains their difference in reaction.

PAUL MONIZ: Can you know ahead of time how you are going to react in terms of the type of person you are? Is that the danger that people get into is they don't know when they have bitten off more than they can chew, so to speak?

WILLY WIENER, PhD: I don't know if it's about biting off more than they can chew. I think certain people have ways of thinking about things that give rise to stress. Rules, rigid scripts that they have running in their head.

PAUL MONIZ: Such as?

WILLY WIENER, PhD: Such as...

FRANCIS MASSINO, PhD: Punctuality, if I may jump in. Some people are very rigid about time. Not wanting to be late to a movie, for instance. And other people say, "Well if I get there a couple of minutes late, it's not that big of a deal." But that's one.

Other people don't really worry about getting to work on time, taking a lunch break at a prescribed hour. So other people are much more flexible in their thinking about time. That's one that we see that comes up.

WILLY WIENER, PhD: That illustrates the point well and aside from the merits of being on time, it illustrates the point that the way you think about it can change the way you feel about it. If you believe everything must be on time all the time, then when something is 10 minutes late, you're liable to be stressed out, angry, and depressed about it. If your attitude is "Well, I strive for that all the time, but sometimes it doesn't happen and that's okay," you're going to be much more relaxed in the face of that kind of event.

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