Today, stress can seem unrelenting. You unlock your phone and there’s a message reminding you your gas bill is overdue. There’s an uptick in your cortisol level. You open your inbox and there’s a complicated client email that elicits a stress response. There’s an uptick in your cortisol level. You don’t have time to respond because your calendar is telling you there’s a Teams meeting looming in five minutes, and you haven’t had time to read the notes required before the meeting, so there’s another cortisol uptick. You finish your meeting and jump back into your inbox to reply to the tricky client email, and there are 15 more emails that you need to attend to, so there’s another cortisol uptick.
Our days are now dominated by digital stressors that rarely end. We rarely, if ever, feel like we’ve closed the stress cycle. We no longer have short periods of stress. Our days are punctuated by constant micro-stressors.
Your brain is continuously scanning the physical environment for sensory data. It is estimated that the body sends the brain around 11 million pieces of sensory data per second (10 million of which come from the eyes), but your conscious mind is capable of processing between 40 and 50 pieces per second. Your brain likes to form shortcuts, so it creates neural pathways based on the sensory data you receive. For example, smelling coffee or seeing your desk at work might be cognitive triggers you’ve associated with work. This is why many people found working remotely so challenging at first: the bedroom, a place associated with rest and relaxation, suddenly became the boardroom. Dr Sahar Yousef and Professor Lucas Miller from Becoming Superhuman refer to these as ‘muddled associations’.
The problem arises when your brain cannot predict what associations to form when seeing a sensory cue. This is exactly what happens with your digital devices: you see your phone or laptop and your brain cannot predict what neural pathways to activate. Will you turn on your phone to be greeted by a cacophony of voicemail pings, SMS notifications and email alerts? Will these notifications bear good or bad news? (Negativity bias means many of us assume that it will be the latter.)
Research has even shown that some people suffer from email apnea (or ‘screen apnea’). Linda Stone coined the term in 2008 to describe the common phenomenon of unconsciously holding one’s breath, or breathing shallowly, when responding to emails or while texting. Your pupils dilate and your heart rate accelerates, all in response to your emails! Stone suggested that up to 80 per cent of people may experience this phenomenon. When you’re stressed or focused, your brain knows that it needs to prioritise resources (brainpower) for the task at hand, so it switches off certain subconscious activities, such as breathing and hunger (ever noticed you often don’t feel hungry when you’re stressed?). You temporarily inhibit some subconscious brain activities to divert resources to perform the difficult task.
Of course, no-one wants to hold their breath every time they open an email, so let’s look at three micro-habits to focus on to manage technostress and boost focus.
Micro-habit 1: Increase your green time to balance your screen time
We’ve shifted far from our biological roots. We once spent most of our days outdoors but, today, most adults – and children and teens – spend the bulk of their waking hours indoors (and sedentary). Humans are biologically designed to be in natural environments; we’re not designed to spend hours inside hunched over a small screen.
Whether it’s a stroll through your local park or a trek through a rainforest, time in nature – colloquially referred to as ‘green time’ – has been shown to have a myriad of benefits, such as reducing stress and bolstering focus. It’s the balm for our busy brains, because it’s naturally slower paced than our frantic digital world. It has become a widely accepted practice, with some people even engaging in ‘forest bathing’ – intentionally spending time in nature for restorative benefits.
Shift some of your virtual meetings to walking meetings. You obviously can’t do this for all meetings but, when possible, pop your earbuds in and take a walk around your local park while doing your Zoom or Teams call. Determine in advance if it will be an audio-only call and, if not, ask if you could attend in audio-only format. This is contingent upon the type of meeting, the complexity of issues that need to be discussed and whether you need to refer to or take notes.
I’ve found that when you’re direct about why you want to have your camera off, people are much more receptive to the idea. It often has a contagion effect: others will emulate your behaviour and switch some of their meetings to virtual walking meetings.
Micro-habit 2: Take micro-movement breaks
Have you ever felt stressed, then taken a walk and felt like your stress has dissipated? Or perhaps you’ve taken a walk and a genius idea has germinated, or you’ve solved a complex problem you’ve spent months agonising over. Movement is a fabulous tool we can use to manage our stress. However, today we’re spending less time being physically active and much more time being sedentary, thanks to our plugged-in lifestyles.
A brief hiatus from your desk enables you to disengage from work and has been shown to reduce stress, improve focus and have a calming restorative effect. Micro-movement breaks help counter the ill effects of sitting at your desk for too long, which we know is particularly detrimental to our physical health.
Micro-habit 3: Breathe better
Breathing is one of the most effective tools we have at our disposal to beat stress. It’s free, accessible at any time and doesn’t require us to step away from the stressful event or situation, unlike other stress-combatting tools such as mindfulness, meditation or massage. We can discreetly implement this strategy even while sitting in a stressful Teams meeting or tackling our inboxes.
Looking for more tips on how to manage your time and stay focused?
Why not consider joining our short course on time and priority management, where you will learn how to improve your focus on what matters most. In addition to the tips shared in this article, this short course will provide you with the skills needed to take control and focus your efforts on what matters most.
