Have you ever gotten the feeling you’re just totally done with your job, a relationship, or your current living conditions? When it happens, it usually floods you all at once. You just hit a point when you can’t take it anymore — you’re burnt out.
Except, it doesn’t actually happen all at once. Your body does give you signs to let you know something isn’t right and needs to be changed — you just have to listen to the signs!
Here are 4 signs you’re incredibly stressed even though you may not realize it.
1. You get tired very easily
Remember the days when you could stay up all night working after working all day? Or go to a party after a 16 hour shift?
If those days are long gone, then you may be experiencing a lot of stress. Of course, your body shouldn’t normally be able to handle working all day and night; but you shouldn’t feel drained after just a few hours, either.
Science says that some people respond to stress by becoming incredibly tired, or even falling asleep on the spot! Stress causes long-term wear on your body, which increases fatigue. High levels of stress can keep your body in a constant fight-or-flight state, making you even more tired.
2. You overreact a lot
“They forgot my dang fries! I CAN’T BELIEVE THIS!!”
We all know someone who’s overreacted to something incredibly minuscule that could easily be fixed. But are we a culprit ourselves?
If you or someone close to you has noticed you’ve been overreacting lately, it might be a sign you’re getting overly stressed and on the path to burnout. If this is the case, you should take some time to sit and think about what might be stressing you out and how you can resolve the root cause.
3. You’ve been sweating more often than usual
My girlfriend and I are moving this week and we’ve been doing a LOT of packing and heavy lifting… and we’ve been sweating like crazy. Sure, it’s been hot and humid and we’ve been moving big stuff like dressers, but I was sweating almost as much as I did when I was doing hot yoga (if you’ve ever done hot yoga, you know how this feels).
The reason we sweat more often under stress is because the stress is causing our bodies to heat up. Sweating is a natural bodily coolant whenever our internal organs are overheating.
Next time you’re sweating a lot, reflect a little. There may be a bigger underlying cause then exercise or hot weather.
4. You talk to yourself a lot, and you’re not saying good things
People who are stressed out tend to talk to themselves a lot. Sometimes the talk may be positive, but the majority of the time this stressed out self-talk is negative, and you put yourself down.
If you’re a big self-talker, it may be hard to recognize this. If you rarely self-talk, it shouldn’t be too hard. The key is not how much you do it, but rather, what you’re actually saying. If it’s negative, that obviously needs to be changed whether you’re stressed out or not.
If we can learn to turn this self-talk into positive, reinforcing language, it can actually undo the stress that caused it in the first place! Here’s a short guide by Psychology Today about making your self-talk work for you.
Do you show any of these 4 signs? All of them? None of them?
If this article has opened your eyes to the reality that you’re stressed, please share it with others so we can help as many people as possible.
