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tranfree issue 41 - 18 October 2001
Stress ManagementBy Sian Marlow Stress is a fact of life in today's busy world. As freelance translators, the very nature of our work causes stress. It's important to be able to identify the causes of stress, then to manage it effectively and keep it to a minimum. After all, it's your health at stake. Too much of the wrong kind of stress and your health will suffer. First of all, it's important to take a look at all the things which make you feel stressed. Here are some examples...
These are just a few of the things we have to face. You may (in fact, probably will) have others. But if we look at the list carefully, we can see that all these items have one thing in common...
We Can Do Something About ThemThe wonderful thing about working for yourself is that you can please yourself. You can decide how much - or how little - work you want to do.
You can choose whether to invest in training and get it all organised. If you like, you can say no to jobs. Of course, the downside is that you have to organise things yourself - there's no boss around to pass the buck to. If a client defaults on a debt, you have to chase it yourself, for example.
Getting StartedTo start off your stress management programme, make a list of the things that cause you stress in your work. Be honest with yourself. And then when you've done that, take a long look at it and work out what you can do about the things you listed. At this stage, just take the overall view. Don't go into too much detail or you'll get more stressed worrying about it all! If you have too much work, learn to say no to clients. If you don't have enough work to do, do some marketing (use tranmail if you like)... http://www.translatortips.net/tranmail.html Work all the way through your...
The idea behind this is to show you that nothing in your working life is so bad that it can't be overcome. Listing all the causes of stress makes you sit down and consider exactly why you feel stressed. It gives you a little bit of distance from the stress if you can see it all written down in front of you. You can consider the items listed as if someone else had written them. And by suggesting even outline solutions, you're halfway to providing yourself with a remedy.
Now Leave it for a WhileWhen you've got the outline solutions ready, put the list away. Then leave it for a day, or a week. Whatever you feel comfortable with. But don't leave it for weeks or you won't derive any benefit from the exercise! Then take each item on your list in turn. Seriously consider all the measures you can implement to help you with that particular problem. Work through these items one at a time, thinking of detailed solutions for each. At this stage it's important to bear in mind what's possible and what's not. Don't give yourself false hopes. It's also important to remember that you're only human. You can't change the world overnight, so don't even try! Make your suggested solutions realistic and achievable so that when you come to implement them you don't give up straight away. And then you come to the interesting bit - implementing your solutions! This is where you have to have a mantra: "I can do it!" Don't try to tackle everything at once. Take one small aspect of one of your solutions and see if you can implement it. If you can't, don't worry about it - move on to the next solution. Take it a step at a time. And remember the aim is not to remove all stress from your life (if only it were that easy!). The aim is to alleviate some of the more stressful aspects of your work and to make you happier and more relaxed.
It's Not A Quick FixDon't go into this assuming it will solve all your problems - it won't. The objective is to enable you to do your job properly - and well - while maintaining a relatively relaxed attitude. Clients don't enjoy dealing with stressed translators. Relieving some of the stress burden on yourself will make you feel happier and more energetic. This is not a quick fix or a cure-all. It can only work if you're willing to spend time on it. A bad debt will still be a bad debt. Your computer will sometimes still not work. But you'll be able to see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. You'll have some ideas on how to go about solving problems, or know who to ask for help if you need it. And the truth of the matter is that knowing you can do something about every problem that may arise is the best de-stresser there is.
Sian Marlow translates into English from Swedish, |
...list item by item, suggesting a
possible remedy for each cause of stress that you listed.