For many people, work can be incredibly stressful. Even if their actual job is relatively simple, hard bosses, difficult colleagues, and the overall financial health of the company can cause stress and anxiety.
There’s a massive cost to all that stress too. In South Africa, it’s estimated that work-related stress and major depression, burnout and anxiety disorders cost the economy around R40-billion a year. And in the UK, nearly 12-million working days were lost to the same conditions.
Given the scale of the problem, it should hardly be surprising that people in a variety of fields are looking for solutions.
A number of those solutions are technologically-based. And thanks to prevalence of smartphones, apps are among the most popular.
Here are a few of the most popular:
iCBT App
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) has reliably been shown to be one of most effective methods for treating mental health conditions, including PTSD, panic attacks, generalized anxiety, OCD, and some eating disorders.
Recognising that not everyone has the time or money to access their therapist whenever they need one, iCBT has tried to distil the tenets of CBT into app form. Everything on the app is available offline, meaning that you can access it wherever you are.
Headspace
One of the most highly-regarded meditation apps on the market today, Headspace provides guided meditation sessions and mindfulness training for its users.
Headspace’s makers suggest you think of it as a personal trainer for your mind. This approach, they say, helps you make your mind stronger in the same way as going to gym improves your body.
While much of the app’s functionality is paid-for, it does have some free introductory content.
Worry Watch
Rather than trying to overtly treat workplace stress and anxiety, Worry Watch provides users with an anxiety journal.
The journal allows you to log when you feel anxious, track whether the outcome was as bad as you’d feared, and visually analyse the patterns and trends in your anxiety.
Breathe2Relax
Breathing exercises are another powerful tool for combatting stress and anxiety. It can help decrease the body’s ‘fight-or-flight’ (stress) response, and help with mood stabilization, anger control, and anxiety management.
Breathe2Relax provides detailed information on the effects of stress on the body and instructions and practice exercises to help users learn the stress management skill called diaphragmatic breathing.
SAM: Self Help for Anxiety Management
Anyone who’s experienced anxiety knows how difficult it can be to understand and deal with. Developed in collaboration with a research team from UWE, Bristol, SAM aims to help users do just that.
As well as behaviour monitoring, SAM comes with features that help you manage your anxiety through self-help exercises and private reflection.
It also has a “Social cloud” feature will enable you to share your experiences with the SAM community while protecting your identity.
Pacifica
Available on iOS and Android, Pacifica combines techniques from the worlds of cognitive behavioural therapy and meditation to help its users deal with stress and anxiety.
Alongside tools for dealing with these issues, Pacifica provides users with a supportive community that understands what they’re going through.
Do you have a favourite app that helps you deal with workplace stress? Let us know in the comments section below.
