Whether you’re married or single, have kids or not, life is stressful. We are dealing with the stresses of our generation: school shootings, wars, financial crisis. Hard things are going on in the world, things that affect us, our children, and our other loved ones. Even if we try not to think about it, these hard things are always in the back of our minds.

What we do think about is the stuff we have to get done. We think about work. We have to work so that we can pay bills, daycare, put our kids through college, or pay for medical care.

And work comes with stressors that compound the underlying stress we all feel: meeting deadlines and expectations, managing potential conflict and office politics. No wonder many people feel work-related anxiety.

In this episode I’ll share a defining moment and what it taught me about overcoming anxiety at work. I’ll share strategies that help me refocus my energy and sleep better at night. Hopefully it will resonate with you.

I’ve held many titles in my life. I was a teen mom, a single mom, a working mom, a salesperson, a manager, director, and coach.

Of all my titles, I identified the most with being a hard worker. Being a hard worker helped me get off welfare, get an education, build a career and provide for myself and my children.

In my career I’ve been through a ton of stress. I’ve led through the consequences of unwise decisions, dealt with difficult people, navigated challenging HR situations, and got laid off more than once. Because I’m someone who sees challenges as an invitation to grow, I always leaned into stress and anxiety to motivate me.

Somehow I always landed in a good place, but there was a point in time when the cycle of worry and anxiety was too much. My heart ached for change, but I was too overwhelmed and busy to do anything about it.

Can you relate?

My faith told me that that no job or career would ever completely fulfill me, so I tried to be more faithful. I thought if I only tried harder, prayed more, streamed better sermons, or wrote out more gratitude lists, I would figure out how to feel secure, content, and grateful at work.

During that time, I got on my knees, prayed, and fasted for a rescue – to be supernaturally plucked out of my job and into a less stressful one.

That day God answered my prayer, not with a new job, but with my manager giving me an assignment to drive into a community on fire to evacuate animals. I drove up the highway, fire licking up the mountain to my right and thought “what am I you doing?”

For the next several weeks, a series of events took me out of work. Mudslides blocked the highway. I had a flu that went on for ten-days. The day the flu cleared up; I slipped a disk in my back getting up from the couch.

As each of these things happened and kept me away from work, I was frustrated, angry and anxious. I was tempted to give into my anger, to believe that God had abandoned me. I cried out to him, “God, don’t you know I need to go and solve these problems?”

But then something happened. As I laid there, unable to move, I saw that all these challenges coming at once weren’t an accident. They were an invitation. As I listened to soothing worship music and scripture, my conversations with God began to sound different. I asked, “What are you trying to tell me through these experiences?”

He showed me that I no longer had to see myself through the lens of hard work. That anxiety induced motivation had diminishing returns. It no longer served me or the people I loved. It wasn’t the job that had me bending over backwards, driving into fires to please people, it was me choosing to work from a place of anxiety.

It was time to say “no” to striving, people pleasing, and obsessive, worrying thoughts disguised as problem- solving. While hard work had served me well, it was time to let the anxiety go.

To do that, I had to feel secure and replace my anxiety driven motivation with a motivation stemming from a higher purpose.

God helped me do this by changing my thought patterns in three key areas: identity, worthiness, and boundaries.

1. Identity:

Work used to be a major part of my identity. What I did, my title, promotions, and recognition. All of those things are good but they don’t make me who I am.

Alan Fadling, author of An Unhurried life, a book that was crucial to this period of my life, wrote:

“What we do is an expression of who we are; what we do does not establish who we are.”

I see now that my identity isn’t in who I am or what I do, it’s in whose I am.

I am a beloved child of God. Because Jesus is my Lord and Savior the righteousness of Christ has been transferred to me. The bible says I’m a co-heir with Christ. Even before Christ performed one miracle or healing, God declared he was well pleased. And according to the bible, God feels that way about me (and you!).

2. Worthiness:

Because my identity was tied to work, I looked to work to give me a sense of worthiness. This was exacerbated by childhood wounds. God used this time of rest and reflection to slowly but deeply, heal me from the shame of abuse, neglect, and poverty.

3. Boundaries:

Did you know that whatever you do in worry, you can choose to do in peace? I’m not saying it’s easy, but we can retrain our brains. It gets easier with practice.

We can stop unhealthy comparison. I spent years comparing myself to others who seemed to be able to have more rest. Lamenting that I didn’t have more rest. I finally landed on yes, God offers the gift of rest, but I was the one standing in the way of receiving it.

In addition to boundaries on my time, I had to put boundaries on my mind, not allowing work issues to occupy my thoughts. I became aware that problem-solving thoughts, though well-intentioned, if left unchecked, quickly became worrisome and anxiety provoking.

Have you noticed, when you’re worried, it’s harder to see the goodness, prosperity, and blessings you already have? It’s also harder to pray. But it’s vital we keep pressing into it.

I still work hard. But now that my identity and worthiness are in the right place, I don’t feel ashamed or guilty about setting boundaries.

Questions to reflect on:

Where is your identity
Where are you looking to find worthiness?
Is it time to review your boundaries?
Is there a specific area of boundaries, maybe your time, or maybe your thoughts, that you can focus on improving?

There’s so much more I want to explore about this so please keep tuning into this season of The All Gifts Podcast where we are focusing on women, work, and faith.

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