How to handle stress: a five-minute plan

What is the five-minute plan?

Stress is your body getting ready for a demand. That is useful for an hour and expensive for a month. The plan does not try to switch it off, which never works. It gives the body one clear signal that the demand is being handled, and the body usually takes the hint.

1. Name it. One sentence, out loud or on paper: "I am stressed because the report is due at four and I have not started." A named worry is smaller than a vague one, because a vague one borrows weight from everything else.
2. One breath. Breathe in through your nose, then out slowly through soft lips for longer than you breathed in. Do it three times. The longer exhale is the part that matters; calm breathing (4 in, 6 out) is the pattern if you want one.
3. One small thing. Not the whole report. Open the document and write the first heading. Send the one message you are avoiding. Put the shoes by the door. Stress feeds on a task that has no first step, so give it one.
4. The longer view. Ask what this will look like on Friday, and in a year. Most stressful afternoons are forgotten by the weekend. The ones that are not are telling you something about the month, which is the last section on this page.

That is the whole plan. The rest of the page is the same four steps in the places people most often need them.

How do you handle stress at work?

Work stress is rarely one big thing. It is a day with no gaps, where each task leaks into the next and nothing gets finished cleanly. Three habits help more than any technique.

• Close one thing before the next. Thirty seconds between tasks to write down where you got to. Our post on a five-minute reset between meetings is the longer version.
• Make the list shorter, not longer. Three things for today, written down, in order. Everything else is tomorrow's list, and writing it there is what lets you stop thinking about it.
• End the day on purpose. The stress that follows you home is usually work you have not put down, not work you have not done. How to switch off after work is a routine for that.

If you work from home, the end of the day needs a marker: a walk round the block, a change of clothes, the laptop closed and put away. Without it, the evening is just a quieter shift.

What helps in the ten minutes before a meeting?

Before a meeting, a presentation or a difficult call, the body gets ready whether you ask it to or not. Your heart speeds up, your breath goes high and shallow, your mind rehearses the worst version. Do not fight it. Give it a count instead. Box breathing (in for 4, hold 4, out 4, hold 4) keeps you calm and still able to think, which a bedtime breath would not. Six rounds takes two minutes. Then one small thing: write the first sentence you will say. Box breathing before a meeting walks through the ten minutes in order.

What helps with Sunday-night dread?

Sunday-night dread is stress about a week that has not started. It is mostly two things: an unplanned Monday and a weekend that ended without a proper close. So the five-minute plan on a Sunday looks like this. Name it: "I am dreading Monday because I do not know what I am walking into." One breath. One small thing: write Monday's three things on a piece of paper, in order, and put the paper where you will see it in the morning. The longer view: by Monday lunchtime the dread is usually gone, because the week has become real and real things are easier than imagined ones. Sunday night dread has four more things for tonight and the one Monday change that shrinks it for good.

Is it burnout or a hard month?

A hard month ends. Burnout does not end when the deadline does. The difference is worth looking at honestly, because the answer to each is different. A hard month has one sign: you are tired. Burnout, as the World Health Organization describes it, has three: exhaustion that rest does not fix, growing distance or cynicism about the work, and feeling less able to do it. If you are tired but still care and can still do the job, it is probably a hard month, and the plan above plus some sleep will see you through it. If the other two signs are there, five minutes is not the answer. The answer is a conversation with your manager, a doctor, or both, and burnout or a hard month is a way to think about which conversation first.

Stress is not an illness, and this page is not medical advice. If stress is constant, or it comes with chest pain, panic, or weeks of poor sleep, see a doctor.

What does Bliss do when you are stressed?

Bliss is the voice companion in CalmSpace.ai. When the day gets heavy, you talk to her by voice or by typing, and she talks it through with you: what happened, what it is really about, what the one small thing could be. She is not a script. You can choose how she talks: listens first, warm with a little humour, or fewer reflections and practical sooner.

The part that makes a difference over a month is that she remembers. If on Monday you told her the week was about a launch and a difficult colleague, on Thursday she knows that, and you do not have to start from zero. You can see everything she remembers, pin it, correct it, mute it or delete it. The library has a 7-day program for work stress, guided meditations in her voice, and Breathe together, where up to six people breathe to one shared start time and she can guide everyone. On an iPhone with an Apple Watch she can notice while you talk whether your heart rate is climbing, steady or settling, and slow down or suggest a breath, without ever saying a number.

CalmSpace.ai is not an emergency service. If you are in crisis, the app shows crisis lines for your country, and Bliss recognises crisis language and points to real help.

Where to go next

• Mindfulness: a daily habit that makes the five-minute plan easier to reach for.
• Self-compassion: for when the stress is mostly the voice in your head.
• Sleep: stress and short nights feed each other; fix the night and the day gets lighter.
• Breathing guides: every rhythm written out, with what the research says.
• Bliss: the voice companion who talks it through and remembers.

Bliss is free to talk to for up to 10 minutes a day by voice: sign up at app.calmspace.ai or get the iPhone app. Premium is on the pricing page.

Frequently asked questions