You have been directed to this page because the answers you gave in the reflective questionnaire suggest that you may be having difficulty resting and recovering after work.
Work-related stress and exhaustion are serious problems in many societies. At the present time, people are experiencing addtional stressors due to concerns about their health or that of their friends and family, and the stresses of having to adapt to remote working during the COVID19 lockdown and social distancing measures.
Being able to detach from work and other stressors during non-work time, are important for workers’ health and well-being. Rest and recovery are necessary factors for avoiding a build up of work-related stress and for feeling prepared for the next day of work. In order to do this we adopt strategies to help us take our mind off the things that are worrying us. – we have to actively try to change our emotional state for the better. This is called emotion regulation and often involves what experts call “down-regulation,” or willfully reducing the intensity of emotions.
It turns out that our technology can help us here too. In this situation, many of us engage in what we call “digital emotion regulation” – the use of a smartphone, videogame or other technology to distract yourself, to relieve stress, to block thoughts of failure, to focus on a success, to seek alternative perspectives on a troubling situation or to share your emotions with others via social media.
We have prepared resources to help you improve your recovery experiences by using digital tools. These include:
- Recover by playing videogames
- Reduce blue light at night
- Recover using music and soundscapes
- Recover by using digital technology to support social contact
- Recover by using technology to support physical activity
