Does Stress Manage You, or Do You Manage It?
This vulnerable reflection unpacks the hidden cost of overachievement and why learning to say no might be the most powerful yes you ever give yourself.
Serious question — and I genuinely welcome your thoughts in the comments. I’ll be honest: right now, it still feels like stress manages me more than I manage it.
Last year, I threw myself into books and podcasts trying to understand how to deal with stress. By my birthday month in 2024, stress had become chronic and started affecting me physically. That’s when I become curious about the concept of managing stress and more importantly, figuring out what actually worked for me. If I could master this, I truly believe that it would unlock a whole new level of self-growth (which I’m obsessed with).
To my surprise, I handle unpredictable, short-term stress well. I can react, problem-solve, and quickly regulate my emotions – postponing the emotional processing for later. But the stress that lingers, the kind I know won’t be resolved quickly, that’s a different story. When I look at it with my project management eyes, it’s like the difference between a task and a long-term project. Ad-hoc stress feels like a task, I solve it and move on. But long-term stress? That’s the project that hangs over me, the one I wake up dreading because it takes time for it to be complete.
One of the most important things I’ve learned so far is this: for me, it starts with saying no — or at least saying, “Let me think about it.”
If you're an overachiever (I am), you probably know the rush of saying yes. The rush when you help someone, take on more work, or show up for a friend. That “yes” gives me a dopamine hit. But I’ve realized that sometimes, my yes isn’t about the friend or task at all. It’s a way to avoid doing what I need to do. Saying yes became a way to escape my own responsibilities.
And maybe you’ve done this too:
You say yes to extra work to avoid problems at home.
You say yes to social plans because you don’t want to be alone with your thoughts.
You say yes to endless scrolling or replying to texts, instead of facing your personal to-do list.
Sometimes, we are the ones actively contributing to our own stress. For me, learning to say no or not defaulting to yes has been a game changer. But the truth is, it’s also why I’m not as far along in this process as I thought I’d be. Because while I know what I need to do, I’m not doing it consistently.
People describe me as always busy, someone whose calendar you have to get on in advance, a person that gets things done, and someone that you can rely on. But what others praise, I internally criticize, because the result is no longer fruitful. I’m resting, yet exhausted. Smiling, yet unhappy. Producing, yet unfulfilled. Celebrated as a great friend, yet feeling like a fraud. I finish one project – receive positive feedback – yet I dread the next one. Not because I don’t enjoy seeing the ones I love happy or not because I don’t enjoy the work that I do, I’m simply doing too much, literally.
As a former people-pleaser and a current chronic overachiever, I know that this mindset has its benefits — but if left to its own devices, the consequences of being an over-achiever can take a serious toll on your mental and physical health. I can organize, prioritize, and even ignore what’s not urgent today. But none of that will help me reach what I truly want: to be free. Not free from stress, because that’s impossible but free from the weight that stress puts on my shoulders because I don’t know how to manage it. In 2024, it started to feel like I couldn’t breathe — like I was doing but not being. Achieving, but not existing. Receiving wisdom but not applying it.
I’ve seen some progress this year. My “no’s” have made the load a little lighter but I know myself … the progress I’ve made is not my best. I haven’t been working on this as actively as I was telling myself I had. The vulnerable truth? Being busy feeds my self-esteem.
When I was in my single-digits I learned that accomplishments brought me love and attention. “I’m proud of you,” or “I love you” typically followed something I did. I’ve noticed it now in my own parenting, praising what my child has accomplished and forgetting to say, “I’m proud of you,” for no apparent reason. When a parent says that it shouldn’t take a child off guard. If it does then we are not saying it enough, if you’re a parent, I want you to try this and see what happens.
That part of me though, the doer, there is a piece of that which is innate. But there is also a piece that was nurtured. And like any seed, it grew. Now, its roots are so large that it’s started to choke out the other plants in my garden — my creativity, emotional regulation, and peace. In trying to be everywhere and do everything, I’ve started to feel shaky on other skills I’ve worked hard to master. I did what I told myself was my best, to avoid the truth of what doing less was bringing up for me: there’s a part of me that doesn’t want to let go. A part that craves the dopamine hit of being praised, appreciated, and productive.
When you tie your identity to what you do, managing stress becomes nearly impossible. Because what you’ve now done is you’ve attached yourself to the task, to the approval of others, or to the results and outcome. Stress becomes who you are and it’s hard to manage something you’ve allowed to define you.
Instead of thinking, “I’m going to complete this task,” the mindset shifts to, “I have to do this perfectly, or I’m worthless. If I can’t do it well, what’s the point in doing it at all?” Uh okay, definitely not a sentence we would say to anyone we love. Yet, we will say it to ourselves.
It’s impossible to simply be when your self-worth is wrapped up in do.
For me, learning to say no with intentionality and mindfulness is the first step toward unlocking the potential in myself that I see. It's the key to facing the real work I’ve been avoiding: detaching my self-worth from productivity, from approval, and from outcomes. Instead, attach it to who I am when I am simply being, who I am when I’m at peace.
This may not be your exact story, but I know somewhere in this, you’ve seen yourself. You’ve remembered a time where stress was in the driver’s seat. Or where you avoided what you needed to do by chasing what you wanted in the moment.
I’ll always be a doer — that’s my default. But my hope for this year is that I begin to direct that “doing” more intentionally. That I learn to pour my energy into the things that actually produce the kind of fruit I’m truly seeking. I have a feeling that by prioritizing this I’ll achieve more than my mind can imagine.