Your career is important to you -- it helps you feel productive and it lets you provide for your family. Unfortunately, work can also stress you out so badly that it ends up killing you!

Workplace stress is blamed for 120,000 deaths per year and can cause damage to your immune system, induce post-traumatic stress disorder, aggravate inflammatory disorders, and increase depression. To help you find ways to cope with the stress from your job, consider trying a few "home remedies" based on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) techniques.

*What Is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy?

CBT focuses on helping improving mental health by shifting your thoughts and feelings away from the self-criticism and negativity that can flood modern life (especially places of employment). It helps you live your best life and do your best work, while simultaneously reducing your stress.

What Are Some Methods You Can Use?

1. Prioritize Your Work

Simply diving into work each morning without a plan can feel good out the start but end up feeling bad at the end. It's a chaotic approach that can leave you in a disorganized mess. Take a few moments and prioritize the tasks that you have. Be realistic about what you can actually accomplish in a day and let everything else that doesn't fit into your list for that day go (for now). Everything will eventually make it onto your list.

2. Take Breaks

Do you find yourself working through breaks and eating lunch at your desk? You're probably not really being productive. Take regular breaks to refresh your mind and clear your thoughts so you don't get overwhelmed. Take a quick walk around the building, go make a cup of coffee, or spend a few minutes just deep breathing in a stairwell somewhere or back room to ground yourself.

3. Focus On What You Control

Catastrophic thinking is what often leads to stress -- and catastrophic thinking never helps anybody. Sure, the sun could blink out or a meteor could crash, but you can't do anything about those things. Focusing on the fact that you're powerless against them is negative thinking to the max and non-productive. It's the same with work. Sure, a major client could decide to leave or a project could end up flopping when it's released to the public, but you can't control those things. All you can control is what you are doing, right now. Focus on doing it to the best of your ability.

What If You Need More Help?

Nobody expects you to learn to manage the process of handling your work stress overnight. It often takes coaching and practice. There are therapists who are trained to help people learn how to reduce their work anxiety and balance their lives. If you're struggling to keep your head afloat and your thoughts out of negative places at work, consider work stress therapy as an option. Reach out to a clinic, such as Darling Psychology, for more information.