Back to Work Anxiety

Whether you’re returning from a career break, maternity leave, a period of sickness or even a short holiday, feelings of anxiety may start to arise as you make the transition back to work. This summer of course, droves of women are contemplating the move back to their workplace after months of remote working. 

Managing anxiety about returning to work after coronavirus lockdown

Anxiety around the return to work after the coronavirus lockdown has become a common phenomenon, and for good reason. Quite frankly women have had a tough time of it during the pandemic, some even having to take voluntarily furlough and pause their careers in order to replace childcare. We’ve seen anxiety and stress around returning to work, and social anxiety too, bubbling up in our community for a while and women’s mental health has been suffering as a result.

Specifically, to describe this unique phenomenon, re-entry anxiety is the term being used to describe the stress related to the fear of being unable to adapt to pre-pandemic routines. Because, let’s face it, we were in lockdown, and almost lockdown, for so long that we’ve normalised this kind of living, and which is why returning to the office is a big adjustment for some.

Change is fundamentally scary, so heading back to work, and the unknown, is naturally unnerving. As the mind naturally seeks out threat in order to plan for it, we’re likely to picture our work routines, and social life, and just focus on all the scary stuff. This is just what our brains do sometimes! However there are things you can do to manage anxiety about returning to work.

The effects of anxiety in the workplace

Although a healthy amount of anxiety can keep you alert and vigilant, more often than not, workplace anxiety may also impact your stress levels and sometimes self-esteem too. It can also have a knock on effect in other ways. Some of the effects of anxiety in the workplace might include:

Avoidance or procrastination
Distracted feelings 
Being unable to focus
A lack of confidence in your abilities
Indecisiveness
Feelings of stress
Low mood.

How to plan for your return

How can you deal with this anxiety? With your first day back to work in mind, here are just a few things you can try to help with any job anxiety you may have around returning to the workplace.

Managing worries: What’s worrying you about being back at work? Make a list on the left-hand side of the page. On the right, make a list of the things that would help you to feel more at ease about your worries.

Speak to your employer: One you’ve mapped out your concerns and started to look at ways to overcome these worries, if need be, speak to your line manager about how she or he may be able to help you make the transition. Be open and honest – this transparency is likely to take a weight off your shoulders. Hopefully your manager may also support you in other ways too.

Practice mindful moments: The body keeps the score. When you think about returning to work again, where do you feel it? Nervous, fluttering tummy? Excited, buzzing head? Start noticing, show some kindness to those feelings, and sit with them if you can. Remember, anxious feelings are natural. 

Turn anxiety into excitement: Reimagine your experience. Noticing these feelings of ‘fear’ as opportunities to turn anxiety and nervousness into that of excitement instead! This is a super-helpful cognitive hypnotherapy hack. Simply visualise how you’d like your first day, week, month working from the office/workplace to go, include the location and all the detail. Focus on what you can influence: your responses rather than the other person e.g. you feeling confident, the excitement of grabbing a coffee and croissant before work, seeing your friends at work and the prospect of post-work cocktails. Basically, draw upon all the things you’ve missed and potential moments of joy. Repeat this every night before you go to bed.

Download thoughts into a journal: Try journaling for 10 minutes every day about how you’re feeling about being psychically back at work again, what it means to you, the pluses and minuses, and your hopes. This is a good thing to try before bed, it frees up your mind and can help with sleep.

How can Clementine help?

As many of you will know, we have heaps of helpful hypnotherapy sessions on the app to support you with anxiety and stress. Plus, to specifically help with back to work anxiety, we launched Therapy for Work, a new series designed to support working women transitioning back to the workplace following furlough and remote working during Covid-19. Though all these sessions are super useful for anyone with general workplace anxiety not necessarily related to the pandemic.

Subscribers to the app can access some of the new Therapy for Work content for free, which consists of a series of bite-sized hypnotherapy sessions that help women reframe their mindset around returning to work and ‘normal’ life, to one of positivity. Content is conveniently mapped out in a typical work day, so there is no need to carve out any extra time to benefit from the sessions. You can even listen to these sessions before your first day back to work. 

Here are some of our highlights - the content which teaches you how to deal with anxiety includes sessions:

Positively visualising your day: Before work, ideal on the commute
SOS content for overwhelming moments: During work, for when you need to dash to the ladies!
Managing social anxiety: During work for 'planned' breaks in your day
Creating healthy boundaries: Suitable for any time of day
Winding down from the office day: After work evening session to bookend your day, ideal for the commute home.

The Therapy for Work sessions use simple but powerful cognitive hypnotherapy methods, such as visualisation, to help people recognise these so called ‘threats’ as opportunities and turn feelings of anxiety and nervousness into that of excitement instead!

Specific sessions from Clementine that will help

Below we’ve mapped out some of the ways you can deal with anxiety using Clementine and our new Therapy for Work content. 

Firstly, to help with back to work anxiety, you might like to start by checking out the app’s home page where you’ll find, Morning Sessions. Each of these are only 3 minutes and use butterfly tapping, a super effective technique that’s handy to learn. We talk you through the process, so it’s dead easy. One little session can be easily squeezed in when you first wake up and still dozing in bed or when you’re having breakfast.

Before Leaving the House

Then, you might like to head to the new Therapy for Work section and go to, Before Leaving the House, and look for these short visualisation and coaching sessions: 

My Day, My Way (4 mins): For preparing to have the best possible day simply by visualising what you want out of it.

I Speak With Confidence (4 mins): For when you need confidence to speak up, know your worth and communicate what’s on your mind.

My Life is One of a Kind (4 mins): For when you need a day free of the stress and bitterness that comes from comparing ourselves to others.

I Am Productive (4 mins): For those busy periods when you need to remain in control of your time to feel and be productive. 

Try listening to these every day for 2 weeks. For preparing you to have the best possible day simply by visualising what you want out of it.

Travelling to Work

These sessions are particularly great at tackling topics that you might be worried about in terms of your day ahead. They help you to get your mindset into a healthy place so you can tackle whatever the day throws at you, whilst you are at work!

Before returning to the office, during your commute you might like to choose the: Travelling to Work section, and here you’ll find sessions you can do either walking to work or on your commute, which is super cool. 

They include: 

Visualise Your Work Day (19 mins): Listen to this session to set-up your best possible work day. Visualise how you want to show up and how you want it to play out.

Ditch Colleague Comparison (13 mins): Listen to this session if you want help ditching the destructive habit of comparing yourself to friends and colleagues. Your worth is not defined by the success, appearance or belongings of others.

Communicate With Confidence (16 mins): Listen to this session if you want to feel more solid or at ease in meetings, more comfortable delivering presentations or to boost your confidence when talking to small groups or with specific individuals.

Be Productive Not Busy (16 mins): Listen to this session when you are busy but feel like you aren’t getting all the things done. Sometimes it’s not the number of hours spent at work which matter, but how you use them.

Scheduled Breaks

Taking a break at work is soooo important to help you get some perspective. Our range of sessions for breaks range from 6 minutes. Step outside for some fresh air or listen to them in the loo for a much-needed break and to reset. 

Recharge Your Mind (12 mins): For when you feel tired, overwhelmed, or are struggling to focus. Your mind is incredible but to work at its best it needs some love. Take a break to recharge, so you can trust your mind to handle it.

Take a Breather (7 mins): For when you want to relax quickly and get a bit of piece and quiet. A great combo with a bath to help you unwind. A brilliant way to relax your whole body and mind. Ahhh!

Let Go Of The Chatter (6 mins): For when your mind is being particularly unhelpful and you can’t stop ruminating about things in the past or even imaginary scenarios that might never happen. We help you interrupt that and get back to focusing on the here and now.

Power Nap & Recharge (20 mins): For those ‘I NEED  a coffee’ moments when your energy is lacking but you want to recharge and boost your energy in a natural way. This session really works! You’ll feel refreshed and ready to take on the day afterwards.
Travelling Home

Our Wrap Up Your Work Day (16 mins) session is amazing at helping you to park the stuff that happened during the day. You can do this walking or commuting. Wrap up your day and mentally distance yourself from the day’s events by listening to a cleansing guided visualisation. Reclaim your personal time and leave work at work.

So many people struggle with this. Finding a way to let go of all the stuff that happened at work. Ruminating thoughts, putting distance between yourself and your work so that you can enjoy your personal time. Let’s face it, you’ve earned it!