While it sounds silly, especially since I have a variety of construction skills, I lay awake some nights stressing about our stairs. We had gotten quotes for replacing the carpet on our stairs with white oak, but the average estimate, not including materials, was $10,000 per flight.

Three flights of stairs, at $10K per? Sounded like another job for me — except I had never remodeled stairs, and everyone I knew, including contractor friends, said I shouldn’t try.

What really stressed me out was the fact I didn’t know what I didn’t know. It’s one thing to think you know how to do something and worry about whether you can actually pull it off; it’s even more stressful to know there are things you don’t know.

So I stressed about it while we waited for the wood to arrive, and acclimate.

Sound silly? On second thought, not really. Regardless of the worthiness of the cause, if you feel stressed, you feel stressed — and studies show four in five people experience stress at work.

Including Jeff Bezos. Here’s Bezos in 2001 talking about stress:

Stress primarily comes from not taking action over something that you can have some control over. If I find that some particular thing is causing me to have stress, that’s a warning flag for me. What it means is… something is bothering me that I haven’t yet taken action on.
As soon as I identify it, and make the first phone call, or send the first email, or whatever we’re going to do to address that situation … even if it’s not solved, the mere fact we’re addressing it dramatically reduces any stress that might come from it.
Stress comes from ignoring things you shouldn’t be ignoring.

I wasn’t ignoring the stairs project (it felt like it was always lurking in the back of my mind), but I wasn’t doing anything to address the situation.

So I removed the carpet from a couple of treads and risers so I could see the stringers underneath. I got a stair jig and figured out how to use it. I got some plywood and cut a few practice pieces to start to learn how to get the fit right.

The problem wasn’t solved. The worry hadn’t gone away. But I felt a lot better about it, because taking action had helped me turn a few unknowns into knowns. I didn’t know everything I needed to know, but I was on a path to figuring it out.

Science backs up that approach. A study published in Stress and Health found that having a plan not only improves outcomes, it also reduces stress. A study published in Healthcare found that active coping strategies reduce self-perceived stress. A study published in Journal of Behavioral Medicine found that taking action significantly reduces self-perceived stress, regardless of the outcome of those actions.

Feel stressed? First, identify the source of your stress, and be specific. Maybe you’re worried about completing a project on time. Or concerned about a relationship. Or hesitant to speak up about a problem. Or unsettled by a recent conversation. Don’t settle for “I feel stressed.” Take the time to think about the reasons you feel the way you do.

Then, don’t wait until you have the problem all figured out. (If I had done that, I never would have started working on our stairs.) Come up with one or two things you can do to start to address why you feel stressed.

Then do those things.

Action will lead to action, and each step along the way you’ll feel a little better about whatever situation you face.

And a little less stressed.

Science says so.

—Jeff Haden

This article originally appeared on Fast Company’s sister website, Inc.com. 

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