10 Top Tips for Harvest From Stress to Strength Series Wrap up

As the headers start rolling and the to-do lists stretch longer than the days, it’s easy to feel stretched thin.
In this final episode of From Stress to Strength: Navigating Life on the Land — a series proudly supported by Ski for Life — Steph Schmidt wraps up the 10-part journey with her Top 10 Tips for navigating harvest, end-of-year pressure, and everything in between.

From noticing early warning signs of stress to holding onto the AND (the reminder that we can love the life we live and still find it hard), this episode pulls together the biggest lessons from across the series — the practical, real-life tools that help farmers, families, and communities move from stress to strength.

Steph also shares updates about the Farm Life Handbook, an online hub of videos, tools, and tip sheets to help you fill your silo and find your AND through every season.

In this episode you’ll hear:

• Why noticing stress early makes the biggest difference
• How to check your capacity (and give yourself permission to let go)
• The power of teamwork and repair during high-pressure times
• Sleep, communication, and micro-moments that refill your tank
• A gentle reminder that you’re human — and that’s enough

👉 Explore more tools and tip sheets at www.farmlifehandbook.com.au

🎧 Tune in wherever you get your podcasts, and share this episode with someone who could use a reminder that they’re not alone this harvest.

Disclaimer:
From Stress to Strength shares general wellbeing strategies and is not a substitute for professional advice.
If you or someone you know is in crisis, please contact Lifeline 13 11 14, Suicide Call Back Service 1300 659 467, Beyond Blue 1300 22 4636, or 000 in an emergency.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Sometimes we do have to consciously put down the glass balls so that we can keep juggling the plastic balls. Back to the From Stress to Strength series, a special series of the Farm Life Side with Steph Schmidt Podcast. If you've been following along for this 10-part series, you may have noticed another accidental break over the past couple of weeks. But we're here now. Here is our final episode, episode 10. We have started harvest. I've also had a bit of work going on over the last few weeks, and I realised today it was probably now or never to jump on and record. So here we are. If you are new to the podcast, welcome. Really glad you're here. I am Steph. I'm a psychologist by training. I spend most of my time farming with my husband and our three young boys in the midnorth of South Australia with another property in the valley, and yes, I am equally someone who is right here alongside of you, navigating that travel of farming life, and here whether you are already weeks into harvest, starting harvest, maybe not even harvest, but this time of year is it's a busy, stressful one. Um so today's episode is a bit of a series wrap-up. Um for me it's going to be the season wrap-up, uh the wrap-up of the podcast for 2025 at this stage. You know, like who knows with me? I might decide to throw it around episode in a couple of weeks' time because that maybe is not a strong point. But at this stage it is the wrap-up for the end of the year. Um so what I'm intending is just to share with you, if you've been listening, hopefully you've taken away some strategies. We've we've covered a lot over this series. I hope we've looked at capacity, we've looked at stress, um, relationships, parenting, movement, food, or I guess the what are the basics of what we very much often forget about, especially when our stress does that. So this episode is really going to be aimed at uh a bit of a ten-top tips, uh, wrapping up some of the messages that I've shared, and then yeah, go back and have a listen to any of the previous episodes. I'd love to hear from you what has resonated with you so far, which episodes you've loved, um, which episodes you want more of. I'll reflect a little bit on this at the end because it's amusing, but um yeah, I'm still working out what 2026 looks like. I really I enjoy recording the podcast, it always feels a bit awkward getting into it, but once I'm in the swing, I feel like I'm just here to have two friends out there. So it probably will come back in some way, shape, or form. I've been and yeah, okay, I'm gonna hold those thoughts and I'll come back to what next year might look like at the end. Now we'll dive into 10 top tips to carry through, whether it's harvest, whether it is just end of year, um, or beyond as well. So, number one is noticing early, noticing your stress, noticing how you're going, noticing how you're traveling as early as possible. I guess I share this one from experience, both just when the everyday stress builds up, but also from personal times when I have kind of gone down that slippery slope with postnatal depression other times, and I feel like there's this fine line, a slippery slope of awareness where we're coasting along doing okay, then we start to slide and we know that that stress is building, we we have that awareness that the stress is building, and if we don't take action at that kind of midpoint and start to kind of realize that maybe we're not doing so well or maybe we're not coping so well, we can slide down further pretty quickly, and then whether we do kind of fall into a place of depression, anxiety, um, chronic stress, more into that kind of heavier place of mental health issues, once we're there, that noticing is so much harder, and oh, this is a whole episode on its own. But once we do get into that space, our negative biases get stronger, we're more likely to see lots of things as being everyone else's fault, not ours, um, a whole gamut of stuff. So, starting off with that early warning noticing signs. I'm gonna make sure I link some resources in in the show notes for this one because I've also got an online hub, the Farm Life Handbook. So I'll link in there a page you can go to which has got a whole heap of stress signposts. Have a look at it, print it off. You might look through it and you go, oh, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. Um, if that's the case, I'm there with you. Take care of yourself, notice it, and do those little tiny micro moments. One of the things that's been a big takeaway in a lot of the workshops I've been running lately is that it's the micro moments that count. Um so notice where your stress level's at, notice where how you're traveling, and then take some micro moments. It might just be notice your feet on the ground, it might be switching off phones and devices that little bit earlier at night or having a phone-free day. It might be knowing that the farm is going to be really full on. So, what are the little things that you can say no to? The earlier we notice what our stress is, the easier it is to do something about it. And I guess that feeds into overlapping with number two, so checking in on our capacity, not just our to-do list and everything that we've got to get done. There's always more to do on the farm, there's almost more that we'd like to be doing within our relationships or for our kids or within our businesses, um, but checking in on what our capacity is. So it comes back again to that fill your silo analogy that first notice how full, how empty your silo is, and then what's your capacity? If you're sitting out empty, then your capacity today might be to get the three loads of washing packed away. That was my job before I did this podcast. And the kind of cool thing is, if you reduce that task twist down to one thing, recognize that you're at low capacity, and then do that one thing, it's gonna bounce your capacity up a little bit more, so then you can move on to the next thing. Look, sometimes it might not be, it might be that you get to very, very low capacity, you do the bare minimum to get yourself through, and then you give yourself permission to go and watch Netflix. That's okay. Um, but recognizing what that capacity is then can help us check in on what we actually can do. And look, we are moving, slamming into harvest. Literally, the wheels fell off yesterday, uh, wheel fell off the header. Um, and it's a time when sometimes the needs, the demands might outweigh our capacity. Um, again, that recognition, that noticing then one helps us cut ourselves a little bit of slack, gives ourselves a little bit of compassion to recognise that we're we're turning up to do the best we can, but the demands that we're faced under might be exceeding our capacity. It might then be again checking in on what can I do? Can I do a pre-packaged meal order to stock the fridge with pre-packaged meals? So that's one thing that I don't have to do. Um, can like do we just do more lunch orders to get through the end of the term? Whatever it might be, check your capacity, do a bit of a comparison of what needs to get done, and then work out is there something that can get taken off the list? Is there something you can let go of, or is recognizing that the demands are exceeding your capacity just that reminder to give yourself a bit of grace and to give each other and everyone around you a little bit of grace, which feeds into number three remembering you're on the same team. So I touched on this a bit in the parenting and the relationships episode, and I think it's something we need the reminder of even more as the pressures build up in times like harvest. Whether it's your intimate relationship, whether it's your immediate family as parents and kids, whether you are working alongside your mum and dad on the farm, whether you're working alongside brothers or sisters, your farming team with employees, during high pressure situations, all of us are stretched so thin. Um, as that stress builds up, as ten the tension builds, it's really easy to see each other as the problem. Again, that negative bias comes in. We kind of detect neutral, tired faces to being more likely to be threats. Um, so often it's easy to see everything else that everyone else is doing as being the problem, but sometimes that might be the pressure and the stress that we're under talking. So having that reminder to yourself, to each other, taking a breath that we are on the same team, and that reminder that we are all doing the best we can in the situation we're in, and that applies for yourself, your partner, your kids, parents, everyone around you. Um, and I guess as part of that, coming back to the important of repair, ruptures are going to happen. I would put a million dollars on it. There will always be ruptures. Whether you're on farm or not, there will be ruptures. Put farming, put harvest, put end of year into that. There'll probably be a few more ruptures in there, but get into it and put in some repair. It might be sending a text, um, it might be taking a breather in that heat of the moment to recognise that you're not having the healthiest conversation right now, giving each other a bit of grace, and then coming back to it when you're both in a place to talk about it. Sometimes that repair might look completely different for different people. So it might be a text to say, Hey, I'm thinking of you. It might be um when you drop in getting someone else a cup of tea at the same time as you get your own. For those that aren't carrying the household load, it might be putting the dishes away if that's not something that you usually do, just those little moments, little and it's hard. I get it, like it's it's hard when we are all carrying a load, but again, starting tiny, really, like just make those repairs. It might just be reaching out and touching someone on the shoulder. Okay, so remembering we're on the same team and doing those repairs in number four is recognizing how vital sleep is, which again is really tricky during the high pressure seasons of harvest, and I guess this comes into the team part, recognizing that for some, if you're out on the header, as much as we all try and work into the Ochealth safety guidelines and all of that kind of stuff, there will be long days, there'll be 14-hour days. Um, but we don't expect the headers to run on empty, you're always going to refuel the header with fuel in the morning when you go down the blow-down machinery checklist routine. Your body's the same, we can't run it completely on empty. So if you're if you're out working on the machines, it might be making sure if you're not getting enough hours each night, doing a 20-minute nap during the day as a top-up. Um, if you're the one at home holding a halt home for I know something I've struggled with over the years, when my husband's out working late hours, it might be because there's lots of jobs to do at home, or it might be almost that feeling of guilt if I go to bed early, but it is 100-200% okay for someone to be getting enough sleep and maybe even prioritizing it even more. Because again, if you've topped your tank up a little higher, you're putting a buffer zone in if your partner's is getting a bit lower. Sleep means you're gonna have a bit more patience, you're gonna have a a bit more steadiness, you're going to be able to have that empathy with other people. I'm gonna put that in silent. Um, and I guess watching those late-night habits as well. If you are the one at home, so often that bit of bedtime revenge creeps in that you've got the kids to bed, you've got the dishes done, you've got the meals prepped for the next day, and then you sit and start scrolling on the phone or watch a Netflix episode. A little bit of a reminder to give yourself permission to do that wind down, to head to bed. Um, and sometimes even if you can't get to sleep, again, check back in on the sleep episode. I shared some strategies to help with sleep when our bodies can't wind down as well. So, sleep is fuel to top ourselves up. Importantly, we need to make sure we're fueling ourselves properly during the day as well. So, really, the bare basics, making sure we are eating as much decent nutritious food as we can. Um, and again, make it as simple as possible. So, I'm not a nutritionist, a dietitian by any means, but make sure you're getting some protein in, throw in some nuts or whatever it might be, not just another handful of lollies or packet of shapes. That reminder, we take care of our machines, we need to take care of ourselves, making sure you're hydrating with water. Um, and again, this applies on the home front as well. So, often for those of us who are navigating the home load looking after kids, often you making sure everyone else is fed and forgetting about you. So, this is your reminder: make sure you're eating, you're drinking water. Um, moving your body in little amounts when you can as well. Those really core foundations to top your body up. Number six, I think, applies especially during harvest, um, but whatever this kind of peak stressful times might be, and for it's really that reminder of letting go of the non-essentials. Um, letting go, and often this analogy comes up of the glass balls that we're juggling glass and plastic balls. And it's often talked about that we kind of need to make sure we don't let go of the glass balls, but when I read further into the analogy, it was that reminder that sometimes we can't juggle all the things, sometimes we do have to consciously put down the glass balls so that we can keep juggling the plastic balls. So I'm just trying to think of an example within farming. For one person, the farm, its success, that might be a glass ball, that's one that they're holding on to. For another person, the farm might not be the glass ball. The relationships, the kids the kids' um success in schooling or the kids taking part in sport and community events, that might be a glass ball, something they really value. But the reality of holding the glass ball of farming and the glass ball of community engagement, that might be really tricky to juggle, especially during harvest. So you might make that conscious decision to put down the glass ball of community engagement, recognize that your kids' sport might be a bit hit and miss during harvest, but you're making that choice to put it down. The same taking care of the house. We all know that having a clean house helps us have a clean mind, yada yada. But sometimes the house might be messy, you might live out of the laundry baskets. Hell everyone might be just wearing their dirty farm clothes three days straight. Um remembering to message a friend on their birthday might end up being a message a week later. Sometimes we do for all of the things that we're carrying, we don't get to turn up as who we truly want to be. And instead of trying to carry all of that glass balls, all the plastic balls, it's consciously letting go of some of that stuff because honestly, yeah, during harvest, it does take priority over pretty much everything else. Alright, well, this is not a 15-minute episode. That's okay. Maybe if you're getting through it, jump in and listen to the rest later. Anyway, number seven, a reminder to keep communication simple and kind. This is kind of communication with others and maybe communication with ourselves as well to bring that kindness in there. Um, I think recognising coming back to that capacity check-in, the reality is everyone's capacity is going to be start start to run low. Everyone's tanks, everyone's bins, whatever we want to say, it's all gonna start to run low. So being as simple as we can, um, bringing it back, remembering all of those guidelines of one question at a time, um assuming the best in each other as well. I think what we can find is so often people might make clear requests, like, okay, I don't know whether I share this or not. No, let's delete that. Um sometimes when communication is sure and simple, the interpreter of it can actually take that as, especially if everyone's tired and tense, can take it as being a criticism or an accusation. So both as the kind of listener, talker, communicator, responder, whatever what we want to say, remembering to assume the best in each other, being specific in what we want, don't let things kind of fester in the background where then the resentment builds up. Um, I think so often we do assume that everyone's carrying so much, so we don't want to put more on each other, but sharing the load, sharing what's going on in our minds. Um, but probably if in doubt, do pause before you speak and think and reflect on things. Remembering that appreciation key as well. Again, as stress builds up, probably often we're all just trying to get the job done. We may start feeling underappreciated, so then we probably forget to show that appreciation. But remembering that change starts within ourselves, we can have all of these hopes, expectations of how we want other people to show up. The reality is the only thing we control is our behaviors, our actions, how we choose to do it. Number and I think part of that communication, going to kind of combine it, communication, and connection. So bringing again back into those little moments you might have long hours apart, finding those ways of building in that social connection, whether it is with your partner, sending a text, quick phone call to check in and see how they're going, share a little bit of your day, remembering to connect socially as well. You might not have time for that couple after school drop-off. But can you send a voice message to a friend that they can get back to in a time that suits with them? When you've had those mornings where everything's gone pear-shaped, taking that 30 seconds with the kids before they head off to school to have a hug if they still let you. Taking that few minutes extra before they go to bed to have a hug, say goodnight, have a cuddle, bringing those routines of connections back in as well. So those little moments of connection, no matter how full-on the times are, those those connections keep us connected. Connections keep us connected, those connections can keep us going. Um I think I'm kind of at eight. Um, and for eight, I would add in make sure you're moving, uh, finding the smallest way to move your body. It's such I think we all know how vital it is for managing our stress and and improving our health, but often we overestimate what we need to do, and yes, absolutely, getting 10,000 steps, getting 15,000 steps is fantastic, but you might have times where you are in the header for 12 hours a day, or you are you have to go on a parts run and then you're in the car for four hours. So all of a sudden being able to go for a 30-minute walk feels undoable. Instagram has recently been showing me lots of these reels of like this Chinese medicine movement, which is literally like one minute of jumping on the ground, spinning your arms, kind of flapping your arms up and down. I don't know. I'll find one and share one. Maybe I'll get the guts and record one. I don't do it perfectly, but I've started trying to do that in the morning because it feels like a very low pressure way to just get my body moving a little bit when I'm still tired and trying to get into the day. And it might just be a three minute thing. And I think those again, it comes back to those micro moments. So it might be when you're fueling up the header, instead of standing there scrolling on your phone, you go for a couple laps around a ute or do challenge yourself. I was thinking, I'm like, oh, I should do a squats challenge to see how many squats people can get in through harvest. If you want to hit jump on that one, let me know. Um, but just finding all of those tiny ways of incidental exercise. Um, keep your phone away because it is the time suck that we pick up. Um, I find it the best thing when I'm in a paddock with no service, so when I've got those spare minutes, I have to do something else. So just those really little moments, micro moments of movement, which again just help fill your tank. Number nine is that reminder to reach out early for yourself, for people around you. And again, I will link in resources in South Australia. If you're listening from SA, I feel like since we first started talking about the drought like 18 months ago, it has, and that's how governments work, taken that amount of time for all of the supports and resources to be in place, but they are now there. So there I'll link the SA Government resource page, but there are now one-to-one counsellors available across South Australia, both face-to-face, or they can chat to you on the phone. Um, there are online resources. There's the the Farm Life Handbook Hub, which I've got online. So, from that range of things that you can kind of check in and a bit of self-help things that you can do, but also down to the range of giving a fab mentor a call or linking in with a face-to-face counsellor because sometimes we can know all the things in the world, but we need someone to come beside us or work with us to help put it into place. And I will reinforce till the day I die the importance of checking in with ourselves and taking care of ourselves. Then it is also that checking in with people around us and and watching out for those signs in people we care about. If they've started, if that stress really has started to build up, if things aren't looking okay for them, and again, you don't need to have the answers, you do not need to step in and be their counsellor. When we get to that point when we're really struggling, it's actually hard to talk about what's going on. Maybe it's easy for some people, but it's never been easy for me. So if there's someone you care about, maybe find a way to connect, but just do the things that you'd usually do together. Or if there's someone you care about but you don't know how to reach out, reach out to one of the fab mentors and they can contact that person for you. So we've we do have services around, it's not that we're in this service black hole. Yes, there are still so many challenges there, but we've actually got services, and I guess part of me knows these services at this point are only available till June 2026. The more we jump on them and actually utilize them, be aware of them, more likely we can get more support for them. Okay, and finally, um that reminder of holding on to the and my husband Keith said a while ago, maybe I should do an and campaign through Harvest. I don't know my capacity to actually run a campaign, but I might just be jumping on doing little social media things because it sometimes helps me remind it. But if you followed me through this year, you'll know that the and has been my word of the year. Um, I'm actually considering getting a tattoo of it because I don't want to let it go. It's been such a vital reminder. I still forget it. I honestly do. But it's that reminder that more than one thing can be true at once. You can love the life you live and find it hard. You can be grateful for what you've got and feel exhausted. You can be proud of what you're be building and be ready for it to be over or want it to have been over already. It's not a failure, it's the reality of being human, it's the reality of farming. But the more we can kind of build that practice of holding both the struggle, the pain, the challenge, and the strength and finding those tiny moments of joy, finding those tiny moments of connection. That and it is it's how I've found my way through this year, it's probably how I'll find my way through Harvest, but it's how we can find our way through from here. So holding on to the end in there. So that's my 10 tips. Pull back to previous episodes, have a listen back. Look, to be honest, I have sometimes listened back to episodes even from a couple of years ago, and I feel a little bit I don't know, big headed, but as my husband, or as I kind of remind myself, I probably show up as the best version of myself when I'm recording these podcasts. The reality is slightly different because I'm human as well. So have a listen back. Let me know what episodes have resonated with you. In the show notes, I will put some of the other resources that are available there. So, again, a reminder if you'd like some more tools when this podcast goes on a break or whatever it looks like, check out farmlifehandbook.com.au. It's an online hub that's got a heap of videos, or you can listen to them as audios from me to remind you of these tools. You can also share them with people around you as well. There'll be videos, there's the PDFs of some of the exercises, strategies to build your flexibility to find that and to fill your silo, but also some like just tip sheets for sleep, for movement, for problem solving, for goal setting. Um, sorry, have a look. It's there for your family, for anyone who might find it helpful. I'd love it if you if you do find it helpful to share it with others as well. So, yeah, wrapping up this episode and this series, I am so grateful to uh Ski for Life for supporting this 10-part series. It has been a little bit messy in delivery, um, but thank you for sticking with me through that. I think that just also reflects the reality of how life rolls as well. Um, as I said, I'm still looking I'm constantly working out what my years will be like. I'm not really someone, and this is probably again due to the juggle and balance of farming life as well. Never know quite what the season will hold, I never know what the plans will be. Although the funny way the world works out is when I reflect back on, so say this year, the farm life handbook has rolled out across communities with support from Preventive Health, and that was first developed five years ago. And part of my goal setting was that was to see a thousand of them across Farming Essay. We're now working on the reprint for another thousand, which will mean three thousand booklets, which just it blows my mind a little bit, and I'm so grateful. But I think there's that reminder of the flexibility that we need. We can set our goals, but sometimes life gets messy. So, on that note, as I said, I haven't locked in what the podcast is going to look like. Sometimes it feels like I've kind of put it out into the ether and don't really hear back. So if you like it, if you're listening still this far along, please flick me an email or a message on socials. It always gives me a little boost to hear it. But I also, when I chat to people at workshops, it's wonderful when I hear that oh my husband's had a listen and then he's flicked it on to me, or I listen and then I've shared it to my team. Um, those things are the reason that do keep me going because I do think we need a range of resources, and podcasts are in general a helpful way. So, anyway, watch this space, it'll probably be back in some shape or form. As we wrap up, thank you again to Ski for Life for their support. Thank you for tuning in. Keep noticing, keep checking in on yourself, keep feeling your silos, even in the middle of the dust, in the challenge, in the pressure, in getting the crop in before the rain comes. You do have in you those little ways, those tiny moments to keep finding your way from stress to strength, um, and well you will always get through to the other side. As I've said, you can listen to all the previous episodes of this series, but also go back and listen to any of the past ones. So, until next time, maybe until 2026, take care of you and don't forget to fill your silo.