Stress Management: A Self Help GuideWritten by Trevor Dumbleton
There have been many words written about stress management, though many people do not realize that it can be managed. In fact, stress is a scary thing but it is also a self-creating thing. The more stress you feel, less able you are to deal with things that are stressing you, causing stress to increase. This is a vicious cycle and key to stress management is to not get into it in first place. How do you do that? Well, there are many ways.One of most effective methods for managing stress is through meditation. This is a simple method of simply focusing mind on nothing instead of focusing on everything that is stressing you out. It is not some sort of mystic trance or mysterious method. In fact, it is a simple method to help you strengthen your mind and learn to focus on task at hand. Though there are many deep levels of meditation, best place to start is with simply closing your eyes and taking deep breaths while concentrating on your breathing. By paying attention to your breathing and really focusing on it, your mind will clear itself out and permit you to relax easily. This is best done every single day as a preventive measure rather than as a cure for stress. However, it can also be effective when you need to ditch some stress in a jiffy. As well, stress management is possible through simple chores or hobbies. Either building a model airplane or organizing a coin collection or cleaning kitchen will help you get your mind on a task rather than on everything that needs doing. The tasks will still be there later, but simply giving your mind something to focus on that is not stressful will help you cope with stress much better. This method of stress management is a sort of distraction for your mind. It moves your mind away from all things that are cluttering it and organizes something in your life, even if it is just your CD collection. And organizing something is a nice way to get your mind off of everything in your life that is not organized. Another way to manage stress in your mind is to take care of your body. Playing a sport, lifting weights or running is a good way to clear your mind and get healthy at same time. Going out to gym and, for instance, playing racquetball is a good way to get your mind away from things and change your focus for a little while. As well, by taking care of your body you are also cleansing toxins from your system, enabling you to clear your system of those pollutants that aren't doing your mind any good. So take care of your brain by taking care of your body and give yourself a nice little mental break.
| | Combating the Effects of StressWritten by Trevor Dumbleton
The effects of stress are many and varied and, it is now known, they are almost all entirely bad. Stress weakens system, tears down body and mind, and causes long-term health problems that have been documented in numerous studies and reports. Thus, stress is ultimately a bad thing that should be avoided. By keeping stress away, you can help ensure a lifetime of health and keep yourself from overloading your body and mind.Of all effects of stress, first and foremost is "fight or flight" response that it brings to your body. As soon as stress hits, body starts churning out hormones that set your body on edge and ready it to either fight or run. Obviously, this is pretty pointless when stress is how you are going to get your report into boss on time, but it is still there. Your mind only knows that it is under gun and threatened and it has same response for workplace stress as it does for a tiger coming at you. The human body and mind is still designed with physical danger in mind and any stress is taken to be a physical threat. Thus, body begins churning out these hormones as though you were about to be set upon by a pack of wolves. What does fight or flight response do? First, it sharpens awareness and confuses mind. Of all effects of stress, this seems most contradictory. However, it is also true. The body pumps in adrenaline, which heightens mental sharpness, and noradrenaline, which causes mind to be confused. This is a bad thing because your mind is simultaneously receiving messages to stand up and fight while it receives messages to get heck away from there. Thus, mind is clouded with indecision and this will not help you focus on what you need to get done. This response to stress also causes heart to speed up in order to pump more blood. This rise in blood pressure allows body to react stronger and more quickly in order to either fight or escape. Unfortunately, stress of everyday life is not of same sort as that of a person out in wilderness and it tends to stick around longer than threat of physical attack. Thus, what should be a short rise in blood pressure is actually dragged out over a long period of time, making heart work way too hard for long periods. This causes a rise in blood pressure which can result in increased risk of stroke or heart attack in long term.
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