A lot of the time stress comes about from the way you perceive a situation, but it goes further than that of course.

Our perceptions are colored by our upbringing.  All those comments and interactions and  the inherited ways of perceiving of our parents, siblings, teachers, friends the media and so on and so on gradually accumulate to make up our own special way of seeing the world.

Added to all of this are our beliefs, also learned and influenced by our culture and the people we admire, whether living teachers or in books or films and documentaries

Indeed there are levels and levels of influence, like, for example, our instinctual or survival responses which are wired into the body and work unconsciously to ‘keep us alive and safe’.

And then there is the internal ‘pull’ to find peace and happiness which often creates frustration and stress by contrast when we are not achieving what we believe will give us that peace. Or when we reach a goal that we thought would give us peace and satisfaction only to find it didn’t and off we go again, looking for something else, chasing another goal or dream.

Or maybe we followed the advice of well meaning others only to find that their promises didn’t come to fruition. Maybe we got a good education, expecting a well-paid, high status job, only to find the economy in recession and that work is only available, if at all, as short term contracts rather than a cushy permanent career with the promise of a secure pension at the end of it. We can feel highly stressed whenever we feel out of control and this often happens when the unexpected happens or when our own expectations are disappointed.

So what can be done about all of this?

You can find a list of some great stress management techniques I can highly recommend that have worked very well for me by clicking here.

One answer might be to start by accepting things as they are, since it is resistance to our situation that increases stress. We can accept things as they are and still plan for the future – just be less attached to the outcome and enjoy the moment for what it is. Too many of us are rushing about making ourselves very busy and often lose the pleasure of the ‘now’.

Take a ’stress check’ and one or two deep breaths in, stop for a moment and look around you and find something to appreciate – the sun coming in through the window, the fact that someone smiled at you today, that you have two legs and ears to hear with, eyes to see. The list of things to be grateful for and to appreciate is endless but sometimes we forget all of this and focus instead on lack.

Find ways to slow down, find moments throughout the day when you can have a ’slow down minute’ or  give yourself 20 minutes at bedtime to meditate or another great way to wind down is to  listen to some chillout music before you go to sleep . When you are faced with potentially stressful situations remind yourself that you have a choice about how you perceive it. How could you perceive it differently? Maybe the person shouting at you has just been told they have a serious illness, or maybe they come from a family of angry people and don’t know any other way to behave, so maybe you don’t need to take it personally.  I have found EFT to be a great tool in dealing with stress as it arises and it can help dissolve disempowered feelings almost instantly and get you back on track with empowered choices once again.

Another technique I have found that works very well is to  laugh! That may sound funny (doh!) but it works, even if you fake it at first (because you’re ‘not in the mood’) Try it as an experiment. you may be pleasantly surprised. And laughter has all sorts of benefits for health , instantly relaxing you and giving you a brighter perspective, and even giving your immune system a boost in the process.

Stress is very prevalent in the world today but that doesn’t mean you simply have to ‘frown and bear it’. You have the ability to choose how you respond and there are many techniques, processes, programs and supportive people out there that you can take advantage of to change your own internal and external world for the better.

Have a nice day!

Joy Idries

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Another way to find relief for stress is by playing with your kids or pet. Some people find so much comfort with a pet, they sometime consider them as one of the family members. Sometimes a dog is truly a man’s best friend.

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Stress and relaxation are just two sides of the same coin, or like a see-saw they go up and down from time to time yet both are part of life. So when you feel that you are out of balance just try making an adjustment by doing some of the opposite.

Here is an article that you could find interesting:

Stress is a bit sneaky. At first you feel good. You have a busy life and you like it. You are happy in your job and with your relationship, your home and your children. But while you continue to work hard you feel that it is not as much fun as it used to be. So now you will have to watch out. At first, a bit of stress helped you to do your work the best way. But as soon you’re not enjoying it anymore, the negative stress slips into your life.

Why is negative stress slipping into your life, while at first everything was fine? You don’t really do much more work than before. You were always busy, but now it seems to be more difficult. The reason? You forgot to allow enough relaxation into your life and especially into your mind. Maybe you took enough time off. But your mind was still busy. It is important to give your mind some free time. If your mind is not relaxing anymore, stress will accumulate and it will become impossible to resolve your stress automatically. You will notice that you are not happy anymore.

What can you do to solve your accumulated stress?

Check out these suggested techniques. You’ll find a list of them by clicking here

Recognize that it is all in your mind. You should know that negative stress and a feeling of happiness don’t cooperate. There are many ways to solve your stress. One of them is: become happy again and your stresses will disappear like snow in the sunshine.

How to solve stress through becoming happy again? I guess that you are working hard. You have probably forgotten what you liked to do when you were young. Did you like to do sports or did you like to listen to music? Maybe you liked painting or maybe you were lying on the beach for hours on end. You just should find out what it is that used to make you happy.

Reserve some space and time in your life for those hobbies and feel happy again.

You’ll see that when you are feeling happy, your stress will be dissolved. Find out how.

Whenever you think this is not easy, just ask me for more advice to solve your stress. It can really be easy!

Relaxation is a choice. Choose to be happy. See how.

By: Liefya Article Directory: http://www.articledashboard.com

Annelies Hilgers is an online coach. She advises hundreds of people. through the internet. She takes you by the hand with her step to step advice in How To Solve Stress Want some help with your problem? Ask Annelies about: frustration and stress and get your free ebook about emotional health at the same time.

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The same is true for happiness. True happiness belongs to a sphere beyond that of the physical body, the heart or the intellect. The peace and happiness the world is seeking is already within. It needs to be rediscovered. 

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One of the most important things that you can do for your Stress Health is to give yourself a little time every day.

Now, of course, your schedule is busy, but all that you need to set aside for yourself is a mere twenty minutes.

20 minutes meditation is equivalent to about 2 hours sleep.

Find out more about meditation here

Take the steps to carve out that twenty minutes, and then find a quiet activity for yourself. This down time is essential to your bodies overall health, and you do not want to neglect it.

Believe it or not, even though thinking about going to the gym may stress some people out that exercise is precisely what will help you to balance your Stress Health. Exercise will release endorphins that essentially make you happier and will therefore reduce that stress that you typically hold.

Spending social time with your friends and family is another great way to help your Stress Health.

Chances are in situations like this you will find yourself laughing and that is a fantastic way to reduce stress.

Surround yourself with love, friendship, and laughter.

By doing this you will not only realize how lucky you are, but you will leave feeling refreshed and relaxed.

Laughter is the best medicine

Another way to keep your Stress Health under control is to find a hobby for yourself that you love to do. Find something that will allow you to lose yourself a bit.

Get absorbed in your activity and forget about your day-to-day worries. Taking a little time off those worries is not only good for your emotional well being, but it will also allow you to return to those stresses with a new and fresh perspective.

Though maintaining an even keel in your life is difficult, you can take some simple steps to help your stress health. By carving out some time for yourself, you will be surprised at how much better you will feel as well as how much, much more you are able to handle without getting overly stressed out. Unfortunately, we will never be able to eliminate stress, but the good news is that you can handle it!

Give yourself some time out to  relax with calming music

By:Chris Latter, Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Chris_Latter

To find out more fantastic advice on Stress health and the truths about Stress health please simply click on the highlighted text

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Stress is a fact of life, it is impossible to eradicate it completely.

What we need to do, is keep our flight and fight response under control so we can be efficient and effective, avoid health related problems and burn out.

Keep the fight and flight response under control with regular meditation.

Relaxation is the antidote to stress and enables clearer decisions to be made.

Stress is sited as the cause of a wide range of health problems, costing businesses billions each year in lost work days and in compensation and pensions. This does not capture the huge personal cost in anxiety, poor health and premature death. In order to deal with stress effectively, either as an individual or as a manager, ensuring the well being of your employees it is important to understand what stress is and the potential impact it can have.

The first thing to understand is that stress in itself is not a bad thing. It is how we react to stressful situations which, makes the difference.

Take a look at how to see things differently and  attract ease and happiness

One persons thrill and sense of excitement is another person’s anxiety and agony. In this article we are going to consider ways for you to understand what stress is and the effect it has on your body. Strategies for creating a lifestyle which allows you to deal with your stress and ensure you have a great work life balance can be found on our website.

Stress can cause major health problems or in extreme cases be fatal. All of the information included is for your guidance only. If you are experiencing any health problems brought on, or made worse by stress, or if you are feeling significantly unhappy, it is extremely important that you seek professional health advice. You should always seek the advice of your medical practitioner before any significant change in diet or exercise routine.

What Is Stress

Stress is sited as the cause of over 500,000 days of absence a year in the UK alone. It represents a huge cost in both economic and personal terms. In order to deal with it we must first understand what it is and what causes it.

Below are definitions for the word “stress.”

“Stress” is a condition or feeling experienced when a person perceives that “demands exceed the personal and social resources the individual is able to mobilize.” (attributed to Richard S Lazarus)

This serious and depressing take on life can be lightened through learning  how to laugh at whatever situation arises

“Stress (roughly the opposite of relaxation) is a medical term for a wide range of strong external stimuli, both physiological and psychological, which can cause a physiological response called the general adaptation syndrome, first described in 1936 by Hans Selye in the journal Nature ”
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stress_(medicine)

The physiological response happens at the level of the primal brain which is tuned for survival. There are ways that  the brain can be trained to relax with brain entrainment programs

“An emotionally disruptive or upsetting condition occurring in response to adverse external influences and capable of affecting physical health which can be characterized by increased heart rate, a rise in blood pressure, muscular tension, irritability and depression.” www.achenet.org/resources/glossary.php

There is no doubt that people generally respond well to a challenge particularly if they are involved in creating or something they find exciting. Where those involved believe what they do matters and they feel they have some ownership and control over their situation there is a positive payback even when working extremely hard over long hours. We could debate whether the pressure involved in such situations constitutes stress.

Where stress is detrimental people are often in situations where they feel they have little control, feedback is non existent or overly negative, failure, humiliation, lack of support results in the person feeling that what they do has little value or they themselves are not valued. Sustained exposure to such negative situations can have serious implications for the health and well being of the individual and ultimately for the organization as a whole.

EFT works on the principle that all negative emotions are caused by a disruption in the energy system of the body which can cause a blockage in the energy flow and be experienced as stress. EFT can show you how to easily use acupressure on certain points of the body to  restore balance and feel well again .

Impact of Stress on Body

We like to think of ourselves as well down the evolutionary path yet many of our responses harp back to a time when saber toothed tigers and wooly mammoths ranged the Earth. When a caveman – or woman was threatened by danger the body. When we perceive a threat or undergo any emotional or physical trauma our bodies release a hormone designed to help us run away from the danger or fight it. This happens in significant life threatening situations. The impact of the hormone can last long after the perceived threat has gone.

The result is:

An increase in heart rate and blood pressure. The purpose of this is to send the oxygen and blood glucose directly to the cells in the major muscles to facilitate “flight or fright”. Increased perspiring is designed to cool the muscles to keep them working efficiently. Blood is transported away from the skin, this is to reduce blood loss if we were to sustain an injury. Hormones ensure the brain maintains focus on the threat – we become single minded

It also happens in any situation which we find frustrating or different. When the threat is small we may be entirely unaware of the impact on us. When the body reacts to ongoing stressful situations it can result in any combination of the following:

Feeling impatient, anxious, jumpy, irritable, over excited
Raised heart rate, pounding heart and in severe cases palpitations
Dry mouth and sweaty palms
Feeling sick, indigestion
Finding it hard to think clearly
Difficulty in dealing with other people appropriately
Difficulty sleeping. More likely to make mistakes
Accident prone
Less able to take information from a range of sources resulting in impaired judgment
Poor self image, Poor self esteem

There are very few situations where the caveman response is useful. In the vast majority of situations a calm, measured, sensitive approach based on clear rational thinking is not only more effective but far more healthy.

This calm way of responding can be learned

If we are exposed to negative stress over the long term, there is an increased and ongoing impact on the sympathetic nervous system. This leads to a huge increase in the levels of adrenaline, cortisol and other stress related hormones. These can impact on our physical health compromising our immune system, allowing viral linked disorders varying from the common cold and herpes to AIDs and cancer to take hold. Stress also impacts on the production of other hormones and brain transmitters, scientists believe that there are further activities involving enzyme systems and chemical messengers which are still relatively unknown which are affected by high levels of stress. The links of ongoing stress to high blood pressure with the threat of heart attack or stroke, insomnia and fatigue are very well documented. Stress has the potential to harm our mental well being causing problems such as depression.

Laughter has the opposite effect, leading to an increased production of feel good hormones and boosting the immune system and reducing the risk of contracting serious diseases. Try laughter yoga!

Yet stress is a fact of life, it is impossible to eradicate it completely. What we need to do, is keep our flight and fight response under control so we can be efficient and effective, avoid health related problems and burn out.

www.graduatesolutions.co.uk     www.recoveringworkaholics.com

By Gina Gardiner

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Here are some simple but effective stress busters you can implement in your life.

• Learn To Meditate
• Learn To laugh Your Stress Away
• Listen To relaxation CDs
• Go On A Stress Busting Diet
• Learn How to Change Stress Into Joy
• Change The Negative Energy Of Stress Into A Positive Healthy Flow

Are you sick and tired of being sick and tired? Stress is a major contributor to many maladies that inflict us humans.

Day after day we drudge on worrying about every imaginable thing some so trivial that it’s just plain stupid.

Humans are the only earthly animal that has such a problem.(as far as we know!) Other animals go about go about their business undaunted of stressful situations.

We are seemingly addicted to stress. Stress has literally taken over our lives. It is as if we fuel our bodies on a daily basis with stress. Seems ridiculous doesn’t it, but you know exactly what I’m talking about, we thrive on everyday stress. Well if we thrive on it why eliminate it; what’s the point? The point is stress is a killer, it’s out to get you, throw you to the ground and stomp all over you.

Stress is a killer

Talk to any doctor and they will tell you unequivocally that stress damages the body immeasurably in countless ways. Stress is the silent killer that infiltrates and then does it’s damage over time. Okay you know you are stressful and you don’t like it one bit but how in the world can we eliminate something that is so much of our life? You don’t eliminate stress you control stress. A certain amount of stress is actually good for you, it produces a sense of urgency, a motivation, a driving force. Stress can be compared to an adrenaline rush in as much they both create a burst of energy a sense of urgency. The trick is to harness stress so it works for you not against you.

What is Stress?

Stress is negative energy (worry), bottled up inside with nowhere to go. Most stress is self-induced. We are a fast paced society, continually trying to go faster. For example, if a speed limit is set at 55-mph invariably most drivers will push the limit and go at least 10-mph faster. It is our nature to push the limit. We are driven to exceed, succeed, and proceed. Unfortunately stress is a part of our everyday lives so we need to deal with it. If you are going too fast, then  learn to slow down .
Controlling Stress

People make things more difficult then need be. Life needn’t be complicated. Simple is better.  Uncomplicate your life . Set a rule of priorities for your day to day life. Make these priorities realistic, simple, uncomplicated. Know your limitations don’t over extend abilities. Take a breather. Take time out to relax.

Here are some things that can help you reduce stress

1.Start your day earlier then you normally would. Allow yourself plenty of time to get ready for work.

2.Eat a sensible breakfast allowing enough time to actually relax and enjoy breakfast.

3.Don’t watch the doom and gloom news while eating breakfast  start the day on a positive note.

4.Allow a lot of time to comfortably get to work and if you’re driving listen to some good music and drive within the speed limit.

5.Limit your caffeine intake to one cup of coffee in the morning and 3 cups total for the day.

6.Avoid refined sugar foods such as doughnuts, processed cereals, pop tarts etc.

7.Don’t drink any soft drinks for they are loaded with sugar.

8.Stop with all the competition with co-workers do your job to the best of your ability and good things will happen.

9.Be happy for others who succeed in their endeavors.  Be happy with who you are .

10.Drink plenty of clean unpolluted spring water. Water naturally detoxifies the body.

11.If possible take a short nap. I personally nap half an hour after my half-hour lunch.

12.Set realistic goals. Too many people try to accomplish too much too quickly. Most good things worth striving for require a lot of nurturing.

13.Stop worrying about things that are out of your control. 90% of everyday concerns are about stuff you can’t do a wit to change.

14.If a particularly stressful moment or situation occurs take a deep breath (or many) reflect on a pleasant memory and then proceed slowly, deliberately, maintaining control. Listen to a relaxing CD to wind down as you visualise.

15.Set time aside everyday for ‘family talk’ where family members can express their thoughts, problems and communicate one to another. This is a solid ’stress buster’.

16. Eat nutritious foods high in vitamins and minerals low in calories. Good food delivers optimum health thus reducing stress.

17.Live within your means don’t buy things you know you can’t afford.

18.Only use credit cards for emergencies and plan on paying dept in full each month.

19.Don’t try to keep up with what others have, (I.e. neighbors, family, and friends.) be happy for them, don’t resent what they have.

20.Ground your life in faith, family, and friends. Express your love for the important people in your life openly, let them know how you feel about them without any expectations.

21. Laugh often, smile a lot .

22.Exercise moderately at least 3 times a week.

23.Sleep a sound 8 hours every night this alone will reduce stress dramatically.

24.Finally accept the fact that life is unpredictable and we all will be thrown a curve ball now and then that may flatten us for a time. Find solace in your faith and know that things will get better and always think highly of yourself.  Meditate regularly

Stress can be controlled however you must take it seriously and make a plan of action. The silent killer is lurking just below the surface and it wants to destroy you. Are you up for the challenge?

By Gary Kenneth Archer

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