Identify Your Personal Stress Triggers
We all have particular situations or people that make us more stressed. Some of these are easily identifiable and may be avoidable. However, sometimes stress may build up over time, and result from a pattern of incidents or events, rather than a single trigger.
It may therefore be helpful to use a tool like our quiz Whats Stressing You Out? or keep a stress diary for a few weeks to help you identify what makes you stressed.
This will make it easier to take action to address your stress levels.
Try To Find Humor In The Situation
Stress isnât funny, but some situations that cause stress can be seen as humorous if you make the effort.
A good laugh is a good thing. Research has shown that laughter reduces stress and has other positive benefits. Not only does it relieve the stress response, but it brings more oxygen into your body, activates your body, and soothes tension.
Being angry or worrying, on the other hand, is extremely unhealthy, harming your heart, your immune system, and even increasing your risk for stroke.
Finding humor in a situation means:
- You never laugh AT a person. No one person is the target of the humor.
- You laugh about the ridiculousness of the situation.
- You compare a situation to a funny metaphor.
- You laugh about a similar situation in the past and try to show the current situation as a temporary problem.
Youâve probably been in that moment where it feels as if a situation could get very ugly very easily, and then someone cracks a joke and the tension seems to immediately leave. Thatâs what youâre aiming for.
Tricks To Get Rid Of Stress In Your Life
Stress is one of the main enemies of your health. It can cause heart problems, increase the risk of heart attack and weaken the immune system But how can you get rid of stress in your life? The key to this problem is to change your habits.
When we get home from work, we always have something new to do, but it is very important to reserve a few moments to relax. For this reason, in the following we will present you some tips to keep stress at bay when you get home.
Children, household chores, cooking when you get home you are dealing with a series of tasks that can become a real extension of your official service. If you also have other worries, you will become more and more stressed with each passing day.
How about making a change? Why not try the following tips to get rid of stress in your life?
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When Is A Good Time To Relax
Basically, any time can be determined for this. In general, I recommend the evening, or at least sundown when the city life is slowly losing its pace. There is also this soothing feeling, coming from the absence of daylight, which will help you to unwind while your body triggers the relaxing mechanism as it prepares to go to sleep.
On the other hand, if there is no possibility to separate some time for yourself in the evening, daytime is also suitable. Just remember to cover your windows. The color of the sheets covering the windows should not be aggressive, such as red or orange choose a calming color such as cream or purple. It will bathe your room in butter-shaded color and calm you.
For a start, put some relaxing tunes on, and set up the atmosphere. Luckily, the Internet is full of meditation tunes which can be used for free. Find the one which reflects your mood and suits you best.
How To Practice Focused Meditation
Here are six tips to help you practice focused meditation. Based on your availability and interest, these tips may change and evolve. Thats the point: to create a structured practice that caters to your needs.
1. Find a Comfortable Seat
As with any meditation practice, comfort is truly key. The physical body responds to meditation practice by alerting you to whether it is comfortable and supported or stressed out and in pain. This is best observed in practitioners who tend to slouch and lose the tall, supported spine that is essential to meditation practice.
A simple rule in meditative sitting is to ensure that your hips are higher than your knees. Therefore, choosing to sit in a chair instead of on the floor may be a smart decision or perhaps propping yourself up on a cushion. For meditation techniques overall, it does not matter how you sit. All that matters is that you are supported and comfortable sitting for some time.
2. Choose Your Object of Focus
Every meditation training session is going to be different because no single day is the same for any one person. Therefore, experienced meditators know that choosing an object is more about listening to what you need at this time versus following any doctrine or rule.
3. Set Your Desired Time or Go With the Flow
Likewise, if you have the time, you can also listen to your body and come out of your meditation when you feel its right to do so. This is often a beautiful practice of listening and tuning in.
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Sadhguru On How To Get Rid Of Stress
Shekhar Kapur: Since Im having the chance to interview you, I know people will say, Well, why didnt you ask about how to get rid of stress? Is there a definition that we can assign to the idea of stress? Sadhguru: When I first went to the United States a few years ago, wherever I
Oscar-award winning film maker Shekar Kapur asks Sadhguru about stress, who looks at the shift we need to engineer within ourselves in order to get rid of stress.
Shekhar Kapur: Sadhguru:
Have A Delicious Meal
A perfect relaxation isnt complete without a proper meal. Regarding the type of food you like and if you like to prepare it yourself, get your food ready and waiting. We all love pizza, of course, but as I said, take it a bit further.
Italian food is rather easy to prepare, and since it utilizes light ingredients such as pasta and chicken meat, it will not make you feel heavy after eating. One of my favorites is definitely Cauliflower Penne Puttanesca, a light, vegetarian pasta, which requires about 25 minutes to prepare.
Of course, this exquisite meal should be paired with the matching wine, and if you can obtain a bottle of Villa Buccis Riserva, Verdicchio dei Castelli from 2009, it will be simply put, perfect. Wine is a somewhat sensitive drink, so it should be cooled to exact temperature . Luckily, there are many wine coolers & fridges which can do this for you. As a good wine enthusiast, Im sure you already have a cooler. If not, consider having one.
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Keep Your Requirements At Work Sorted
Often times, one of the primary reasons behind the work stress stems from not being clear about the requirements. This is where the problem is circled around.
In order to successfully be able to execute your work on time and to lead a stress-free work life, it is very important that you do have a good idea about the requirements of your work or what your work demands from you.
If you have an unclear idea about the requirements or even struggle with constantly changing requirements at your workplace, the best way to fight that off is to ensure that you keep a track of the requirements at your work. This can be very effective in handling and coping with stress at work very effectively.
Learn To Accept What Is In Your Control And What Isnt
Some things are out of your control.
Find ways to make the things that are out of your control more bearable. If where you work is too noisy, maybe noise cancelling headphones would help.
For example, getting stressed about the traffic on the way to work is completely unhelpful. You canât control the traffic. The best you can do is leave early enough so you have plenty of time to get to work. If leaving late is adding stress because the traffic makes you late for work leaving you apologizing or making excuses for why youâre late, youâre needlessly adding to your stress. You canât control the traffic, but you can control when you leave home.
Make changes to what you can control. The rest is not worth getting upset about.
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The Negative Effects Of Stress
Chronic stress is bad news for your mental and physical health. These are some health symptoms of stress:
- Headaches
- Fatigue
- Insomnia
As one study points out, chronic life stress has been consistently associated with poorer cognitive function, accelerated cognitive decline, and increased incidence of dementia. This underlines the importance of avoiding work stress as much as possible.
Learn To Prioritize And Organize
You tend to get more pressured when your tasks are disorganized. Learning to manage your tasks in digestible chunks will pave the way for a healthier balance of your work and mental health. Prioritize the tasks that speak your responsibilities and organize properly how you will take them on the top, down to the littlest of things. This way, you have more room to breathe, knowing that you have managed your tasks effectively.
Make a to-do list. List all of the tasks you want to accomplish for the day, starting with the important tasks to the less important ones. Analyze the less important tasks to avoid unnecessary tasks. Dont try to rush yourself just to finish your tasks earlier. Set realistic deadlines.
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Learn To Identify Signs Of Stress
You might not even know youâre feeling stressed. Sounds strange, but itâs possible. Even if you donât know the true level of stress youâre feeling, your body does. The damage that stress does happens whether you are aware itâs bad or not.
There are several signs that stress might be affecting you:
- Feeling anxious, grumpy, or depressed.
- Feeling apathy or disinterest in your job.
- Feeling overwhelming dread about your job.
- Difficulty getting a good nightâs sleep.
- General fatigue and tiredness.
- Socially withdrawing from others .
- Using alcohol, drugs, or other destructive coping mechanisms.
If you see a pattern like this list in your life, you need to take action.
Are Your Best Employees Leaving
Employers can often feel that their best employees are continually leaving them, and that may be related to your organization. HR experts have spotted some reasons why good employees quit their jobs.
Among them, the lack of confidence and autonomy, lack of appreciation or recognition, lack of respect, few or no opportunities for growth and development, feeling underutilized, having a bad manager who discharges frustrations and resentment over the team, poor
management, poor communication, excessive workload, lack of support, not finding a balance between work and personal life, lack of inspiration or unhealthy environment, seeing that the other good employees leave, lack of coincidence with the values of the company, and changes in their personal life.
Thus, feeling undervalued is among the main reasons for leaving jobs. You spend many hours at work, sharing time with your colleagues and of course, you want to feel comfortable. Nobody enjoys spending eight or ten hours a day in a place that make them feel unhappy. When you work hard and nobody notices it, or your ideas are not even considered, frustration and unhappiness levels increase.
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Tips To Manage Stress
We all have stress at work, at home, and on the road. Sometimes we can feel especially stressed because of a bad interaction with someone, too much work, or everyday hassles like getting stuck in traffic.
Negative stress can keep you from feeling and performing your best mentally, physically and emotionally. But no ones life is completely stress-free. Its important to know how to manage the stress in your life. Try these three simple techniques for dealing with it.
1. Positive Self-Talk
Negative to Positive
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To really make it work, practice positive self-talk every day in the car, at your desk, before you go to bed or whenever you notice negative thoughts. Its a great practice to teach kids, too!
2. Top 10 Emergency Stress-Stoppers
Emergency stress stoppers are actions to help you defuse stress in the moment. You may need different stress stoppers for different situations, and sometimes it helps to combine them. Here are some ideas:
Be Wary Of How It Affects You
This may appear obvious. However, it is extremely easy to underestimate how much stress affects a person. You should take note if you find yourself pessimistic and emotionally tired by the end of the day.
It can take a toll on your mental health and body if you ignore stress for a long period. According to research, there is a connection between depression and anxiety and work-related burnout.
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Up Your Avoidance Of Caffeine Alcohol And Nicotine
We previously said that it was a good idea not to have too much caffeine, alcohol and nicotine as a way to avoid stress. If you are already feeling stressed, this becomes even more important. Caffeine and nicotine are stimulants and so will increase your level of stress rather than reduce it.
Alcohol is a depressant when taken in large quantities, but acts as a stimulant in smaller quantities. Using alcohol as a way to alleviate stress is therefore not ultimately helpful.
Swap caffeinated and alcoholic drinks for water, herbal teas, or diluted natural fruit juices and aim to keep yourself hydrated. This will enable your body to cope better with stress.
You should also aim to avoid or reduce your intake of refined sugars – they are contained in many manufactured foods and can cause energy crashes which may lead you to feel tired and irritable.
There is more about this in our page What are Carbohydrates?.
Write Down Your Stressors
Identifying and recording stressful situations can help you understand whats bothering you. Some of these can be subtle sources of tension, such as an uncomfortable workspace or a long commute.
Keep a journal for 1 week to track your stress triggers and your reactions to them. Make sure to include the people, places, and events that gave you a physical, mental, or emotional response.
As you write, ask yourself:
- How did this make me feel?
- What was my reaction?
- What are some ways of resolving it?
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Accept The Things You Can’t Change
Changing a difficult situation isn’t always possible. Try to concentrate on the things you do have control over.
“If your company is going under and is making redundancies, for example, there’s nothing you can do about it,” says Professor Cooper.
“In a situation like that, you need to focus on the things that you can control, such as looking for a new job.”
Take The Breaks You Are Given
Take your allotted breaks.
If thereâs a park or bit of nature nearby, go there. If your work environment is stressing you out, try to change your environment, either by going someplace else or by reading to get your mind in a different place.
You need a break, especially if youâre stressed. If management makes it difficult to take a break, press the issue. You have a legal right to breaks.
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Take Control Of The Condition
Do you know what the most common trigger for stress at work is often?
Not having control over a situation is what causes the problem altogether. Youd be surprised to know that we get stressed at work when we fail to either meet deadlines or feel like the assigned work is out of our realm of capability.
It is human instinct to panic and feels under stress when situations are out of our control. This is exactly what correlates with the work stress too.
While being stressed a few times because of extensive work pressure is okay, the same thing happening chronically is not at all admirable and required. It has also been found to have impacts on the confidence and overall well being of an individual.
In order to cope with stress at work, it is important that you remain in control of your own actions because that is what helps bring in the peace of mind that you are seeking on.
Listen To Music On The Drive Home
Listening to music offers many benefits and can be an effective way to relieve stress before, during, and after work. Playing an uplifting song while you make breakfast can help you start the day off feeling better prepared to interact with the people in your life. Likewise, combating the stress of a long day with your favorite music on the drive home can help you wind down and feel less stressed when you get there.
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