10 Stress Management Tips

Life can be challenging sometimes!

The bills might need paying, you may feel overworked and pressured with a to-do list as long as your arm, or family responsibilities or concerns over the economy may be weighing you down.

BUT you don’t have to be passive to the effect of stress!

If you want to learn how to relieve stress in 6 seconds, be able to shift your perspective to cope with stress, or master relaxation techniques, then you are in the right place.

While stress may be a part of life it does not have to be a way of life.

Make a choice to relieve stress today!

Being proactive and taking charge of your thoughts, emotions and environment can increase your ability to cope with stress and deal with daily challenges and problems.

There is "no 'one' magic solution" to deal with stress. I urge you to try the following stress management tips to find out what works for you.

1. Quick tips for for reducing stress

Quick and easy stress management tips that you can use the moment you feel stress is a great tool to take control and experience less stress.

All of us experience stress from time to time. Stress is a fact of life but it does not have to be a way of life.

These quick tips for reducing stress are for busy people who want to combat stress now.

These tips for reducing stress range from Harvard University's Dr Stroebel's 6 second breathing technique that transforms the stress response to a quieting reflex, to practical stress management tips to adopt a positive mindset.

2. Shift your perspective

Do you see a glass as half full or as half empty?

Have you noticed that stressful events for some people send them into a tail-spin of increasing stress while for others the stressful event did not ruffle their feathers?

Our definition of stress says that stress is largely a result of how we perceive the situation.

The way that you think can have a profound influence on your stress levels. In short, how you think influences your thoughts and behavior.

Adopting a more positive mental attitude has been shown to be an effective way to deal with stress and give you more resilience in coping with stress.

Your ability to be able to shift your perspective in a constructive way builds resilience and is on of the defining characteristics of successful and happy people.

Here we show you some ways that you can:

• adopt a more positive mental attitude

  Why is this important?

  Well, every time you have a negative thought your body reacts with tension and stress.

  The more you think in a healthy and positive manner the more likely you are to feel good about yourself.

  Here we provide some of the signs of self-defeating thoughts and how you can develop your positive thinking skills.

• A realistic mindset has been shown to reduce the impact of stress and promote overall well being.

  Cultivating realistic thinking through strategies such as cognitive therapy promotes problem solving and a "try it" again attitude in the face of failure.

3. Fun stress management tips: Bring more fun and laughter into your life

No joke...Laughter may be the best medicine!

Have you ever laughed until you cried?

If so, then you will know that laughter is a good emotional and physical release.

Laughing yoga not only brings a smile to your face but reduces the stress hormones in your body such as cortisol and may help you to re-frame the situations causing stress.

First started in Mumbai in 1995, laughter yoga combines unconditional laughter with pranayama yogic breathing. A good laugh is good exercise and helps relieve emotional and physical stress.

Try these fun stress management tips.

4. Cultivate a positive support network

Do you withdraw from the world when you feel under stress - focusing on solving the problem that is causing you stress.

This may not be the optimal way for you to manage your stress .

Have you ever felt better after sitting down with a friend.

Talking with friends or your support network has a way of dispelling the tension associated with stress and can boost your problem solving skills.

A support group can also broaden your attention and distract you from your own situation.

5. Structured problem solving techniques to deal with stress

Sometimes, no matter how good your stress management tips are, or the positive spin that you put on things, or your great support network, or the benefits that you reap from various relaxation techniques – the PROBLEM may still be a main cause of stress for you.

If this is so, then this problem solving technique could be a useful stress management tip.

Download a structured problem solving worksheet which allows you to identify the options available to you and to examine the "pros and cons" of the stressful situation in more detail.

6. Practice relaxation techniques

When stressed the body activatest the stress response which releases stress hormones into the blood stream.

This results in a number of common symptoms of stress such as muscle tension and racing thoughts.

Relaxation techniques are useful to counter the emotional and physical effects of stress by activating the relaxation response.

Some relaxation techniques that may be useful include:

• stress management hypnosis
• music and stress reduction
• breathing exercises
• progressive muscle relaxation.

7. Practice mindfulness for stress reduction

Empirical studies on mindfulness meditation have been shown to provide stress relief and reduce anxiety and the incidence of depression.

Mindfulness is about staying focused in the present which means not worrying about the future or dwelling in the past.

Formal mindfulness training has been adopted by practitioners such as Jon Kabat Zin who founded the empirically tested mindfulness based stress reduction program.

This 8 week course helps you to maintain your focus and expand your awareness in the NOW to reduce stress, chronic pain, anxiety and depression.

8. Time management and stress

Do you have a to-do list as long as your arm?

Are you feeling pressured or overworked?

If so, then you are not alone. One of the biggest causes of stress is the feeling of being pressured by time.

This is where taking charge of your schedule with time management can help.

If you feel that you have too much to do and not enough time, then time management could be beneficial to you.

See this article on five time management techniques to reduce stress.

9. Anger management tips

Stress creates tension and anger can discharge this excess tension.

Anger may reduce immediate stress!

But this relief is only brief and usually comes with costs to relationships, happiness, and business...not to mention your own health and wellbeing.

Take control of your anger and relieve your stress today with these anger management tips.

10. Taking Care of Yourself

When stressed, we don’t always take care of ourselves.

For example, in a national poll of Americans, “43% said they eat too much or eat unhealthy foods because of stress” (APA).

Not taking care of yourself when stressed can lead to a cycle of increasing stress and health problems.

Here are a number of stress management tips that you can use to take care of yourself to build your resilience to cope with stress.

Healthy eating – what to eat and avoid.

It's not difficult to demolish a bar of chocolate or polish off that cream bun when your world is falling apart.

However, turning to comfort foods in times of stress can actually make your stress worse. How well you cope with stress depends in part on your food choices, as stress and nutrition are closely related.

Are you wondering what foods to eat or avoid when stressed? See how a balanced diet influences stress levels.

Vitamins and Stress.

Stress can also rob your body of important vitamins such as vitamin B complex.

Similarly, stress can make it difficult for your body to absorb vitamins such as calcium – which can be particularly important for women. Read more about how vitamins and stress.

Exercise and Stress Reduction

According to a national poll, 48% of Americans have been told by their health care provider to exercise more.

Exercise can reduce the impacts of chronic health conditions and can also reduce the impact of stress on your health.

Exercise works in a number of ways to reduce stress.

Physical exercise reduces the stress-related tension in your body, improves your health, and promotes the natural feel-good chemicals in your body.

This article on exercise and stress provides information on how you can start to exercise more for better stress health.

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