What does stress mean? Stress is what we feel when we have to handle more than we are used to. When we are stressed, our body responds as though we are in danger. It makes hormones that speed up our heart, make our breathe faster, and give us a burst of energy. This is called the fight-or-flight stress response.

 

The word “stress” is a biological term which refers to the consequences of the failure of a human or an animal body to respond appropriately to emotional or physical threats to the organism, whether actual or only imagined. It is a normal psychological and physical reaction to the demands of life. But when we are unable to cope well with, our mind and body may pay the price.

Our body is able by nature to react to stress in a way originally meant to protect us against perceived threats from predators and aggressors. But today’s many demands may include managing a huge workload. We may feel overwhelmed by these daily stressors (any agent that causes stress to an organism) and wonder if we’ll ever get a handle on all of these extra "threats".

The Natural Stress Response

If our mind and body are constantly on edge because of excessive stress in our life, we may face serious health problems. That’s because our body’s "fight-or-flight reaction",  its natural alarm system, is constantly on.
When we encounter perceived threats, the hypothalamus, a tiny region at the base of our brain, sets off an alarm system in our body. Through a combination of nerve and hormonal signals, this system prompts our adrenal glands – located atop our kidneys – to release a surge of hormones, including adrenaline and cortisol.

•    Adrenaline increases our heart rate, elevates our blood pressure and boosts energy supplies.

•    Cortisol, the primary stress hormone, increases sugars (glucose) in the bloodstream, enhances our brain’s use of glucose and increases the availability of substances that repair tissues. It alters immune system responses and suppresses the digestive system, the reproductive system and growth processes.
This complex natural alarm system also communicates with regions of your brain that control mood, motivation and fear.

Good And Bad Stress

Some stress is normal and even useful. It can help if you need to work hard or react quickly. For example, it can help us win a race or finish an important job on time.

But if stress happens too often or lasts too long, it can have bad effects. It can be linked to headaches, an upset stomach, back pain, heart disease, sleep problems, digestive problems, obesity, memory impairment, worsening of skin conditions, such as eczema, and high blood pressure. It can weaken our immune system, making it harder to fight off disease or may even effect severe diseases, like depression, heart attack or cancer. If we already have a health problem, stress may make it worse and it can make us moody, tense, or depressed. Our relationships may suffer, and we may not do well at work or school.

How Am I Coping with Stress

Some behaviors and lifestyle choices can interfere with the ways our body seeks relief from stress. For example, as we sleep, our body recovers from the stresses of the day. If we are not getting enough sleep or our sleep is frequently interrupted, we are losing a chance to recover from stress.
Our actions and behavior can be a sign of stress. Some people who face a lot of stress respond by smoking, drinking alcohol, or eating poorly. The health risks posed by these behaviors are made even worse by stress. Our body experiences stress-related wear and tear from two sources: the stress itself and the unhealthy habits we have developed to respond to stress. Evaluate how you respond to stress by identifying your positive and negative coping strategies. Use the following activity to learn about the ways you cope with stress.

Answer the following questions:        Rarely                     Often

Listen to music

Go out with a friend (shopping, movie concert, dining)

Criticize yourself or say things to yourself that are negative

Take a bath or shower

Drive fast in a car

Play with a pet

Chew your fingernails

Write in a journal, write poetry or fiction

Become aggressive (hit someone, throw or kick something)

Pray, go to church

Exercise, get outdoors to enjoy nature

Eat too much or too little, drink a lot of coffee

Smoke tobacco

Discuss situations with a spouse or close friend

Get drunk

Do physical labor (garden, paint, make home repairs

Yell at your spouse, kids, or friends

Take a drug to calm yourself down

Practice deep breathing, meditation, muscle relaxation

Avoid social contact with other people

(By Anspaugh DJ, et al. (1994). Wellness: Concepts and Applications, 2nd ed. St. Louis: Mosby.)

What To Do To Relieve Stress
Some of the most useful stress management skills you can learn are healthy coping strategies. Many of these can be done with little or no instruction. No one strategy is preferable – you need to find what works best for you. Using these techniques regularly until they become habits that are part of your lifestyle is the key.

Ways To Work Through Emotions And Relax Mind

•   Writing

There is evidence that writing about stressful events and circumstances may help relieve stress and improve diseases linked to stress. Write for 10 to 15 minutes a day about stressful events and how you felt. One way to use writing to deal with stress is to keep a stress journal. This can really help you identify the sources of stress in your life so that you can find better ways to cope with them.

•   Expressing your feelings. Discussing how you feel with friends, family members, or a counselor is an important way of coping with and relieving stress. Laughing and crying are also natural ways to release tension and frustration. They are both part of a normal emotional healing process.

•    Mindfulness activities. Mindfulness activities help relax your mind and are often combined with body-centered relaxation exercises.

Autogenic training consists of six standard exercises that make the body relax. For each exercise, you use visual imagination and verbal cues to relax your body in some specific way.

 Listen to classical music like Mozart.

Classical Music boost energy, lowers heart rate and deceases anxiety. Slow soft music calms our nerves and fills us with peace.

Acupressure, instead of using acupuncture needles Acupressure uses finger pressure to stimulate the same points for relexation.

Meditation focuses your attention on feeling calm and having a clear awareness about your life.

Guieded imagery (visualization) is a method of using your imagination to help you relax and release tension caused by stress.

Your body responds to the images in your mind. Use the following simple imagery exercise for relaxing or renewing your energy when you need to relax. Take a 10-minute trip in your mind to someplace you enjoy. The place may be a quiet, peaceful scene or a fun activity. It may be a favorite place from your past or some place you have never seen but can imagine.

Picture yourself there in as much detail as possible. Imagine the sounds, smells, sights, and feelings. Let your body and mind respond as if you were actually there. Your thoughts will be calmed or brightened, your muscles will relax, and a feeling of letting go will come over you.

Playing an Instrument or Sing

Music has many health and stress relief benefits. While listening to music can probably be considered a hobby, creating music can be an even more powerful stress relieving hobby, as it can absorb our attention fully and become a vehicle for creative expression as well. Learning to play an instrument such as the piano can be a wonderful stress reliever.

Music therapy can relax your body, improve your mood, and change the pace of your day.

Drawing. We can get in touch with our artistic side and use drawing as a way to process emotions, distract ourselves, and achieve other stress management benefits.

Painting carries similar stress management benefits as drawing, but through a different medium.

Read a book

like: “From Stress to Faith Rest” by J. Doug Settle. (God’s Word has provided the practical wisdom principles one needs to help in managing the many stressors of life, including “post-traumatic stress disorder” (PTSD).

Humor therapy is becoming widely accepted as a tool for reducing stress and boosting the body’s immune system.

Self-hypnosis can open your mind to suggestions that can relieve stress or change the way you respond to stress.

Ways To Relax Our Body

•    Physical activity

Exercise can reduce stress and the stress response. Aerobic exercise – the kind that increases our heart rate, such as walking, running, bicycling, or swimming – is especially useful for counteracting the harmful effects of stress. Even everyday activities such as house cleaning or yard work can reduce our stress level if we do them vigorously. Stretching is also a good way to relieve muscle tension. Regular, moderate physical activity may be the single best approach to managing stress.

•    Doing something we enjoy

A meaningful activity helps relieve tension. This can be a hobby, such as gardening; a creative activity, such as writing, crafts, or art; or doing volunteer work for a cause that benefits others. Playing with and caring for pets also can help us relax. Although we may feel that we are too busy, making time to do something we like can help us relax and make us more productive in other areas of our life.

•    Body-centered relaxation. Body-centered relaxation skills are especially useful for people who experience physical symptoms of stress.

These skills include:

Breathing exercises, such as roll breathing, a type of deep breathing.

Progressive muscle relaxation, which reduces muscle tension by relaxing individual groups of muscles one by one.

Outdoor workout might be the best remedy for work-related stress.

Gentle stretch and exercise all efforts at learning stress reduction are enhanced by regular exercise and daily stretching. Muscles that are toned and loose respond better to our efforts to relax them further. We also know that autonomic arousal tends to quiet down in response to gentle physical activity. Warm, loose muscles simply don’t hurt as much.

Relaxing baths

help alleviate a general state of exhaustion and induce restful sleep, during which our body can recover and charge itself with new energy. Herbal bath formulas work by being absorbed through the skin and through inhalation of the steam. Using freshly dried, organically grown fragrant herbs is best.

Herbal Tea like Valerian Root, Kava Kava, Chamomile, Lavender and Peppermint relieve stress and anxiety. Typical symptoms of anxiety include a general feeling of panic and doom. The sufferers of this affliction experience rapid breathing, a tightness in the chest, nausea, diarrhea and frequent urination.

Bedtime Tea

is a great way to relax and wind down in the evening. It is a safe, gentle and delicious way to help us get a restful nights sleep.

 Herbal stress relief products.

The preliminary rule of consuming herbal stress busters is: Consult a physician before you buy them. Herbs are either used individually or in combination with other herbs in stress management therapy. Here are some of the prominent herbs used in stress management along with their medicinal properties:

Kava: Kava (also referred to as Kava Kava) is famous amongst other stress-busting herbs. Traditionally, Kava is consumed like any herbal tea. The tea extract is derived from its root and/or stump. The kava extract comes both in liquid, solid and pill form. Kava is said to relax muscles and aid in getting a good sleep.

Valerian: Valerian is regarded as the oldest stress reliever. It is used in the herbal stress management therapy as a sedative, as it soothes tensed muscles and relaxes the nervous system. Valium is not derived from Valerian.

Passion flower: Passion flower is a grouping of flowering plants. Their extract contains alkaloid that boasts of anti-depressant properties. Passion flower is also known for painkilling properties. In herbal treatments, it is believed to act like a sedative.

Hops:

This flower is primarily used as a flavoring agent in beer, and in herbal stress relieving medicine. In herbal stress therapy hops are used as mild mind-pacifiers as hops-extracts have mild tranquilizing properties.

Catnip: Catnip or Nepeta has excellent properties. When used as an herbal tea, catnip induces sweating. It also helps relieving digestive problems.

Chamomile: This is used as an herbal stress reliever. Chamomile relieves gastric ailments such as colic and dyspepsia. It also aids sleep and therefore known as mild herbal tranquilizer.

Rhodiola Rosae: Rhodiola Rosae is a plant that grows in the cold regions across the globe. Russian research shows that this plant is effective for treating ailments related to depression. It also reduces fatigue.

St. John’s Wort: Its extract is used in herbal stress relieving medicine and it is prescribed to fight depression.

Ginkgo: The Ginkgo herb is not a plant or a shrub. It is a tree. The extract of its leaves contains flavanoids that are believed to enhance memory and improve blood flow.

Massage, such as a shoulder and neck massage. We can see a massage therapist, have a friend or family member give you a massage, or even give ourself a massage.

Aromatherapy, which uses the aroma-producing oils (essential oils) from plants to promote relaxation.

Meditation affects the body in exactly the opposite ways that stress does, restoring the body to a calm state, helping the body to repair itself, and preventing new damage due to the physical effects of stress.

Yoga, Tai Chi, Qi Gong

which are forms of exercise and meditation. They generally require initial instruction. Books and videos are available, and these activities can be done at home.     

Avoiding unnecessary Stress

Because stress is unavoidable in life, it is important to find ways to reduce or prevent stressful incidents and decrease your negative reactions to stress. Following are activities to help you do this.

Managing Time

Time management skills can allow us to spend more time with our family and friends and possibly increase your performance and productivity. This will help reduce our stress.
To improve our time management:

•    Save time by focusing and concentrating, delegating, and scheduling time for yourself.
•    Keep a record of how you spend your time, including work, family, and leisure time.
•    Prioritize your time by rating tasks by importance and urgency. Redirect your time to those activities that are important and meaningful to you.
•    Manage your commitments by not over- or undercommitting. Don’t commit to what is not important to you.
•    Deal with procrastination by using a day planner, breaking large projects into smaller ones, and setting short-term deadlines.

Build Healthy Coping Strategies

It is important that we identify our coping strategies. One way to do this is by recording the stressful event, our reaction, and how we coped in a stress journal. With this information, we can work to change unhealthy coping strategies into healthy one – those that help us focus on the positive and what we can change or control in our life.

Lifestyle

Some behaviors and lifestyle choices affect our stress level. They may not cause stress directly, but they can interfere with the ways our body seeks relief from stress. Try to:

•    Balance personal, work, and family needs and obligations.

•   Have a sense of purpose in life.

•   Get enough sleep,

     because your body recovers

     from the stresses of the day

     while you are sleeping 

•    Eat a balanced

      diet for a nutritional

      defense against stress.

•    Get moderate exercise throughout the week.

•    Limit your consumption of alcohol.

•    Don’t smoke.

Social Support

Social support from family, friends, and the community is a major factor in how we experience stress. Research shows a strong relationship between social support and mental and physical health.
This type of support includes both emotional support such as love, trust, and understanding, as well as advice and concrete help such as time or money. Asking for help is not a sign of weakness. In fact, it can bring us closer to people we interact with every day, and it can significantly reduce our stress level. If we are feeling stressed, we can look for support from:
•    Family members and friends
•    Programs offered through your school or job (for example, assistance programs or stress management courses)
•    Colleagues at work, or people you interact with in other areas of your life (such as people who share your hobbies or other interests)
•    A professional counselor. Be sure to see someone who has experience and credentials
•    Members or leaders of our church or religious organization
•    Support groups, if we have special circumstances such as providing care for someone who is elderly or has a chronic illness. Support groups may also be available on the Internet.

Change Thinking

When an event triggers negative thoughts, we may experience fear, insecurity, anxiety, depression, rage, guilt, and a sense of worthlessness or powerlessness. These emotions trigger the body’s stress response, just as an actual threat does. Dealing with our negative thoughts and how we see things can help reduce stress. We can learn these techniques on our own or seek help from a professional such as a counselor or specialist.
•    Thought-stopping helps us stop a negative thought to help eliminate stress.
•    Disproving irrotional thouhgts helps us to avoid exaggerating the negative thought, anticipating the worst, and interpreting an event incorrectly.
•    Problem solving helps us identify all aspects of a stressful event and find ways to deal with it.
•    Changing our communiation style helps us communicate in a way that makes us views known without making others feel put down, hostile, or intimidated. This reduces the stress that comes from poor communication.

Treatment For Anxiety, Depression, Insomnia

We may need treatment for other emotional conditions related to stress, such as anxiety, depression, or insomnia. Treatment may include medicines or professional counseling.

When We Need Professional Help

Stress can be overwhelming. If this is the case, we may want to seek outside help from a professional counselor or other health professional. This can help us find a number of approaches to reducing the symptoms of stress and help us decrease the stress in our life.

Professional help is available for the following therapies or techniques:

•    Conversational therapy is process orientated and is chosen according to the clients reasons and symptom picture. The body feels and remembers everything. The psychological strain is deposited in the body through muscle tensions, the nerve system and the accumaltion of feelings.

Stress is registered down to the cell-level. With a psychological acknowledgement, a change of attitude and clarification will reflect in the relaxing of the muscles, improved nerve system, cause, and symptoms will loosen up. New knowledge and insight can turn a crisis into personal growth and development.

•    Cognitive-behavioral therapy teaches us to be aware of how we perceive stress, helps us understand how our perception influences our reaction to it, and teaches us how to develop and maintain skills to deal with stress.

•    Biofeedback is a method of consciously controlling a body function that is normally regulated automatically by the body, such as skin temperature, muscle tension, heart rate, or blood pressure. Learning biofeedback requires several sessions in a biofeedback lab or other setting.

•    Hypnosis by a hypnotherapist helps people accept suggestions that can help change their behavior. It is important to find a health professional with a lot of training and experience in hypnotherapy. Some psychologists, counselors, doctors, and dentists are experienced in hypnotherapy.

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