Mental Health Series: Stress Part 2
Last time we look at what stress is, the causes and the effects. In this post we will be discussing how to deal with stress and how to prevent oneself from getting into stressful situations.
Coping and preventing Stress
How to cope with stress; Relieving yourself form stress
1. Listen to music: When you start feeling overwhelmed by a stressful situation, try taking a break and listening to relaxing music.
Research has shown that playing calm music has a positive effect on the brain and body, it can lower blood pressure and reduce cortisol "one of the hormones associated with stress."
*You can also listen to ocean or nature sounds.
2. Talk it out with a friend: When you're feeling stressed, take a break to call a friend and talk about your problems, Having someone to talk to is very important especially when you're under a lot if stress.
A reassuring voice even for a minute, can put everything in perspective.
3. Talk yourself through it: There are times where calling a friend is not an option. In this case, talking calmly to yourself can be the next best thing.
You can try: Telling yourself why you're stressed out, what you have to do to complete the task at hand, and most importantly, that everything will be okay.
4. Eat Right: The relationship between stress levels and proper diet can never be over emphasized. People tend to eat more of sugary, fatty snack food when feeling overwhelmed.
Various studies have shown that eating fruits, vegetables and fish with high levels of omega-3 fatty acids helps to reduce the symptoms of stress.
5. Laugh it off: When feeling a bit overwhelmed or stressed a good laugh always brings relieve. Laughter releases the endorphins that improve mood and decrease levels of the stress causing hormones cortisol and adrenaline. It tricks your nervous system into making you happy.
When stressed just look for comedy skits or movies and soon you'll be cracking up.
6. Drink Tea: Some people don't really enjoy drinking tea, so if you like tea this one is for you.
A large dose of caffeine causes a short-term spike in blood pressure. It may also cause your hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis to go into overdrive.
Instead of coffee or energy drinks, try green tea. It has less than half the caffeine of coffee and contains healthy antioxidants, as well as theanine, an amino acid that has a calming effect on the nervous system.
7. Be Mindful: Most of the tips suggested are for immediate relief but there are many lifestyle changes that can be more effective in the long run.
The concept of "mindfulness" is a large part of meditative and somatic approaches to mental health and has gained significant attention in recent times.
Some systems if mindfulness includes yoga, tai chi, meditation and pilates. This systems incorporates physical and mental exercises that prevent stress from becoming a problem.
Join a class, in addition to the benefits the exercises brings when you join a class you gain a community that understands you and can cheer you up when you need it.
8. Exercise(even if its for just a minute): Most people get freaked out just by seeing or hearing the word exercise because they feel like its about lifting weight and climbing high mountains but really exercise doesn't have to be that extreme. A short walk around the office, climbing up the stairs or simply standing up to stretch during a break at work can offer immediate relief in a stressful situation
Exercising aids blood movement and when the blood is moving it releases endorphins which help to improve your mood.
9. Sleep Better: As much as stress is one of the major factors that causes loss of sleep. Lack of sleep is also a major cause of stress and when it becomes continuous it causes the brain and body to get out of whack and it only gets worse with time.
Doctors and medical practitioners all over the world recommends at least seven to eight hours of sleep daily. You can also have a pre-sleep routine where you dim the lights and relax before drifting to sleep. This may be one of the most effective ways to get rid of stress.
10. Breathe easy: While "take a breadth" may sound like a cliche, it holds very true when it comes to stress. For many centuries, Buddhist monks have been very conscious of deliberate breathing during meditation. I have a suggested routine below;
Duration three- to five-minutes
Sit up in your chair with your feet flat on the floor and your hands on top of your knees. Breathe in and out slowly and deeply, concentrating on your lungs as they expand fully in your chest.
While shallow breathing causes stress, deep breathing oxygenates your blood, it helps center you body, and clears your mind.
Preventing Stress
The best way to prevent stress is to develop an healthy routine in this section we will take a look at Five must haves in every healthy routine;
1. Balance Responsibilities: Having an unbalanced life can lead to loneliness and frustration. Life is all about been balanced too much work/ too much leisure is never good. The key is to find a balance between work, school and social life.
2. Manage Responsibilities: One big cause of stress is mismanagement of responsibilities e.g financial responsibilities (lack of budget), work responsibilities, family responsibilities and school responsibilities. In order to prevent stress you need to keep everything you do in front of you. Get a weekly planner thinking about all that you need to get done that week it will help manage your time and help you meet deadlines better.
3. Eat healthy foods: The food you eat can have a huge amount of effect on your stress levels as discussed in the section above. This is not saying that you say goodbye to ice creams and chocolate again the key to surviving in life is BALANCE. Make sure you get your daily dose of protein, carbohydrates, fruits among others.
4. Get Proper sleep: In the previous section we spoke on the the importance of sleep and also mentioned the recommended time required for sleep daily. In as much as sleeping can be a way of relieving stress it can also help in preventing stress in the first instance. When the brain gets enough sleep it level of efficiency is increased however over sleeping is also dangerous for the brain.
5. Make time to exercise every day: Jogging/ running for even just few minutes will go a long in reducing stress because when we exercise the endorphins are released which helps to improve the moods of individuals.
Looking back on this write-up we would see that stress cannot be completely prevented because its basically a part of life but we can reduce the amount of time we get stressed and also there is no much difference between the coping mechanism of stress and ways to prevent stress.
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