Posted on 26 May, 2011 -
What exactly is stress? And what can we do to cope better?
What exactly is stress? A simple definition of the main three causes
THE most important thing you can do to start reducing your own stress levels
How a fireman’s visit to my daughter’s school gave me a great stress-fighting formula that I’m passing onto you…
Dear Reader,
Yet again, in my email on the epidemic of digestive problems on Monday, that huge subject of STRESS raised its ugly head… made us nod our own heads… but then disappeared back into its ill-defined shell again.
There are few people I know who wouldn’t say they were stressed in some way these days. And few people who still doubt that it can be a key cause in a lot of types of health problems. In fact, a certain degree of ‘stress’ is a necessary part of a full life and in the right dose it can actually have a positive effect on our health…
But what exactly is stress?
There is not, unfortunately, a unanimous definition of what stress is and how and why it affects us as it does. But to put it very simply, we can say that stress is:
Any emotional and physical strain caused by our response to pressure from the outside world.
A simple definition of the main three causes of stress
We can suffer stress because life seems so difficult - and its demands so much. We can suffer stress because we are working so hard and are emotionally, mentally and physically exhausted. And we can also suffer stress because of the high levels of anxiety that our constantly reeling and anxious thoughts produce in our minds and our bodies.
Or, to add a bit less certainty and a pinch of controversy to the mix, here are a couple more definitions I’ve found:
”Stress, in addition to being itself, and the result of itself, is also the cause of itself”. (Ellis & Thompson,1983)
”Stress is something which is not naturally occurring but is a manufactured concept which has now become a ‘social fact’” (Pollock, 1988)
THE most important thing you can do to start reducing your own stress levels
Stress and anxiety, of course, are not the kind of thing you can shrug off or remove from your life easily. It is, however, important to remember that you are actually the person who has ultimate control over your own life and that there are some things you can do to lessen stress or cope with it better.
First of all, the most important key to reducing your own brand or cocktail of stress is to take a REALLY CLOSE LOOK at what is causing it in detail.
When we take a really close and honest look at what is causing us stress, we often find out that the real causes are not the ones we had imagined - or that the imagined causes were in fact just part of the bigger picture which was somehow masking the real truth…
Know your enemy - even if it is your own self…
As I advocate throughout my positive life therapy programme,The SuperFit Mind, it is very difficult to get to the underneath or the core of any real issue by simply going through things in our thoughts. Only by speaking, for example, to a counsellor (good but expensive) or putting things down on paper ourselves do we really get to the bottom of what’s really going on in our mind and our life.
If you really want to get to the bottom of the various causes of your own stress, for example, try sitting down for five minutes and writing some answers to the following questions (write spontaneously, whatever comes into your head):
When I say that I am stressed, what do I actually mean?
What things am I worried about at the moment?
What things in life make me feel anxious or stressed?
When I think about these situations, what are the things that I keep telling me about them that make the situation worse?
However small or large they may be, what are the specific details that make me so anxious or my life so stressful?
What simple things could I do - what actions could I take - to lighten my load?
REMEMBER: You will get so much more from these questions if you take the time to WRITE some answers down and take time to really explore what you have written.
You may be surprised by how easy answers can be once you’ve pinpointed the sources
You may be surprised by how deep some stress can go. But you may also be surprised by how simple changes you can make to your daily routine can lighten your stress a lot.
One formula I have used and helped people work successfully with in the past is the idea that when you have something that is stressing you, you have three main options for dealing with it: You can LET GO, look for CHANGE, or ACCEPT it.
If there is a specific cause of stress in your life, is there anything you can do to CHANGE the situation or your stress reaction to it to make it a bit better?
Are there things that you do or feel or say to yourself that you need to LET GO of?
Or is this one of those situations that you just have to ACCEPT? There are a number of things in our lives, for example, that we cannot change. I cannot, for example, change certain things about the ways in which my daughters are and act....
I only make things worse for myself if I allow myself to get angry about things that just are. When I remind myself to ACCEPT the fact that children just do take ages to put their shoes on then I can go from apoplectic to… well, just slightly enraged in an instant!
Easier said than done but…
Another medicine that can often be very hard to swallow is the fact that a large part of our stress can be caused by the way in which we react to the situation - rather than all the fault lying with the situation itself.
Even when we do not have any control over the situation we’re in, we can at least have some control over how we choose to deal with it.
When situations become bad, we often make them even worse by constantly telling ourselves really bad things about them. We blow things out of proportion. We only see the negative. And we punish ourself a lot more than we have to.
Is this situation really so terrible or might there be some good in it?
Is there a way you could react emotionally to the situation that would make it easier to bear for you?
Are there ways you could think about the situation which would make you see and feel it in a different light?
The second most important thing you can do: TAKE TIME TO RELAX
Another side of the stress story is that many of us need to take more time out to relax. Sure, we may use the weekend well to have fun and relax. But it’s also important to take time out to relax during each and every day.
Which is where my daughter’s fireman visit story comes in.
You see, as any five-year old who’s had a visit from the fire brigade will tell you, the thing you must do if you ever find yourself on fire is: “Stop. Drop. Roll.”
This also makes a nice little mantra for reducing the heat of our daily stress as well. Only this time it’s: Stop. Drop. And UNRoll.
Instead of spending the whole day braced against life - a non-stop forward hurtling through the trials and tribulations - ensure, instead that you take STOP breaks through the day.
STOP whatever you are doing for just five minutes of relaxing, breathing, enjoying just watching life around you. Or simply doing nothing or looking at a nice picture.
DROP your shoulders and become aware of the tension you were holding in them. DROP the grip that your controlling muscles were exerting on your face. DROP the tension you were clenching in your stomach or your bowels.
UNROLL. Hang your hands heavy and loose. Close your eyes and take a slow deep breath in. As you let it slowly out feel it unrolling all the tension in your body.
Your mind and your body need this kind of break. Stress may not be as immediately or fatally dangerous as being on fire. But the idea of cooling the fire is not a bad analogy.
Stop. Drop. Unroll. And don’t forget to smile…
All the best
