Part 1 > Part 2 - Stress Management Techniques.
The second style of stress management is to change your approach to the stress factor. There are many ways by which you can change your perspective towards stress and that way make it work in your favour rather than against it.
Befriend Stress:
As discussed earlier, stress is a natural form for the body to prepare for something unnatural. Whether you are going on stage to speak, or taking part in a competition, stress helps you prepare for that situation in advance. So next time you feel stressed out, just take it in the right spirit and acknowledge that you are better prepared sub consciously now than before.
Avoid negative people and thoughts:
Stress many times also brings along a lot of negativity. You must actively avoid negative thoughts from clouding your mind. Many times there are people who are also highly stressed.
When you are in their company, it is really becomes a clash of positive and negative vibes. If you are not alert enough, the stressed people around can bring down your enthusiasm too. Instead you must try to uplift their moods.
Learn from others:
There are always people around who seem to manage stress better than others. Look at them, learn from them and try to emulate them while managing your own stress. If you are shy to walk up to them and have a quick chat, then just observe them from a distance. This is a very simple approach to handling stress.
Deep Breathing:
If the stress is making you go breathless, then try to do the opposite. Forget everything and just focus on breathing deeply for around 5 minutes. Breathe in for a count of 7, hold the breath momentarily and then breathe out for a count of 11, again hold your breath momentarily. Once you regulate your breathe, the body as a whole calms down and you can now address the situation better.
Control your thoughts:
One of the problems with stress situations is that one problem can lead to another fictitious one and then you just end up with a whole gamut of possibilities which adds to the stress. You must kill this at the root and not think of all the things that can go wrong. Instead just focus on the problem at hand and try to solve it.
Know you stress spots:
Generally there are specific times when you feel a lot more stressed and not always. Talking in public can be tough but not in front of everyone. You need to find out which are the situations when you get really stressed out. One your know your stress spots, you must work to counter them. Sometimes listening to music, deep breathing or just cracking a joke before the situation can help you relieve the stress.
Healthy lifestyle:
Most times the problems themselves are not solely responsible for stressful life. It is our lifestyle in general that really makes things bad for us. Irregular meals, insufficient sleep and lack of physical activity can cause more damage than a stressful situation. Smoking, drinking or coffee is not a solution to these problems, healthy lifestyle is the best solution and you must work hard to adopt it.
Get back to nature:
Many times when you are really stressed, a simple walk around a park can do wonders to you and the confidence. The sweet smell of flowers, bright sunshine, sounds of birds can be very relaxing and rejuvenating to mind and body. If you have a garden then try to cultivate useful flowering plants like lavender which can help you calm things down.
Indulge in childish pranks:
We are all grownups, but there is always a child within all of us. Letting that out once in a while is not a bad idea at all. Just go out and play some games, build sand castles, color some pictures, play some music or sketch some pictures. It does not matter what you do, but this will help you get rid of the stress.
Know your limits:
Most times people end up stressed because they did not look at their limits beforehand. A good example is when you take up new responsibility at work. Do not commit to timeline without knowing your present schedule, personal commitments and other factors. Unplanned commitments can only lead to underachievement and stress.
The magic of No:
Generally ‘No’ is associated with lack of drive, passion or just disinterest, which is why many people are afraid to say no. But not saying ‘no’ can sometimes only lead to more stress. Do not take up work just because someone asked you to.
In fact, you could be doing more damage by saying ‘yes’ than ‘no’. If you do not have the time to take up some work, and you say yes, you have blocked that work for you. You are stressed and do not complete it in time. Had you said no in the first place, someone else could have taken it up and done a better job than you. So in that case your ‘no’ would be much better than your ‘yes’.
Invest in yourself:
If you are satisfied and happy, you can tackle stress better and you can help others better. While your job may require you to help others you need not always put them before you, because in the long run this can affect you as well as others adversely.
Refer to my 7 Days Home Spa. for more interesting stress management techniques.
This is not all, there are some more interesting stress management techniques for anxiety problems too. Now that you are looking at managing stress why not learn as many stress management techniques as possible.
Next >>> Part 3 - stress busters on stress management techniques
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