Stress! it’s almost a fact of life nowadays. Whether it comes from your job, your children, your partner, noisy neighbors, your in laws, your parents, trying to be everything to everybody. . . . truth is the situations that can cause stress in our lives are almost endless.
Stress is not only hard to live with, it can cause serious health problems, including insomnia if left unchecked. So what is this modern day monster and is there anything we can do to reduce stress without resorting to medication?
Stress is caused by the body’s reaction to danger. This danger can be real, for example a large vicious dog running towards you, or perceived, for example you are called into the boss’s office and you are afraid you may be fired. Instead your boss tells you how impressed he was with your latest project.
When the body senses this real or imagined danger, it leaps into action. The adrenal glands pump out hormones into the bloodstream, among these are adrenalin and cortisol, Adrenalin puts the body into a “fight or flight” mode. The blood flow is redirected from the organs into the muscles to give us extra strength and speed. This used to protect us in ancient times from wild predators or aggressive humans who wanted our cave!
Running away or fighting used up a lot of energy and the adrenalin was dissipated. Today the opportunities to fight are rather restricted and the adrenalin takes a lot longer to be reabsorbed by the system. Cortisol is necessary to the body in small quantities, it is only when it is present in excess that problems can occur.
How stress affects sleep
Stress can affect your sleep quite dramatically. It can be an isolated stressful incident which keeps you awake for a few nights or the stress may be chronic. It can become a habit, certain situations will then always cause you to become stressed. If you suffer from insomnia, whether the inability to go to sleep or to stay asleep, stress could be the cause. Your sleeping problems can cause more stress which in turn makes it even harder to sleep. So how can you better handle stress?
What presses your buttons?
A fairly common cause of stress is driving your car, especially on today’s congested roads. Sometimes you seem to spend more time sitting in an immobilized vehicle than you do actually moving! And when you finally get going is there someone in front of you going several kilometres under the speed limit? And of course you are in a hurry, aren’t we always? What about the aggressive driver in the car behind you? He or she is so close that you are afraid he will collide with you. These situations either cause us to be angry or afraid, both bad for our stress levels!
Ways to get rid of stress
Find out what’s causing the stress in your life, isolate those situations first. This will help you to formulate a plan to reduce it. Over a period of say a week. Stop each time you feel stressed out or angry. Ask yourself, “What’s causing this?” This exercise will do two things. It will force you to confront the real reason for your stress, which may calm you down on its own. Plus it will show you exactly what is causing your stress so that you can work on it.
If you are severely stressed or are suffering from anxiety or panic attacks, try PureCalm for fast relief while you work on your long term strategy to reduce stress. PureCalm is a safe and natural homeopathic remedy. Get More Information on PureCalm for Anxiety & Panic Attacks.
“PureCalm has helped me remarkably I find myself wanting to be around my family and friends and I’m no longer afraid to be in large groups of people. I also find it a lot easier to engage in conversation with others. This is a great product!” – Michael, FL, USA
Your child and stress
Kids get stressed too! Your children may not be able to explain that they’re feeling stressed, they just know they’re not feeling right!
If your child’s not sleeping, seems worried and anxious or not doing well in school, they may be stressed or anxious and not able to talk about it. Child stress management can involve taking your child to a phycologist specializing in child stress management or taking them to the doctor for an anxiety prescription. Who wants to give their kids chemical medications or drugs though?
Is there a better option? Well thankfully there is. K-OK Kiddie Calmer is a homeopathic remedy which soothes anxiety in children. Homeopathic remedies work by strengthening the child’s own body to heal itself.
“Just wanted to let you know this product is great! My 8 year old son would become overly anxious about normal things. He would have trouble sleeping because he was always worried about “what if”
I ordered the kiddie calmer…… have noticed a huge improvement. He’s able to work on projects without worrying that they need to be “perfect”. He gets along better with other children at school and he is able to fall asleep and he STAYS asleep. Thanks a million.” – Jennifer, CA
What more can we do to overcome stress?
Once you’ve identified what causes your stress try and find out why. What are you telling yourself every time a certain situation occurs? We all have an inner voice that talks to us all the time, try to listen to the messages it is sending.
For example when a stressful situation happens, for example a car cuts in front of you causing you to brake, try and hear what your inner voice is saying, chances are its something like “That stupid idiot! He nearly caused an accident! Anyway who does he think he is? He’s trying to push in because he thinks he’s more important than me!……”
Or how about this ……
Work stress, job stress
You walk past a group of chattering work colleagues. As you pass they stop talking. What message is coming up from the subconscious? “I know those people were talking about me, otherwise they wouldn’t have suddenly gone all quiet. I wonder what they were saying? Nothing good I’ll bet, but I don’t care I don’t like them anyway………..”
Your thoughts about the situation, not the situation itself, is causing your stress. Your interpretation of the situation may be entirely wrong. The impatient driver may have a genuine reason to be in a hurry, your colleagues may simply have run out of conversation!
Try to isolate what your thoughts are telling you and see if they are reasonable. If not, question your thoughts – why am I thinking this? Is this necessarily true? You will soon be able to monitor your responses and thereby combat your stress.
Exercise and stress
Love it or hate it, exercise is one of the best, and cheapest! ways to reduce stress that is available to us straight away. We can always pull on our runners and go for a brisk walk or jog when we are feeling tense. Exercise both relaxes us and helps us sleep. It also facilitates our positive thought processes which can work to soothe the stress response.
If you prefer a gentle exercise regime, take a look at our Qigong page. Qigong is a healing modality which takes only minutes per day.
A good tip to reduce your stress
Try reducing stress by simply deciding not to be stressed. Declare to yourself “I’m not going to get stressed today!” Remain watchful throughout the day and if you feel yourself becoming tense, gently remind yourself of your decision. This sounds simplistic but its very effective for a DIY stress reducer. Give it a try!
There are many techniques such as breathing exercises and visualisation which can lower our stress levels instantly and safely. Visit our relaxation techniques page for 4 different techniques to help you relax quicker and remain relaxed. Please try this before you consider any type of medication which could become addictive.
Good nutrition will help those stress levels
Poor nutrition is a leading cause of stress. For instance including B vitamins in your diet is another way for you to lessen stress.
So make sure you have a healthy diet. This will help in the battle!
A couple of resources I can recommend to help with your stress…
Stressfocus.com is an information hub with valuable information on stress, its causes, symptoms along with the right solution to overcome stress by easiest and affordable methods.