Searching For Happiness In a Stress Filled World?

Part #2 – Anger Management

Anger and its After Effects

In recent years we’ve heard more and more about anger management, mainly
because the effects of anger have become so prevalent in the news. One of the
most insidious forms of violence, domestic violence, is on the rise and its cause is
directly attributed to anger. Men commit 95% of all reported domestic violence
and domestic violence is the number one reason for women seeking emergency
medical attention.

Poor anger management is also the leading cause of physical abuse resulting in
serious injury or death of children. Researchers found that, in 2004, over 80% of
children who were killed were under 4 years old. And Shaken Baby Syndrome, an
injury that directly results from a poor ability to manage anger, affects between
1,200 and 1,600 children every year. In 2004, an estimated 3 million children
were found to have been abused or neglected.

Domestic violence is a learned behavior. Children who are abused, or who witness
abuse or violence, often grow up to be angry, abusive, violent adults. The cycle
often begins with men who have low self-esteem, who imagine the world is against
them, and it builds into an all-consuming anger that eventually escalates to
violence and abuse. These men become husbands and fathers and pass their
abusive and violence behaviors on to their children and the cycle repeats itself.

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SPECIAL STATISTICS FOR 2011 ABOUT CHILDREN

Top 10 Alarming Facts About How Domestic Violence Impacts Kids
1. 63% of all boys, age 11-20, who commit murder kill the man who was abusing their mother
2. 75% of boys who are present when their mothers are beaten were later identified as having demonstrable behavior problems
3. Children from homes characterized by domestic violence are five to seven times more likely to experience significant psychological problems relative to children in the general population.
4. Domestic violence exposed children are four times more likely to visit the school nurse.
5. More than half of school age children in domestic violence shelters show clinical levels of anxiety or post-traumatic stress disorder.
6. Researchers have linked exposure to chronic abuse and violence with lower IQ scores, poorer language skills, decrements in visual-motor integration skills and problems with attention and memory.
7. Cognitive problems associated with exposure to violence and abuse comprises one of the most direct threats to the developmental task of school adaptation and academic achievement.
8. Witnessing violence as a child is associated with adult reports of depression, trauma-related symptoms and low self-esteem among women and trauma-related symptoms among men
9. Children in homes where domestic violence occurs are physically abused or seriously neglected at a rate 1500% higher than the national average in the general population.
10. 3.3 million children witness domestic violence each year in the US.

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Poor anger management leads to violence and by either allowing, excusing, or
ignoring that behavior, we actually encourage it and allow it to grow. When angry
people learn there won’t be any consequences for their violent behavior, the
violence just gets that much worse. And as the other people in the household see
how successful the angry person is, they too, turn to anger to get want they want.
Especially since there are no consequences for their poor behavior.

Children who grow up in these angry, abusive households quickly learn that, in
order to get what they want, it’s okay to destroy things and hurt other people and
the cycle continues.

Once caught in this cycle of anger and abuse, it’s difficult to escape. The angry
abuser commits a harmful act toward a member of his family, either verbally or
physically, and then feels remorse for what he’s done. Then he becomes angry
with himself for losing control, the anger escalates and the abuse happens again.
The person who has poor anger management skills often convinces himself that
he’ll feel better once he “lets that anger out”, but does he really?

You might think you feel better when you’re in the middle of that rage, but when
it’s over how do you feel? You probably want to curl up under a rock somewhere.
Don’t worry though. Just as anger and violence can be learned, so can anger
management. The cycle can be broken.

TYPES OF ANGER

There are different types of anger. Different things make us angry for different
reasons. Recognizing what type of anger you’re experiencing will help you to
control it. So before we take a look at different ways of managing your anger,
let’s try to define your anger first.

Behavioral Anger
People who experience behavioral anger usually confront whatever is making them
angry. And it’s usually other people. This confrontation typically begins with
verbal rudeness and often escalates into violence.

Chronic Anger
These people who experience chronic anger are the people who hate the world,
they hate everyone in the world, they hate themselves, and they usually can’t tell
you why. They fly off into temper tantrums at the drop of the hat and they’re
just angry all the time.

Constructive Anger
Often the result of anger management techniques, these people channel their
anger in a constructive manner to get the results they want.

Deliberate Anger
Your boss might be a good example of deliberate anger. It’s often used as a ploy
to control subordinates and it doesn’t usually last long.

Judgmental Anger
People who experience judgmental anger often have low self-esteem and they
express their anger by putting other people down in public in an effort to try to
make themselves look better.

Overwhelming Anger
Exactly what it says. These people are so wrapped up in their anger that they
can’t take it any more. They often result to destruction or violence, or even
physical violence, causing harm to themselves or someone else.

Paranoid Anger
This type of anger is totally without cause. Generally due to low self-esteem, the
person imagines that someone is against him and resorts to anger and violence to
lash back at their imagined attacker.

Passive Anger
These people typically use sarcasm or mockery as a way to express their anger
and they stay away from confrontations and conflict. This generally makes them
even angrier with themselves for not being able to handle the object of their anger
directly.

Retaliatory Anger
Probably the most common type of anger, this occurs as a direct response to
someone else lashing out at you or doing something that makes you angry.

Self-inflicted Anger
People use this type of anger to punish themselves for something they think
they’ve done wrong. They may cut themselves, or overeat, or even starve
themselves.

Verbal Anger
Anger that’s expressed verbally, not physically. People who experience verbal
anger use insults and criticism to put people down and hurt them psychologically.

Volatile Anger
When something is volatile, it’s explosive. Anger is the same way. This type of
anger can erupt out of nowhere and can be extremely violent. It often comes and
goes without any warning.

These are the most common types of anger. Do you recognize any of them in
yourself? As I said, different types of anger occur in different circumstances. And
something that made you angry yesterday may not even bother you today. But
it’s important to understand the different types of anger that you may be
experiencing so you’ll be able to decide how best to handle each different
situation.

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Part #3 of Anger Management will deal with the benefits of anger and anger management at work.

Until then, have a great day.

Warm regards,

Karen C Groves

BustingStress.com

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November 23, 2011

This is the first in a series of 8 on Anger Mangement.

Part 1 – DO YOU HAVE AN ANGER PROBLEM?

We see these angry people on TV all the time. The husband and wife, arguing
while they’re washing dishes, who end up smashing plates full of food all over the
kitchen. The angry teenager screaming “I hate you!” at his parents while he
smashes his cell phone into the wall and then runs to his room and slams the
door. Even young children get into the act, stomping on toys and throwing
tantrums left and right. And then someone usually says something funny, the
audience laughs, and the whole incident is forgotten.

What they don’t show you on TV is that someone has to clean up that mess in the
kitchen. And someone has to pay to replace the plates. They don’t show you that
the reason the teenager thinks it’s OK to scream and destroy his cellphone is
because he watches his parents act the same way. And they don’t tell you that
the reason the toddler is so angry is because everybody else in the house is
always screaming and throwing things.

What they don’t show you on TV is all the harm anger can do. It has lasting
effects on everyone around you. The toddler who is standing in the doorway
witnessing the plate-throwing incident between mommy and daddy is learning
that, when you’re angry, it must be OK to scream and throw things. Mommy and
daddy do it. And it must be OK to call people names – mommy and daddy do it all
the time.

On TV you don’t get to see that same toddler, a few years later, physically attack
their third grade teacher or try to poison their fifth grade teacher because they
didn’t like the grade they got on the math test. You don’t get to see that same
toddler grow into an angry teenager who takes a gun to school or the mall.
All you see on TV is that someone gets angry and that it’s OK to violently express
that anger…and then everyone laughs.

In real life, it’s pretty easy to recognize when someone we know at work or school,
or even just an acquaintance, has a problem with anger. They yell a lot, they
throw things, they stomp their feet, they call you names and say terrible things to
you, they behave irrationally, sometimes even putting themselves or someone else
in danger.

Unlike TV, though, the things they say to you are not funny. They’re often very
hurtful, things that they would never consider saying if they weren’t so angry.
Things that they apologize for later, but that can never be taken back or forgotten.
Their actions aren’t funny, either. Breaking plates and destroying property shows
a lack of respect, not an appreciation of comedy. In fact, a lot of times, their
actions are threatening. Imagine what that toddler in the doorway must really
feel. I doubt she’s laughing at all the fun mommy and daddy are having. More
likely, she’s frightened, which means she feels threatened.

We see these angry people every day and we tend to shy away from them.
There’s no telling what will set them off and we certainly don’t want to be around
the next time their violent temper erupts. But what if these angry people are
right in your house? What if you can’t get away from them? Worse yet, what if
the angry person is YOU and you just don’t realize it? What if YOU are the reason
your entire household is always so upset and everyone you love is angry
themselves?

Too often we look for scapegoats, we look to others to blame for our bad choices
because it’s difficult to accept that we ourselves may be the problem. The way I
look at it, when the same issues continue to arise, when you often find yourself at
the center of turmoil in your personal and professional life and you always arrive
at the same outcome, for example your co-workers keep their distance from you
and you find the same is true at home and your spouse and family do the same
thing then perhaps the problem isn’t purely coincidental. If you find that you keep
getting the same outcomes and reactions from people in your life, then it could be
you. It’s what you’re doing that you’re not aware of. This should be a wake up
call that you need to change. The sooner you can recognize this in yourself and
that you need to change, the quicker you’ll have your life back on track.

Just remember, if you keep getting the same reactions from people in regards to
your behavior then you need to take a good long look at yourself and change
some things. Wake up and observe other’s reactions to you, why do they treat
you in a certain way?, what is it you are doing for people to treat you in this
manner? Observe not only what you say to others but how you say it and how
they react in response. You might find that you come across angry or have an
aggressive tone when you speak without even realizing it.

ASK YOURSELF THESE QUESTIONS

1. Are you frequently angry? Not just disgruntled or negative. But angry to
the point that you can feel yourself getting red in the face, you can feel your
blood pressure rising, and you want to strike out at something or someone.

2. Does your anger last for long periods of time? If your child spills his milk at
breakfast are you still yelling at him about it when you pick him up from
school?

3. When your boss makes you angry, do you take it out on your family at
dinner that night?

4. Does the least little thing set you off? Do you get angry when the paperboy
misses your porch and the paper lands in the driveway instead? Do you
allow trivial things that should have no effect on your life to make you
angry?

5. Do you find yourself always on the defensive? When someone points out to
you that your shoe is untied it’s not a criticism, it’s an observation. People
who have anger issues constantly feel they are being criticized and they
become angrier because they feel they need to defend themselves.

6. Do you allow anger to control your life? Do you miss out on enjoying your
time with your family because you’re just too angry about what happened at
work today? Is your job performance suffering because all you can
concentrate on is what you should have said during your performance
review?

7. Do you use your anger to help you get through life? Do you have to adopt
an “I’ll show HIM” attitude before you give your boss your best effort? Do
you only try your best so you can prove someone wrong?

8. Is your anger too intense? Does your anger feel more like rage, to the point
where you can’t control it, the point where you couldn’t stop being angry
now no matter how hard you try?

9. Do you become aggressive and violent when you’re angry? Are you the one
smashing dishes and cell phones? Do you strike out at others when you’re
angry – either physically or verbally?

You may have purchased this guide in an effort to help you deal with an anger
issue that’s going on in your own home or your own life. And there may very well
be a person in your life that has a problem with anger management. If that’s the
case, then this guide will help you learn to deal with those people.

But if you answered yes to any of the above question, then you may have an
anger problem, too. That’s not to say that you are causing the anger problems of
those around you or that you are even the cause of any anger problem. But
somewhere along the line, you have been affected by anger, just like that toddler
in the doorway. Somewhere along the line, you were taught that it’s OK to
express your anger in any way you see fit. In fact, you may even think it’s
necessary to become violently angry because somewhere along the line, someone
told you:

IT’S NOT GOOD TO HOLD YOUR ANGER INSIDE…. LET IT
OUT!

But there are healthy ways to express your anger. And throwing things,
screaming, stomping around and hurting those around you is not healthy. With
this guide, we’re going to take a look at just how much better your life will be
when you learn to control and manage your anger.

Contrary to what you may think, managing your anger does not mean that you
have to go through the rest of your life with rose-colored glasses on. You don’t
have to become a doormat either. It’s OK to get angry. It’s a natural, human
emotion. But your life, and the lives of those around you, will be much better if
you learn more productive ways of expressing that anger when it occurs.

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I hope that you enjoyed today’s newsletter. Next time we will take a look at anger and its after effects and the different types of anger.

In the meantime, have a great week.

Warm regards,

Karen C Groves

November 7, 2011

Part 5 – Other things that might help in dealing with stress
Many people who have previously suffered stress find that adopting a
hobby or a pastime helps to relieve their condition. For example, rather
than slumping in front of the TV for a few hours every evening, it is far
more relaxing and therefore stress relieving to involve yourself in a
hobby or interest, something in which you can immerse yourself for
many pleasurable hours.

One of the reasons that many people suffer stress is that they have
little in their life that is enjoyable upon which they can focus their
attention and effort. Consequently, it is far too easy to become self-centered
and self-absorbed, completely wrapped up in the minutiae of a
life in which there is nothing to shift their focus away from the things
that cause stress in the first place.

Hobbies such as photography, gardening, painting, collecting or even
carpentry may not be something you have ever considered before, but
they are all highly relaxing pastimes that give you something else on
which to focus. The fact that all of these hobbies require a degree of
concentration and attention means that if you want to be good at what
you are doing (and you will), you need to forget your everyday stresses
to focus on the task in hand.

Another thing that you might consider as a way of dealing with stress is
by using biofeedback, a non-medical process by which you learn what
your body is doing. If you can for example learn about your muscle
tension and heart rate, you will become more attuned to what your
body is doing so that at times of potential stress, you have something
far more important and useful to concentrate on rather than getting
stressed.

And many doctors and stress management specialists emphasize that
having a sense of humor, being able to laugh at situations rather than
getting stressed by them is one very effective way of fighting stress. We
have all had experiences of situations that seemed dire or extreme at
the time which eventually became funny, so instead of waiting until
later, why not make an effort to see it as funny from the beginning?
It may not be easy to do so in every situation but if you can learn how
to see the funny side of life, you will naturally lower the amount of
stress you feel by a very significant margin.

Another recommended strategy for dealing with stress is massage
therapy, which is widely recognized as being one of the oldest healing
arts for the very good reason that it works extremely well in many
different situations and circumstances.

It is well established that massage can help to relax your whole body,
and that it generates new levels of energy which stay with you long
after your massage session is over.

Many research studies have been carried out over the years as to the
efficacious benefits of massage, with results showing that it helps to
reduce your heart rate, lower blood pressure, increases blood circulation
and prompts the production of endorphins which are your own natural
painkilling chemicals.

At the most basic level, most people find that massage is an incredibly
relaxing experience, and the fact that enjoying a good massage can
also help to reduce stress levels is almost a bonus.

Herbs and supplements for stress relief

St. Johns wort
As suggested earlier, there are many well-established reasons why
taking a SSRI antidepressant to deal with stress is not a particularly
smart move. However, there is absolutely no reason why you should do
so because St John’s wort is widely believed to provide exactly the
same benefits as leading antidepressant brands like Prozac without the
side-effects.

Indeed, in some countries in Europe (particularly Germany), St John’s
wort is prescribed as a treatment for anxiety, stress and depression far
more commonly than SSRI antidepressants for this exact reason.
While it cannot be said that there are no potential side-effects taking St
John’s wort, it is noticeable that almost all of the side-effects quoted are
those that might occur if this particular substance is ingested at the
same time as antidepressants or stimulants.

As it is a widely recognized replacement for the first of these, there
would be no logical reason to take the two at the same time, while
taking stimulants at the same time as a herb that is known to have
antidepressant qualities would simply make no sense.

Consequently, while you should be aware that there are potential side effects,
it is still fair to suggest that taking St John’s wort to treat
anxiety or stress is far safer than using chemical-based SSRI
antidepressants.

Passionflower
Passionflower in herbal form is a substance that is believed to have
been used for hundreds of years to treat anxiety and insomnia.
In more recent times, studies have indicated that the effects of
passionflower are very similar to those of benzodiazepine drugs,
although using passionflower tends to prompt a far higher improvement
in job performance and less drowsiness than leading drugs such as
Mexazolam.

Some possible side effects of using passionflower may include nausea,
vomiting and drowsiness, while the safety of using passionflower during
pregnancy has not been extensively tested. Furthermore, passionflower
should not be taken at the same time as sedatives either.

Nevertheless, for those who do not suffer side-effects, using
passionflower is an extremely effective way of combating the worst
effects of anxiety and stress completely naturally.

Valerian
While the herb valerian is most commonly known as a treatment for
insomnia, there are indications that it can also help to relieve the worst
symptoms for patients who suffer from stress or anxiety as well.
As a general rule, valerian should be taken an hour or so before retiring
for the night and you will need to take your dose for two or three weeks
before you start to feel any appreciable beneficial effects. However,
because valerian is considered to be a fairly strong herbal remedy, you
should not take it for more than three months at a time.

Both capsules containing valerian extract and teas are available, but
most people who use valerian prefer to take it in capsule form as the
smell of the tea can apparently be somewhat off-putting.

Possible side-effects that you should be on the lookout for are mild
indigestion, slight light-headedness or palpitations and possible
headaches. However, as it is best to take valerian before going to bed,
the majority of people suffer no adverse side-effects whatsoever. They
do however enjoy significant benefits in terms of anxiety reduction and
a better night’s sleep, so valerian is a herbal option worth considering if
you suffer from anxiety or stress.

Calcium and magnesium
It is generally believed that you are more likely to suffer from stress if
you do not have enough of certain trace minerals in your regular diet.
In particular, most stress experts agree that having sufficient calcium
and magnesium in your diet is essential to limit the possibility of
becoming a stress victim.

Of course, you can use dietary supplements to make sure that you
consume enough of the necessary trace minerals, but it is generally a
far better idea to try to increase the amount of foods or liquids that you
consume which contain these essential trace elements. By doing so, you
effectively ensure that there is no way in which you can take an
overdose of minerals, which is not something that can necessarily be
said if you are supplementing your diet with pills or capsules.

NOTE: Most mineral supplements on the market are not organic according to the scientific definition of organic: having the carbon molecule. If the mineral is truly organic, the carbon molecule aids the body in recognizing the mineral. If fulvic acid is also present, the fulvic acid will act as a transporter carrying the mineral through the body for use. The carbon and the fulvic acid aid the body is using all the mineral that is needed. Any excess mineral is simply dumped by the body. This is not the case with inorganic minerals. Our bodies only utilize  about 10-15% of inorganic minerals and then store the excess in the joints, muscles or any place they can find. This may explain why we seem to have many more people showing up with arthritis (mineral deposits) in the joints. Nature’s Unique has an excellent liquid mineral that has the carbon molecule and the fulvic acid.

There are plenty of websites where you can find information about both
calcium and magnesium rich food and liquids, with this page as an
example of the former and this of the latter. However, if you want to
find more information, run a Google search for ‘calcium rich foods’ or a
similar search for foods that contain plenty of magnesium.

Aromatherapy
As avoiding stress is all about learning to relax more effectively,
aromatherapy can be a big help in reducing your tendency to suffer
stress.

By adding essential oils to your bath, infusers or as a massage oil, you
can limit your susceptibility to stress and anxiety by regularly increasing
your capacity for relaxation and serenity. Oils that can be of great
assistance in aromatherapy for stress reduction include lavender,
jasmine, geranium, cypress and sandalwood.

Conclusion

As you will no doubt understand by now, dealing with stress and anxiety
in a completely natural way is more about changing your lifestyle and
your attitude to life than it is about any particular form of treatment.
Although some of the herbs highlighted in the last chapter may help to
reduce your susceptibility to stress and anxiety, in order to tackle your
problem in the most effective way, you have to do so by dealing with
the causes of your stress and anxiety rather than by dealing with the
symptoms or signs of it.

As highlighted, this is one of the reasons why seeking medical
treatment for stress and anxiety is never likely to be the most effective
way of dealing with the problem. Leaving aside for the moment the fact
that many medical treatments prescribed for dealing with anxiety and
stress could cause adverse side-effects that range from being
unpleasant to lethal, these medical treatments will only reduce the
severity of the symptoms rather than attacking the root cause of your
stress problem.

It is a little like the weeds growing in your garden. If you want to get rid
of them once and for all, you have to pull them up from the roots,
because if you cut them down with a mower or a blade, the only thing
that you can be absolutely certain of is that those weeds will grow back
again, probably twice as strong as before.

In the same way, if you attack stress on a peripheral level, you can be
sure that your stress problem will come back time and again. If
however you attack the root cause of your problem, you can be equally
certain that barring a disaster, your stress problem will probably go
away for good.

And as you have seen, in order to deal with stress at the roots, you
have to spend some time identifying what it is that causes you to be
stressed. It may be one thing, but it is far more likely to be a
combination of several situations or circumstances. You need to identify
and isolate all of these factors to come up with your own personal
‘stress trigger mix’ in order to be able to tackle the problem head-on.
Do things in the way that you have read of in this book and I have little
doubt that you will be able to get rid of your stress problem once and
for all. However, there is no denying that there is some work involved
and that a little time is also going to be absolutely necessary as well.

And now you know what to do, it is time to start doing it.
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I hope that you have enjoyed this series on dealing with stress and, perhaps, learned some new methods for dealing with it.

If you have any questions or would like more information, please contact me at Support@BustingStress.com.

The next newsletter will be the first in a series that will present information on Anger Management.

In the meantime, have a great day.

Warm regards,

Karen C Groves

BustingStress.com

DISCLAIMER:

The Publisher has striven to be as accurate and complete as possible in the information found on this site, notwithstanding the fact that she does not warrant or represent at any time that the contents within are accurate due to the rapidly changing nature of the health/medical field.

While all attempts have been made to verify information provided in these publications, the Publisher assumes no responsibility for errors, omissions, or contrary interpretation of the subject matter herein. Any perceived slights of specific persons, peoples, or organizations are unintentional.

In practical advice books, like anything else in life, there are no guarantees of results. Readers are cautioned to rely on their own judgment about their individual circumstances and act accordingly.

This is for information only. This  is not intended for use as a source of medical advice. Users are urged to seek medical advice before embarking upon or changing a course of medication or fitness program or before making extreme changes in their life style. All readers are also advised to seek services of competent professionals if they are having serious medical, mental or emotional problems.

November 1, 2011

Part 4: The importance of stress management

Once you have created a list of factors, events and situations that you
recognize as being the primary causes of your stress problem, you are
faced with two options when it comes to what you are going to do about
the problem.

Option one is to remove yourself from any situation where you might
suffer stress. This may be relatively easy to do (although not always
practical) if the primary trigger for your stress can be readily identified.

If for example your own self-analysis indicates that the primary cause
of your stress problem is a boss whom you absolutely loathe, then you
can get rid of your problem in one fell swoop by quitting your job to
work elsewhere. However, this of course assumes that there are other
jobs available and as you have no idea what your new boss is going to
be like if you do change jobs, it might be a case of jumping out of the
frying pan and straight into the fire.

Nevertheless, in a relatively ‘cut and dried’ situation like this, your
solution is fairly clear and obvious.

For most people who suffer stress however, it is far more common for
their problems to be a result of a combination of several different
factors. In this case, taking one action (like quitting your job) is not
going to provide the solution you are looking for. While it might remove
one major source of stress from your life, it still leaves other factors
that you have identified as being a source of stress for you.

In this case, you fall back on the other option, which is learning to
manage your stress levels by changing your attitude or approach to the
stress causing factors that you cannot remove from your every day
existence.

For instance, while you can walk away from a job, you cannot walk
away from an ex-spouse with whom you have joint custody of your
children. In this case, if the ex-spouse is causing you stress and upset,
the ‘flight’ option does not exist and as choosing the ‘fight’ option will
only lead to more tension and upset, you need to learn how to deal with
what you are going through.

In effect, neither ‘flight or fight’ is a realistic alternative here so you
have to seek a third way, which is to teach yourself to deal with the
triggers that have hitherto caused you stress in a way that minimizes
the depth of your emotional reactions.

Turning off the alarm

As previously suggested, stress is as old as mankind itself, a chemical
reaction in your body to real or perceived danger which has been
passed down through the generations for thousands of years.
In effect, in the days of our Neanderthal ancestors, stress was a
warning system or an alarm that told our ancient forebears that urgent
action was imperative, an alarm that suddenly changed their whole
metabolism to prepare for the fight or flight that inevitably followed.

Given that it is very rare indeed for modern man to be in a situation
where such dramatic or drastic actions become imperative, it is a fact
that stress is nowadays something akin to a false alarm. While there
are hazardous situations that need quick and decisive actions (for
example, if you are base jumping, you need to make sure your chute
opens), there is no real need for most of us to get stressed out in
general, everyday situations.

Another thing that you have to understand that might help you deal
with stress is that it is not always the situation or event that we
perceive as causing stress that is the real cause. It is often the way that
we deal with the situation that causes the stress levels to rise, rather
than the situation itself.

This happens because it is a basic feature of human nature that we are
always harder on ourselves than we would be on other people. When
we make a decision or attempt to do something that goes wrong, most
people immediately tend to become super self-critical. They give
themselves a good ‘dressing down’, internally explaining why they
should never have attempted to do what they were trying to do in the
first place, how they have just made a fool of themselves and so on.

If a friend or family member had tried what we have just tried, we
would console them with the thought that these things happen, that if
you never try, you never know and that it is just one of those things.

When we are telling ourselves off however, we tend to be far more
critical and sharp. Hence, most of us have the capability to create a
stressful situation out of something that was not at all inherently
stressful a few brief moments before.

This is effectively a double-false alarm because there was no need to
get stressed in the first place but we did, only to aggravate our stress
levels considerably further by giving ourselves a hard time about it.
Negative thinking of this nature is extremely destructive because not
only does it damage your potential to perform to your maximum
capabilities by undermining your self-confidence, it also distracts your
attention away from the main task of focusing on your internal emotional
strife.

If you can therefore learn or teach yourself how to turn off these false
alarm situations so that you do not react to challenging and difficult
events by getting stressed, you have taken a significant step towards
reducing stress levels in your life. In this way, you have minimized the
possibility of suffering the attendant medical side-effects that can be so
critically dangerous.

So, how do you set about turning off these false alarms when they
occur? There are many different tactics or strategies that you can try
that have been successful for many other sufferers before you, most of
which are focused on learning to relax rather than reacting when faced
with a situation which might otherwise become stressful.

Deep breathing: Whenever you are faced with a situation that has the
potential to become a stress filled moment, it is extremely effective for
reducing the impact if you have mastered the art of breathing deeply
and slowly on command.

Taking slow, deep breaths under complete control rather than the fast
and shallow breaths that we automatically tend to take when we are
stressed is a highly effective way of making sure that stress never gets
its foot into our emotional ‘door’. Teaching yourself to react to stressful
situations by conscious command of your breathing is a superbly
effective way of minimizing the possibility of stress taking control of the
moment.

There are many different ways that you can teach yourself to breathe
deeply and slowly at those moments when stress seems imminent, such
as the classical ‘stand back, count to ten, in and out’ strategy. Anxiety
or stress attacks both tend to hit you quickly and suddenly, so if you
make a conscious effort to take a step back (physically or
metaphorically), slowly count to 10 and force yourself to breathe deeply
and slowly, the stressed moment will almost always pass.

Sometimes however, even though you know what you should do, it can
be difficult to actually physically do what you are supposed to be doing
at those times when stress or anxiety hits hardest and deepest. As this
is obviously the time when controlling your breathing to keep your
stress or panic under control is most critically important, this can be a
major downside of having to make a conscious effort to breathe deeply.
For this reason, my favorite method of learning deep breathing is to
follow a training method that was first used around 100 years ago with
dogs!

You may have heard of Pavlov’s dogs, a phrase which refers to an
experiment carried out by an eminent Russian scientist named Ivan
Pavlov.

He wanted to establish whether it was possible to prompt what might
otherwise be seen to be involuntary reflex reactions on command.
Hence he carried out his experiment into what he called ‘conditioned
reflexes’ with dogs.

After ringing a small bell, he would feed the dogs and he continued this
process of ringing the bell, then feeding them for some time.
One day, he rang the bell but did not feed them. Nevertheless, the dogs
became attentive, began to salivate and Pavlov noted that the digestive
process also seemed to start at the same time.

In effect, by ringing the bell he had conditioned their automatic reflexes
to react in a certain way on command.

By following this adaption of the Pavlov method, you can teach yourself
to do the same thing with deep breathing and stress. Through a process
of self education (which is explained in detail in the article), you can
condition your reflexes so that every time you’re faced with a stressful
situation, you have already trained your metabolism to slow down your
breathing as an automatic response.

In effect therefore, by learning this version of the Pavlov method, you
put yourself in a position where you will automatically avoid almost
every stressed situation without even having to think about doing so.
Not only this but just having the knowledge that whenever stress
appears to be imminent, you are capable of banishing it automatically
has another significant advantage. As you know that your Pavlovian
conditioned reflexes will ‘kick in’ whenever stress raises its ugly head
and that through deep breathing, you have the power to neutralize
stress automatically will make you a far calmer and more relaxed
individual. Hence, by adopting this particular deep breathing training
idea, you reduce the possibility of stress in two different highly effective
ways.

Muscular relaxation: As mentioned before, one of the effects of stress
is to make you tense-up, knotting all of your muscles into a tight ball as
an inadvertent reflex action to the stressful situation you are facing.
Tense muscles release chemicals into your body that exacerbate your
stress levels and ensure that the stressed feeling itself lingers
considerably longer than it might otherwise. Hence, if you can learn to
relax your muscles at times of imminent stress rather than tensing
them, you can reduce the severity of your stress and the length of time
it lasts as well.

One of the best ways of doing this is to consciously move from the top
of your head to the tips of your toes, tensing and then relaxing every
individual muscle group as you go. When you feel stress coming on,
start by tensing and then releasing your forehead and eye muscles,
before moving on to the jaw muscles, then on down to the neck and
shoulder muscles and so on.

For each individual muscle group, tense and relax for a few seconds
before moving on to the next muscle group.

This works well on its own as a way of both relaxing you and turning
your mind to matters other than the one that was just about to start
stressing you out.

However, relaxing your muscles in this way works even better when
used in combination with deep breathing, so try the two at the same
time. Again, you could teach yourself to include muscle relaxation in
your conditioned reflex training so that the whole combined program
becomes automatic.

And if you are a person who suffers stress to a very high level, there
are more advanced muscle relaxation programs that you can learn
about that might be more effective for you than the basic program
highlighted above.

Perhaps the best known of these is Progressive Relaxation (follow the link for a description) while you can learn how to use this particular form of muscle relaxation by following this link.

Visualization: Wherever you are when stress starts to hit you, you can
be as certain as anyone ever could be that you probably don’t want to
be where you are, in that situation at that very moment. Visualization
develops this idea by taking you away from that situation or event
through the power of your imagination.

For example, imagine that you are on a beautiful sunny beach, sitting next
to a wonderfully serene and peaceful harbor or strolling purposefully
across a stunning snow clad hill. It really doesn’t matter what kind of
place you visualize or even if the place that you are visualizing is real or
a figment of your imagination. The point is, you must visualize a place
of wonder and beauty before trying to involve all of your senses in
enjoying and soaking in the atmosphere and experience of ‘being’ in
this marvelous place on both a mental and emotional level.

As suggested by the name, you can see everything in the scene, but
what exactly is it you see? What do you hear or smell? Is it hot or cold,
sunny, raining or snowing? Mentally reach down to touch the earth
beneath your feet or the bench on which you are sitting. What does it
feel like?

The more you can involve all of your senses in visualization, the more
deeply you will be pulled into your visualized world, taking you further
and further away from your potentially stressful reality.

Hence, you should try to master the art of visualization when you are
relaxing, at times when you have a few moments to spare. If you can
teach yourself how to visualize in this way before finding yourself in a
potentially stressful situation, it is going to be far easier to call up your
visualization skills as they are needed.

Learning to visualize ‘on your feet’ is going to be far harder, so learning
visualization skills is something you should start right now.
Other things that help: Deep breathing is an essential element of
both yoga and certain forms of meditation, and learning more about
both of these ancient disciplines will help you to apply a far higher
degree of control to your emotions, thus making it less likely that stress
is going to be a problem for you.

Of course, if you find yourself in a potentially stressful situation on the
way to work or in the office, you are not going to drop down to the floor
to adopt a yogic asana (pose) or sit crossed legged humming! These are
not, therefore, disciplines that you will use to rebuff the onset of stressful
moment as and when it happens.

However, by mastering either yoga and/or meditation, you will acquire
a far higher degree and level of mental control because in both cases,
these disciplines are focused on learning or heightening the levels of
control that you apply to your everyday existence.

For example, as suggested on this eHow yoga page (which is a very
good place to start learning about yoga), it is stated that yoga is all
about ‘disciplining yourself to balance your mind, soul and emotions’,
which is exactly what you need to be able to do if you want to turn off
the false alarms in your head generated by stress.

In a similar fashion, many of the different forms of meditation focus on
positive thinking and how you acquire the ability to think positively each
and every day of your life. As suggested earlier, negative thinking is
one aspect of human nature that tends to elevate the most damaging
effects of stress, so learning to think positive is a very beneficial thing
to do.

For example, if you practice Raja Yoga Meditation, the idea is that you
spend 15 minutes every morning teaching yourself to have only positive
thoughts throughout the coming day. Every morning, you tell yourself
over and over again that you are a peaceful person and that your
objective is to radiate peace to everyone you encounter.

If you can entirely adopt this philosophy by constant training, it really
will make a difference in how many people that you come into contact
with can annoy you or stress you out. You will remain calm, collected
and at peace with yourself, thereby ensuring that the stress alarm
remains wonderfully silent.

Learning to turn off these false alarms is a major step forward, but it is
dealing with the symptoms of stress, not attacking your problem at the
roots. In order to do this, you have to take one further large step into
the unknown.

Don’t turn the alarm on in the first place!

It is all very well learning to turn off the stress alarm once is starts
ringing in your head, but, obviously, it is far more effective if you can
prevent that alarm starting in the first place. In other words, it is more
effective if you can attack the root cause of your stress problem rather
than simply dealing with the symptoms as we have done so far.
Fortunately, once you know how, this is not particularly difficult to do,
with its genesis in the idea of visualization that we looked at in the
previous section.

By learning to visualize, you both increase your ability to relax and take
yourself away from the situation that was threatening to make you
stressed.

This latter point is extremely important, because it highlights a basic
premise of which all cognitive psychologists are aware, the idea that all
of our behavior and also our feelings are largely caused by our own
beliefs and thoughts.

Of course, cognitive psychology is a very complicated and involved
science that focuses on some incredibly complex areas of human
behavior such as problem solving, language and memory. Hence, my
‘snapshot description’ of the connection between feelings and thoughts
in the previous paragraph is massively oversimplified and simplistic but
for the purposes of understanding this concept in relation to stress, this
description is adequate.

In essence, the basic idea is almost an extension of the Raja Yoga
Meditation principle, that by thinking peaceful thoughts, you engender a
feeling of inate calm and peace, whereas by thinking stressful thoughts,
you naturally create stress.

In essence, therefore, the reason that we suffer stress has nothing to do
with what is happening to us, nor is it directly related to what has
happened in the past. On the contrary, stress in this scenario is caused
by how we are currently thinking about what is going on rather than by
events themselves or by memory of previous occurrences of a similar
event.

While any past experience that we have already accumulated
of similar events or situations will influence how we react when it
happens again, it is still our thoughts or beliefs about that
experience and the current situation that makes us react in the way we
do.

A couple of examples may help to illustrate this observation a little
more clearly.

We have already established that the most traumatic experience that
any human being can go through is to lose a spouse but as the vast
majority of us are never going to lose more than one spouse in our
lifetime, few younger people have previous experience in this situation.
And for the majority of us, while we might believe that the unbelievable
shock we feel is directly related to the death of our closest loved one, it
is in fact far more to do with our own confusion, our lack of direction
and understanding allied to a general inability to cope with such a
situation on a mental level. In other words, it is all about our own
feelings and probably also a subconscious belief that we were always
going to stay together forever that causes the stress, rather than the
event itself.

As another example, it is common for adults that were abused as
children to grow up feeling as if they have no value or as if they are
worthless. From this it follows that this adult feels depressed or
stressed because of their feelings of worthlessness and lack of value
rather than because of what happened when they were a youngster.
The strength of this notion is that we are not prisoners to our past
experiences or to our reactions. Because we know that our feelings
control what will happen, we have the power to apply that control in a
positive rather than a negative manner. In effect, whatever happened in
the past to cause stress or what is happening now to do the same
cannot ‘win’ if you apply positive thinking to everything you encounter
on a daily basis.

Instead of being anxious, focus on being concerned because while the
first focuses on taking an idea or a situation and worrying about it, the
latter is all about analyzing that idea or situation in an effort to find a
solution or an answer.

Take care of the real problems in your life by never allowing them to
get you down and instead of getting anxious or stressing about them,
address them head-on and look for solutions and answers.

Learn the strength of positive thinking, adapt this positive thinking to
every situation that you come across and you will go some considerable
way to silencing the stress alarm bells in your head for ever.

*********************************************************************

Well, we are nearing the end of this particular series. There is only Part 5 and we are finished.

I hope that you enjoyed this particular series. When this is finished I will begin a new series dealing with anger management.

Have a great week.

Warm regards,

Karen C Groves

BustingStress.com

DISCLAIMER:

The Publisher has striven to be as accurate and complete as possible in the information found on this site, notwithstanding the fact that she does not warrant or represent at any time that the contents within are accurate due to the rapidly changing nature of the health/medical field.

While all attempts have been made to verify information provided in these publications, the Publisher assumes no responsibility for errors, omissions, or contrary interpretation of the subject matter herein. Any perceived slights of specific persons, peoples, or organizations are unintentional.

In practical advice books, like anything else in life, there are no guarantees of results. Readers are cautioned to rely on their own judgment about their individual circumstances and act accordingly.

This is for information only. This  is not intended for use as a source of medical advice. Users are urged to seek medical advice before embarking upon or changing a course of medication or fitness program or before making extreme changes in their life style. All readers are also advised to seek services of competent professionals if they are having serious medical, mental or emotional problems.

To manage your subscription, please send an email to Support@BustingStress.com.

October 22, 2011

Part 3 – What Does Stress Do To You?

What does stress do to you?

On a purely mental level, stress is obviously a condition that causes a
great deal of upset and emotional torment. However, the physical
effects of suffering stress on a regular basis are also extremely
noticeable and potentially dangerous as well.

• Stress can weaken your immune system, meaning that you have
less ability to fight off infections and diseases.

• It is a condition that is known to increase blood pressure, which in
turn is a major contributory factor to heart attacks and strokes.

• It increases headaches, muscle pains, backache, tiredness and
chronic fatigue.

• If you suffer from asthma, stress can often bring on an attack and
make those attacks far more severe and potentially dangerous.

• Stress has the ability to trigger behavior which ultimately
becomes dangerous such as drinking to excess, smoking and
consuming recreational drugs.

• It could also lead to a decrease in sexual desire and lowered
ability to ‘perform’ as and when required.

There are many more problems that can be caused by stress and, as is
obvious, many of these conditions are killers.

Before seeking medical attention

It is a fact of modern life that each and every one of us has less time
available than we would have had a few decades ago and that with less
time available, it is natural that all of us look for ‘quick fixes’ or
shortcuts to get things done as quickly as possible.

This is probably the main reason why most of us will immediately rush
off to the doctor at the first sign of any kind of medical problem. As
soon as we suspect that we have some kind of malady or ailment, we
understandably want to know what it is as soon as possible but perhaps
even more importantly, we want to ‘cure’ whatever is ailing us as
quickly as possible as well.

After all, most people who are still fortunate enough to have a job
cannot afford to take a week or two off – there are plenty of other
people who will be more than happy to step into their shoes at a
moment’s notice. Moreover, if you take too much time off work, it
almost inevitably means that there is a huge backlog to be made up
when you eventually return, which is a recipe for a great deal more
stress in any event!

Nevertheless, despite the fact that it is human nature to think that you
are the only one who suffers the problems that you do, everyone else
that you deal with on a daily basis is busy as well and that includes your
doctor. Hence, it is natural for your doctor to seek the quickest and
easiest ‘cure’ for any problem that you take to him (or her).

This almost inevitably involves the prescription of chemical-based
pharmaceutical drugs and this is no less true when you ask your doctor
to ‘do something about’ your stress problem than it is with any other
kind of ailment which might see you visiting the doctor’s office.

If by compiling your own stress trigger list you have convinced yourself
that you are a person who is prone to stress attacks, it might be
tempting to seek immediate medical advice. Before you do so, however,
you should take a moment to consider whether this is the most
appropriate action.

If you visit your doctor because you suspect that you suffer from stress,
the chances are that he or she will prescribe medication, most
commonly anti-anxiety or antidepressant drugs.

While we will examine the kind of drugs that doctors most commonly
prescribe for stress in more detail later, the important point to note
here is that these drugs are only capable of calming the symptoms of
your stress problem. They do not attack it at the root by helping you to
analyze what it is that is causing stress in your life, nor do drugs help
you to understand what you need to do if you want to minimize or
eradicate the stress you suffer on a daily basis.

Instead, the drugs that you will be prescribed are most likely to calm
you down when you are in a situation which might otherwise cause you
stress. Hence, the beneficial effect of these drugs is only going to be
temporary after which your propensity to suffer stress attacks will
return unabated.

But the most scary thing is that doctors in the West are aware that antianxiety
and antidepressant drugs are the prescription drugs that are
most commonly abused and misused. While these drugs can provide
temporary relief from the worst effects of stress, anxiety and
depression, they are open to harmful abuse and can be highly addictive
as well.

For all of these reasons, it makes far more sense to study the list of
stress triggers that you compiled earlier in an effort to firstly identify
exactly what it is that is causing your problems. Doing so means that
you can come up with a long-term lifestyle change plan that will
minimize or banish whatever it is that causes stress from your life. In
this way, you reduce the need to resort to pharmaceutical drugs to
‘treat’ stress, thereby limiting the possibility that these drugs will
eventually become as big a problem as stress itself.

And all this is before even beginning to consider the potential side-effect
risks that many common anti-anxiety and antidepressant
pharmaceutical drugs problems pose. We will consider some of the most
commonly prescribed drugs and their potential side-effects in the next
chapter.

Medical stress solutions analyzed

As you can see from this screenshot from Drugs.com, most of the
leading drugs that are prescribed for anxiety and stress are SSRI Antidepressants
among which you will note are some of the best-known
antidepressant drugs such as Prozac and Effexor:

Using Prozac as an example of Selective Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitors
(SSRIs), the first point to make is that antidepressants of this nature
were originally adopted because they apparently presented a far safer
alternative to many other treatments for anxiety, stress and depression.

For instance, SSRIs replaced the older tricyclic antidepressants to a
large extent, which were in some cases extremely toxic.

However, what is becoming increasingly obvious over the years (Prozac
was first licensed and launched onto the market in 1989) is that no
antidepressant drugs are entirely benign and that in many cases, it is
questionable whether these drugs serve the purpose for which they are
being prescribed. For example, SSRIs are called antidepressants for a
reason, which is because they are designed to combat depression.
However, they are commonly prescribed for anxiety and stress, which
are not at all the same thing as depression.

Consequently, a significant percentage of people who are prescribed
drugs like Prozac for anxiety or stress will find that they do little to
improve their condition. In fact, because of some of the acknowledged
side-effects of SSRIs, they may even make matters worse rather than
better.

For example, it is acknowledged that SSRIs can cause headaches,
dizziness and light-headedness, which in any person who is suffering
from anxiety or stress is likely to make them feel considerably worse.
Not unnaturally, if they are already anxious and distressed, suffering
constant headaches or dizziness is going to exacerbate their condition
rather than improve it.

Furthermore, the list of potential side-effects of SSRIs (as a general
group of drugs) is quite long, including constipation, blurred vision,
sleep disruption, weight gain, abnormal bleeding, abdominal pain,
gastrointestinal disturbances or diarrhea and sexual problems (loss of
libido, inability to attain or maintain an erection etc).

On top of this, it is a well established fact that in terms of misuse and
abuse, antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs are by far and away the
most ‘popular’ prescription drugs. For instance, there is plenty of
evidence to suggest that an overdose of antidepressants has always
been the most popularly favored method of committing suicide.
This in fact highlights one of the reasons why SSRIs are so popular,
particularly in comparison to earlier antidepressants such as the
trycyclic drugs.

SSRIs are far safer in an overdose situation than were the earlier
antidepressants, which is extremely important given the propensity of
people to use antidepressants as an overdose ‘drug of choice’.
Unfortunately however, this does not tell the full story because there
are two very real dangers associated with SSRIs that often ignored or
perhaps entirely misunderstood.

First, because of their pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic
qualities, SSRIs can be extremely dangerous when taken at the same
time as other drugs. For example, a combination of SSRIs and
Monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs) could prove lethal under certain
circumstances.

While they are undoubtedly safer in an overdose situation than other
antidepressants like the tricyclics, there is strong evidence to suggest
that SSRIs make suicidal thoughts or considerations of self harm far
more likely than they might otherwise be. And if any further proof was
needed, this fact is categorically confirmed on the Prozac page of the
Drugs.com site:

As suggested at the beginning of this chapter, antidepressants are
designed to treat people with depression which is a psychological
condition that is very different to anxiety or stress.

In effect, using antidepressants to treat stress or anxiety is like taking a
very large sledgehammer to a relatively small walnut, as it is at least
questionable whether taking SSRIs antidepressants is the correct way of
dealing with your stress problem.

Add this to the fact that there are obviously some very serious potential
adverse side-effects attached to SSRI antidepressants and you cannot
avoid the conclusion that trying to deal with your stress with potentially
lethal pharmaceutical drugs is not necessarily the smartest of ideas.
*****************************************************************

I hope that you found this information informative. This has been presented in an effort to give you enough information so that you can make informed decisions about how you will live your life. Each person has to decide what that will be. What I do advocate is that you get information from all angles so that you can make the right decision for what will benefit you. What you choose is up to you.

The next newsletter will take a look at “The Importance of Stress Management.”

In the meantime you might enjoy looking at the new section on BustingStress.com. This will eventually have about 30+ e-books and packages that can help with stress, panic attacks or just your life in general in areas of success, stress and sleep. Please note: these are not affiliate products. These are products that I have produced or have the license to sell.

Until then, have a great week.

Warm regards,

Karen C Groves

BustingStress.com

DISCLAIMER:

The Publisher has striven to be as accurate and complete as possible in the information found on this site, notwithstanding the fact that she does not warrant or represent at any time that the contents within are accurate due to the rapidly changing nature of the health/medical field.

While all attempts have been made to verify information provided in these publications, the Publisher assumes no responsibility for errors, omissions, or contrary interpretation of the subject matter herein. Any perceived slights of specific persons, peoples, or organizations are unintentional.

In practical advice books, like anything else in life, there are no guarantees of results. Readers are cautioned to rely on their own judgment about their individual circumstances and act accordingly.

This is for information only. This  is not intended for use as a source of medical advice. Users are urged to seek medical advice before embarking upon or changing a course of medication or fitness program or before making extreme changes in their life style. All readers are also advised to seek services of competent professionals if they are having serious medical, mental or emotional problems.

********************************************************************************
October  10, 2011

Part 2 – How do you deal with stress?

As already suggested, everyone has their own way of dealing with stress and tension and in many cases, this results in people turning to ‘props’ that can often lead to a form of addiction.

For instance, doctors generally suggest that many addictions such as drinking too much, using drugs, overeating and smoking are all  used as a temporary escape or a way of switching off that enables you to forget your cares, stresses and tensions for at least a few hours.

And stress is not a small scale problem either. According to information from the American Academy of Family Physicians, perhaps as many as two thirds of all visits to family doctors offices or surgeries are made as a result of stress-related problems. In short, the majority of people do not deal with stress particularly well and the effects of not being able to handle stress effectively can be very serious indeed.

For example, the results of a study conducted several years ago suggested that middle-aged men who were suffering severe stress and had no one to turn to for emotional support were five times more likely to die within seven years than those who suffered a similar amount of emotional turmoil but had someone to discuss their problems with.

Another study indicates that learning effective stress management strategies and tactics and being able to apply them successfully can reduce the risk of heart attack and other associated cardiac problems by up to 75%. A combination of these study results can only lead to one conclusion. Stress is a killer but if you learn to manage it properly, you can reduce the chances of it causing significant physical health problems by a massive margin.

Learning to deal with stress is therefore an essential skill but it is unfortunately one that the majority of us do not naturally possess. Learning to manage stress is however a notion or strategy that you can learn, something that becomes far easier if you do so on a step-by-step basis.

In order to be able to manage stress effectively, you need to learn about:
• How and why your mind and body are affected by stress;
• Recognizing the warnings signs that you are in a potentially stressful situation and that stress levels are beginning to increase;
• Developing effective stress management strategies and techniques and
• When to seek professional advice if the homoeopathic and natural ways of dealing with stress that you read of here do not enable you to get over your problem.

People react to stress in many different ways… Stress affects different people in very different ways, so while there are a broad range of ‘symptoms’ that could be attached to a situation where you are suffering stress, it is not necessary for all of these symptoms to be present to prove that you are under duress.

Indeed, as everyone does react to stress in a completely different way, you may be a person who suffers none of these symptoms. But, nevertheless, you could still be suffering from a stress problem.

Stress can be seen in both emotional and physical symptoms, with people who are under stress often being unable to sleep, consistently tired, irritable, unable to concentrate and permanently tense or anxious. At the same time, many people who are under stress suffer physical symptoms such as an upset stomach accompanied by nausea, vomiting or diarrhea. They may suffer from headaches, a dry mouth, an increased need to go to the bathroom almost every few minutes, tight muscles that can sometimes become painful and persistent headaches. While it is extremely unlikely that you are going to suffer all of these symptoms when you are stressed out, it is likely that some of them will affect you. However, even if none of these symptoms are present, you must still learn to recognize when you are under stress.

Recognizing your stress triggers

Perhaps the first question to answer is, are you a person who is by nature inclined to feel stressed out because of your basic character? The fact that some people seem by nature or character to be more predisposed to suffering stress is an important factor to recognize. Your occupation also plays a significant role in dictating how stressful your life is likely to be.

As an example, it is often suggested and accepted that people who are always on the go, folks who drive themselves hard by setting barely possible deadlines and are impatient are more likely to suffer stress than people who adopt a far more relaxed, laid-back attitude to life in general. Some occupations such as surgeons, air traffic controllers and firefighters are naturally in a position where significant levels of stress are a part of their everyday occupation. It is therefore no surprise that individuals who do these jobs are often subject to higher levels of mental problems than people in less demanding positions such as clerks and ice cream vendors.

What are the signs?

In order to master the art of recognizing stress, there are four types of changes that might take place that could indicate a situation that is stressing you out. These are:

• Changes in the way you feel on an emotional level;
• Bodily or physical changes;
• Changes in the way that you are thinking and
• Alterations in the way you are behaving physically.

In order to assess each of these different stress indicators, the first thing to do is to find some time and space in your busy schedule to assess your current life and everyday existence as objectively as possible. You cannot do this properly on the move or when your mind is full of other ‘clutter’. You had to find a suitable window of an hour or two when you can be completely undisturbed and therefore totally focused on analyzing your life to assess just how stressful it is and how you react to the stressful stimuli with which you are faced every day.

Taking each of the four ‘stress indicators’ in turn (and emphasizing again that you have to be as objective as possible to make this a valid and valuable exercise), these are the kind of signs you should be looking out for:

Emotional signs: Are you more irritable than you used to be or ‘snappier’ with friends and loved ones than you know you should be? Do you get angry far more quickly than previously, or are you on the other hand persistently sad or worried? If so, write down what causes you to be irritable and snappy because the fact that you are irritable suggests that you might be prone to stress attacks. Therefore, it is essential to identify what  brings on this irritability or snappiness. These are the triggers that make you stressed and the first step towards being able to handle stress and tension naturally is to identify these triggers.

Physical changes: Are you suffering far more aches and pains than you were six months or a year ago? Do you always feel tired and listless, without energy or  enthusiasm for doing anything outside of your daily routine? How about headaches, dizziness or lightheadedness? All of these could be signs of stress, so try to analyze what you believe is causing these changes. However, this may not always be that easy to do as physical changes of this nature can often come on gradually or slowly.

Because of this slow, onset, there may not be any one event or situation that you can identify as being the starting point of your headache or backache problem, but you should be able to come up with an approximation of when you first noticed that you are suffering more aches and pains than previously. If you can pinpoint the exact time when you first noticed that you seem to be suffering, so much the better, but if not, an approximation of when you first became aware of your problem is better than nothing. From this ‘best guestimate’, you might be able to backtrack to assess whether there was something particularly stressful that might have caused it, so even this is not a waste of time.

Different thoughts: Do you find it harder to concentrate or remember things than you did in the past? Although it is a fact that as we get older, all of us find that our memory is not as good as it used to be, if you can’t concentrate and find it difficult to remember things, it could be indicative of a stress problem, particularly if you are still a relatively young person.

Again, try to identify when you first became aware of these changes so that you can then try to extrapolate whether there was any particular event or situation that caused it. This may not be that easy to do (I know, you can’t remember!) but this kind of advanced self-analysis is nevertheless still critical and absolutely necessary.

Behavioral changes: Have you started to drink a lot more than you used to or perhaps your 20 cigarettes a-day habit has now become a 40 a-day habit? Perhaps you’ve started using recreational drugs, or you find that you sleep too little or too much? The same might apply if you have started eating considerably more or considerably less than you used to consume.

All of these behavioral changes could be a reaction to stress, a way of escaping by indulging or denying yourself the right to indulge. Once you have spent an hour or two going through this process, you will hopefully have a list of factors that could represent a broad cross section of your own personal stress triggers.
Next, you need to sort these triggers into some kind of priority list, with the factors or criteria that you think you are most susceptible to, those
that cause you the most problems or upsets at the top of this list.

What you now have is a personal ‘checklist’ of the triggers or everyday situations or events that seem to trigger your own personal stress attacks.
Armed with this trigger list, you’re ready to move on. Why do these changes occur? If you are to have any chance of reducing or eradicating stress from your life, you need to understand why these changes take place as a result of suffering stress.

Stress is in fact a primeval human reaction that dates back to man’s very first footsteps on planet Earth. At that time, the world was ruled by thousands of ferocious beasts, creatures that man was ill-equipped to deal with at first. Consequently, we developed the ability to react quickly and decisively in moments of high danger, developing the much clichéd ‘fight or flight’ reaction to an instantly stressful situation. Nowadays, it is far less common to have to fight saber toothed tigers, dinosaurs or mammoths, but the same type of stress reactions still form an essential part of the human character.

In effect, not being able to get a job completed before a deadline or having a boss shout at you as soon as you arrive in the office is the modern equivalent of facing down a saber toothed tiger, or at least the closest most of us will ever get to having to do so. And herein lies one of the most important problems with modern day stress. The extreme situations for which the ability to run or fight do not occur nowadays while on the other hand, there are a million more situations which might potentially cause pressure. After all, our cavemen forebears very rarely had their toes stood on during their morning subway ride to the office and the majority of them didn’t have a boss to answer to.

Whenever you feel that you are threatened on a mental or physical level, your body switches up a notch and starts to pump out hormones that make you ready to stand and fight or run away to fight another day. The blood flow to your brain and muscles increases by anything up to 400% so that you can think and react more quickly, your heart starts to be faster and your breathing rate accelerates noticeably as you automatically try to pull in as much oxygen as possible.

So, the next time you feel a stress attack coming on, try thinking of those caveman fighting off herds of rampaging mammoths or a group of very angry saber toothed tigers. Your situation might be bad but you have to be honest, it could be an awful lot worse!

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The next newsletter will look at “What Does Stress Do to You?”

Until next time, have a great day!

Karen C Groves
BustingStress.com

Part 1 – Dealing With Stress Naturally

Before beginning the quest to find natural ways of dealing with stress that everyone can use, let’s start by considering what stress is, and what causes it.

What is stress and what causes it?

There are plenty of different dictionary definitions of what stress is, but perhaps the easiest way of categorizing stress is to describe it as the emotional and physical strain that is placed upon us by pressure from the outside world.

When we are under stress, every one of us reacts in a different way, but it is most common for those who are stressed to be tense and irritable, finding themselves unable to concentrate or focus on the job at hand. Moreover, many people suffer from headaches, increased heartbeat and, perhaps,  even dizziness or light-headedness as a result of  being under stress.

Now, the first thing to understand is that while a guide like this is focused on ‘bad’ stress, there is such a thing as good stress as well, and for many people, positive stress of this nature is an essential requirement in their lives.

For example, there are thousands of people all over the world who spend a significant proportion of their life doing things that the majority of us might suggest are completely crazy. Total amateurs who are not getting paid a single cent climb the tallest buildings in the world, strap a parachute to their back and jump off and everyone knows someone who has been bungee jumping.

When they are standing at the top waiting to go, you can bet your bottom dollar that there is a huge amount of stress and tension involved but in a situation like this, that is the very point of doing it.

The adrenalin rush, the huge buzz that comes with the leap into the unknown and the consequent release of tension and stress makes the whole thing totally worthwhile. This is why there are undoubtedly many people who are addicted to this kind of stress, and to a certain degree, all of us need a little of this kind of stress and excitement in our lives to make living a truly worthwhile experience.

But leaving aside this positive or ‘good’ stress, it is an unfortunate fact that for most of us, there are times when stress and tension get out of hand. These are situations where our emotions take over in an essentially negative way which can become dangerous and harmful to your relationships, your health and to your everyday life.

No matter how confident you are that your life is under control, there are always situations that arise every day that represent a natural breeding ground for stress to creep in. And when you are dealing with stress you are also dealing with the effects of stress as well.

As examples, maybe you can recognize yourself here somewhere?

• Both you and your spouse work a full-time job, and yet you have a demanding family to bring up at the same time. To complicate matters still further, other members of your family are often sick with some ailment of one form of another, meaning that the demands on your time (you are expected to look after them, after all) are even more pressing.

• How about the all too common (and increasingly familiar) scenario where you and your spouse are separated and have joint custody of the family? Although as grown adults in this situation, it is likely that you will try to keep the relationship with your ex as amicable as possible, it is almost certain that there will be tensions which only ever seem to get worse.

• You hate your job, and despise your boss. Each and every day in the office is a living nightmare, but with work becoming increasingly difficult to find, now is not the time to start job hunting. Hence, you are just going to have to put up with the tension, anxiety and stress that you start to feel almost as soon as you get out of bed every morning Monday to Friday.

• Maybe you love your job but things are just not going the way you wanted or expected them to go. You are not climbing the corporate ladder anywhere near as quickly as you expected and your salary just about covers the basics of life. You have no spare cash to go out to let off steam with the inevitable result that you never manage to lessen the stress that you feel every day.

According to the Holmes-Rahe Social Readjustment Scale (a system for measuring stress levels attached to various events in life that was first published in 1967), there are events in life that have a quantifiable stressful effect, with various events accorded a score measured in ‘Life change units’ which are essentially points of potential stress that might be caused by this event.

The higher the score, the more stressful the event is likely to be, with the ‘Death of a spouse’ top-scoring with 100 ‘Life change units’: Divorce is next with 73 points, ranging down to Christmas which not unsurprisingly scores a fairly low 12 points and committing a ‘Minor violation of the law’ with 11 points (it’s odd that breaking the law is less stressful than Christmas!).

No matter who you are or what you do, there are stressful situations in your life and you need to learn how to deal with them quickly and effectively.

And while the information produced by the Holmes-Rahe study is generally helpful, it is also a fact that everyone gets stressed by completely different things and then they deal with the effects of stress as well.

For instance,  many people choose extreme hobbies as entertainment  which the majority of people would tend to avoid like the plague.

Some people thrive in situations where the stress or pressure is on, whereas others seem to fall to pieces in exactly the same scenario. As an example, some high-powered individuals work best when under pressure with an unbreakable deadline that is looming ever larger, whereas other people would find such a situation intolerable.

Some folks would have no problems whatsoever complaining in a restaurant about the appallingly bad service, whereas others would just eat the meal, pay the bill and promise themselves never to visit the same restaurant again without actually mentioning anything. There are those who are excellent public speakers that are completely comfortable with standing up on a stage in front of thousands of people while there are many others that would never dream of doing such a thing.

You get the picture, I’m sure. This list could go on and on, but the point is, what makes you stressed as an individual is likely to be completely different to the events or circumstances that will make your friends or even close family members feel stressed out.

The first step to dealing with stress effectively is to recognize this fact. Only once you have done so can you start to investigate and analyze what it is that causes you serious stress, without which you cannot hope to address the problem.

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The next newsletter with look at “How do you deal with stress?” and “What are the signs of stress?”

Until next time, have a great day!

Karen C Groves
BustingStress.com