Yoga Masters

Clear Thinking About Stress

Posted by on Jun 11, 2010

Introduction

There seems to be a lot of confusion and loose thinking about stress in popular journals and books. How else can you explain terms like “good stress” and concepts like “A certain amount of stress is good for you,” or advice like “Stress is unavoidable.” Once you understand the meaning of stress you’ll realize that stress is always harmful, that there is no “safe” level of stress, and that you can deflect stress if you know how. Let’s start by straightening out the definition of stress: stress is not a mental or emotional state, and it’s certainly not a moral or metaphysical issue. Stress is a physiological and medical condition, produced by prolonged feelings of insecurity and anxiety.

Physical and Mental Symptoms

The Japanese word, “karoshi” means, approximately, “death by stress,” and it’s a significant source of mortality among Japanese workers, especially middle-aged white collar men. Stress kills them either directly, by causing their bodies to break down, or indirectly, through depression and suicide. In either case, stress is bad news and it’s no exaggeration to say that your life is at stake in a stressful situation. Chronic stress affects your heart and arteries, your digestive system, your skin and hair, your immune system, and your brain and nervous system, and virtually every other organ in your body.

Stress is also implicated in a variety of mental health disorders, including depression, anxiety, burnout, substance abuse, workplace and domestic violence, and suicide. And although stress hasn’t been shown to cause personality disorders like schizophrenia, it does complicate them and make them more difficult to treat.

Clearly, chronic stress is a major health problem, and is nothing to take lightly. To put it bluntly, stress can kill you as surely as cancer.

Our Biological Inheritance

If stress is so harmful, why in the world are we so susceptible to it? Wouldn’t you think that evolution would have eliminated it? In a sense, stress was invented millions of years ago, long before we became human, as an adaptation to living in a dangerous world. To explain this paradox, let’s imagine one of our long-ago ancestors on the plains of Africa who suddenly looks up and sees a leopard on the branch over his head. In much less than half a second, without any conscious thought, his brain registers the picture of the leopard and classifies it as a life-threatening danger. Then the brain starts to mobilize the body either to run away or for defense.

Fight or Flight?

When the brain perceives the leopard in the tree and decides that it is dangerous, it sends a signal to the adrenal glands, which sit on top of your kidneys. In response, the adrenal glands produce two hormones: first adrenaline and later cortisol. Adrenaline acts very quickly on almost every part of your body. Your heart begins to beat more quickly and strongly, the small blood vessels in your skin contract (that’s why you look “white as a sheet” after you’re scared), your stomach stops digesting food, and your vision narrows to a “tunnel”. All of these changes make you, for a little while, stronger and quicker than you normally are – ready to run away from the leopard.

As you’re running away from the leopard, the adrenal glands start to produce a hormone called cortisol. Cortisol acts to increase the amount of sugar in your blood for quick energy, and if you have to flee for days and days without food, cortisol helps your body convert muscle and bone into energy. The combined effect of adrenaline and cortisol is to give us the energy we need to deal with dangerous situations – and that’s why we evolved the fight/flight response in the first place.

Where Does the Stress Come In?

As long as your body is reacting to a leopard in a tree, everything is fine: you run away and the stress hormones start to disappear after an hour or so. But if you can neither run away from the danger nor fight it, then the levels of stress hormones never go down. The adrenaline keeps on making your heart beat hard, and the cortisol keeps breaking down muscle and bone to keep your blood sugar high. If this goes on for days at a time, you will start to feel the effects: changes in your sleep and eating patterns, tunnel vision, abnormal tiredness, and a general anxiety and uneasiness. What we commonly call stress is your perception of your body’s physical reactions to elevated hormones.

Why Does Work Cause Stress?

“Well,” you might ask, “That’s all very nice about reacting to the leopard in the tree, but why does my work trigger a stress reaction – I haven’t noticed any leopards about.” It seems that the brain is not very sophisticated about recognizing danger: it reacts to an angry boss, or an upcoming deadline, or an office bully in just the way it would react to the leopard: it starts to mobilize the stress hormones to either fight or run away. But in the office you can’t do either one – you can’t punch people in the nose and you have to come back tomorrow, even if you don’t want to. This combination of perceiving danger and not being able to do anything about it triggers job stress, and it won’t stop until you can either fight or flee.

More Control Means Less Stress

If lack of control makes stress worse, then it follows that being in control counters stress. “Being in control” means different things to different people. For some workers, it just means getting to decide when they take their breaks, and to have some flexibility in scheduling. For others, it means getting to decide how to get the job done: what order to machine the parts or how to process the forms most efficiently. But for all workers, getting to make decisions about how and when to do their job reduces the feeling of danger, lowers stress and improves health.

Learning Conquers Stress

Many, many studies show that one of the best things you can do to reduce your stress level is to start learning something new. Ideally, it should be something new at work, but that’s not necessary. If you’re feeling stress at work, taking an evening course, or even listening to books on tape helps put you back in control of your life and, as we’ve seen, more control produces less stress.

Social Support Helps Fight Stress

The last big thing that you can do to reduce your stress level is to build up a set of friends to support you. Studies show that, when assembly line workers are allowed to talk and socialize at their work stations, their level of stress goes down and the quality and speed of their work goes up. Similarly, if you can walk down the hall and drop in on a friend for a five-minute conversation, the social contact will start to reduce your anxiety and the stress associated with it.

What Does This All Mean For You?

We started out with the fuzzy thinking that produces notions like “good stress,” and we learned that stress is inherently bad for you – very bad. We discovered that stress is not just in your head – it’s making changes in your entire body. And we learned why we have stress in the first place – it’s a leftover reaction to perceived danger, that gets triggered by modern-day situations like toxic work environments. And we learned at least three ways to reduce your stress level – take more control, start learning new skills, and develop a social support network. The bottom line is this: you need to take job stress seriously, because it can kill you; and there are actions you can take right now, on your own, to start lowering your stress.

About the Author
Bruce Taylor is the Owner and Principle of Unison Coaching, and provides corporate and executive coaching to a wide variety of businesses including engineering, human resource, consulting, and recruiting firms. Mr Taylor has extensive background in Psychology, Human Resources, and Software Engineering. He holds a Masters degree in Computer Science from Duke University, a Masters in Psychology from the University of Massachusetts, and a Certificate in Job Stress and Healthy Workplace Design from the University of Massachusetts. He can be reached at http://www.unisoncoaching.com or bruce_taylor@unisoncoaching.com.

Author: Bruce Taylor
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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What is Stress Relief: Part 2

Posted by on Jun 4, 2010

Knowing what stress is, is the first step at knowing how to deal with it. Knowing what types of stress there is helps even further.

There are a few simple groups you can place stresses into…

Physical…
Immune…
Emotional…

Physical Stress: Are stresses that tax your physical frame. Injuries, falls, bumps, sprains, strains etc. These put undue stress on your joints, muscles, ligaments etc. If there is too much stress then injuries in sport, home or work may happen.

Gravity fits into this category. So you need to look at ways to reduce Physical stresses, so that injuries are less likely. But also if you have less physical stress, you expend less energy combating it, which in turn releases energy back into your system to use elsewhere.

Immune Stress: is stress which affects your ability to prevent disease, infection but also includes stresses on most of your organs. Liver, bowel, lungs, kidneys etc.

Food and all its additives, colorings are stressful to the body. Fast foods, junk foods, foods high in fats, sugars etc.

But also, environmental stresses affect the immune response. Allergies, whether it is the Hay Fever season, pollens, grasses etc tax the respiratory system. Pollution does also.

Infections that go through the school yard, community and work place are all immune stresses.

Emotional Stress: this is always the area you attribute most stress to. The work place antics, the home life with all its pressures, families including the extended family, including in-laws etc.

Is depression for example a stress?

No. It is a result of your inability to deal with stress. Grief, sadness, depression, anger etc are all reactions to stress. If your ability to deal with emotional stresses increase, then you tend to respond to stress rather than react to it.

The emotional stresses around you are numerous; they tend to be pressures exerted on you from work mates, bosses, family, work commitments etc. Can you eliminate these? Mostly you can’t, you still have to go to work, and deal with the people around you.

But if you have the mechanisms to deal with emotional pressures then like I said before, you should be able to shrug off the emotional pressures without feeling their ill-effects.

If you deal better with the day to day pressures emotionally, then the major upheavals will be managed better. Life is emotional, if you have a death in the family, lose your job, divorce/separation; these will always knock you around emotionally.

However, if you have a better resistance to stress then the physical effects of emotional stress shouldn’t happen. Major stresses will be emotional, but should not hit you physically, the immune system should still function correctly, energy should remain high etc.

Look at emotional stress this way….

If you were put in front of an audience of 10,000 people, asked to give a speech on something you knew little about. Most of you would be nervous, agitated, and stressed completely. You would have an upset stomach, feel jittery and jumpy, probably snap at people, etc.

However, if you took away all the physical ill-effects of stress, the nervous stomach, the jumpy muscles, and the quivering voice etc. If there was only the emotional stress, but no physical effects. Then the speech wouldn’t feel stressful.

You would have nothing going wrong physically, mentally your brain was calm, energy was high. Then the speech would be no problem at all.

Dealing with emotional stresses allows this to happen. Can you eliminate emotional stress? No. But you can learn to deal with it better.

So stress is all around you and also within you (emotionally), can you change this and make life better. Sure!

Learn to deal with all stresses, not just the emotional, the physical and immune stresses. Learn to reduce stress quickly and easily, use techniques that cover all stress. Stress is said to be the number 1 killer today. Reducing stress is a life saver; you just need to know what to do and how to do it.

Fast Stress Relief [http://www.fast-stress-relief.com/index.html]

is dedicated to teaching you ways to remove stress; simply, easily and quickly. Using a combination of Eastern and Western techniques – stress can be removed, repelled and prevented … fast.

For all the Tips & Techniques to Reduce Stress and Boost Your Energy simply click here. [http://www.fast-stress-relief.com/fast-stress.html]

Dr Graeme Teague has been in private practice since 1991, teaching and treating many clients with emotional and general health conditions.

Through his many teaching seminars and extensive professional knowledge, he has now released two new e-books on the many simple and effective ways to be healthy and stress free.

His new web-site is dedicated to teaching you ways to improve your health with orthodox and natural techniques.

Just click here to visit Fast Stress Relief [http://www.fast-stress-relief.com/index.html].

Author: Graeme Teague
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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Stress Management is for Anyone

Posted by on May 28, 2010

In the newspapers, in the magazines, in the cinema, in the television, everywhere we listen people that talks about the stress..

Why is it so?

The stress has been part of the human race from the beginnings of the history, why do we pay it so much attention now?

Has it changed?

Is it now more more dangerous than before?

Or is it because now we have discovered its incidence in our lives?

Stress is an unavoidable consequence of life and it is not something exclusive of the human beings, because the animals also have it. But the stress it is not necessarily bad.

To win the lottery can produce much more stress that to not win it, but the difference rests in the organic answer that we will have in a case and the other.

On the other hand, there are many people that need some pressure to reach more, and stress can provide a state of alert, anticipation and excitement.

How can we achieve a fair balance between not having stress and having too much?

Stress is the answer of the body in front of external conditions that are perceived as dangerous, worrying or irritating. And our natural answer is the modification of the behavior of almost all the body organs, to allow us to escape or to face that danger.

Although in fact for the body any CHANGE in our life implies stress.

When we face a change, the brain activates the secretion of certain hormones that untie a chain reaction in the whole body, and this is not bad, but rather it is the way that the nature uses to protects us, getting us ready to react to the stressor.

If the situation is prolonged during a short time, the stress and its changes are something good, but if the situation is prolonged in time, it can be exhausting, cause ulcers, cardiovascular illnesses, migraines, sexual problems, asthma, nervous tics, baldness, diabetes, back pains, and even weight modifications increasing or removing the appetite.

WHAT CAUSES STRESS?

Anything can cause stress, since what a person perceives as irritating or dangerous, can be indifferent for another person in the same situation, that is to say that the stressors are different for different people.

And we should distinguish among the stress produced by pleasant situations (vacations, to get marryed, to win the lottery) that it is known as “eustress”.

And the stress produced by unpleasant situations (a divorce, a death, to lose the employment) that it is known as “distress”.

For this reason many people carry a load of stress much bigger than they can imagine.

Any change in our routine and any change in our body is lived with stress.

Some of the more common stress producers are:

To work in excess without the appropriate time to recover

To live in places with extreme climates or extreme altitudes

Toxins like the poisons, the tobacco, the alcohol and the drugs

Fights and discussions

Illnesses

The puberty, with all the physical CHANGES that it bears

The pre-menstrual syndrome: once a month, before the menstruation, the lack of the same hormones that produce stress in the puberty, causes stress states in the mature women.

For the same reason, the sudden fall of the hormones level that takes place in front of the childbirth and the abortion, produce stress

The menopause, although of gradual appearance, it produces stress for the lack of the same feminine hormones.

Being in charge of the actions of another person. This produces CHANGES over our life, which we can’t control, and for this reason it is a strong stressor.

HOW DOES IT FEEL TO HAVE STRESS?

As well as different people react in different ways in front of the same stressor, they also feel different things when they have stress and those things can be:

headache

diarrhea

constipation

insomnia

edginess

sexual inability

depression

anxiety

throbs

indigestion

etc.

HOW TO TREAT STRESS

If the stress symptoms persist during many days, it is reasonable to go to see a doctor or to request psychological support.

As emergency measures the doctor can prescribe analgesic, beta blockers, tranquilizers and antidepressants, but the ideal is to learn how to control the stress by natural means like yoga practices, gymnastics, relaxation and mind control.

When the stressor is an unique cause, like a divorce or the loss of a loved one, it is convenient not over weight yourself with concerns and responsibilities, until the organism adapts to the new situation.

But if the stress reasons are a series of different daily stressors, then it is really necessary to think in the necessity of the psychotherapy or the mind control, to learn how to control your reactions in front of an adverse reality.

HOW CAN YOU ELIMINATE STRESS?

We have already seen that the stress is part of the natural answers of our organism, and that the good news can produce as much stress as the bad ones.

Therefore it is IMPOSSIBLE to ELIMINATE THE STRESS and all that you can aspire to do is to learn how to manage it, to learn how to react in front of the CHANGES.

The stress lack will lead us easily to the depression, the boredom or a sensation of rejection, and an excessive stress it can make us get sick.

WHICH IS THE GOOD STRESS LEVEL?

A good stress level doesn’t exist. A person with sedentary habits, can feel stressed if you put him in a work that requires excessive mobility.

A person accustomed to work on the stock market or in positions that requireS a high level of adrenaline and stress, can feel stressed if it is confined to a sedentary work on a desk.

The good level of stress is different for each person, and for that reason each one must determine what he likes and makes him well. And even this way, this level will modify with the years.

When you feel that the stress has gone beyond YOUR acceptable limit, you should look for a way of dealing with the excessive stress, since more than the strong stressors, what makes us feel sick is the accumulated stress.

Once we detect that we carry accumulated stress, we have two ways to solve it, one is to eliminate the stressor from our lives (which is not always possible) another is to modify the way in which we react.

The steps to follow should be:

Learn how to become aware when you have been surpassed by the stress.

What is it it that usually produces stress on you?

What do you feel in your body?

How do you react emotionally?

Recognize what it is that you can do about it:

Can you avoid that situation?

If you can not avoid it, are you able to experience it with less frequency?

Can you shorten the time that you are exposed to that stressor? It is not the same when something breaks your nerves for one hour, that when it does it during the whole day

Learn how to react in different ways

Do you feel responsible for things that you can not control?

Do you feel in the obligation of pleasing everybody?

Do you always want to be right?

Don´t you agree that everything can not be so serious neither so urgent?

Get used to think that the stress is something that you are learning how to control, and NOT something that overcomes you

Learn how to modify your emotional answer

Learn how to breathe slower in front of stressing situations

Practice relaxation and mind control

Take anxiolitics (only if your doctor has prescribed them) until you learn how to control your mind and body

Build a physical reservation to respond better to the stress:

Feed in a moderate form avoiding the excesses of fat and alcohol

Swim, walk, ride in bicycle, practice jogging or gymnastics of some type, three times a week

Try not to have overweight, neither be below a normal weight

Try to not smoke, and not no drink tea or coffee in excess

Learn how to have resting intervals during your work or study

Rest enough at night and if it is possible take a short nap (30 minutes) after lunch.

Modify your social behavior

Frequent your friendships. Mainly those that are mutually protectors (not those that will always hang emotionally from you, without allowing you to do the same thing when you need it)

Put on realistic goals, according with your age and capacity

Put YOU your own goals, don’t live after the goals that OTHER tell you that you should have (beware of fashion)

Prepare yourself to have failures, displeasures, frustrations and sadness, since they are part of the life. NOBODY is perfect, and NOBODY came to this planet only to enjoy it.

Be always kind with yourself and with the other people (although they are not always going to be kind with you) and this will make you feel well

Written by Dr. Roberto A. Bonomi

You will find all that you need to know about, self help, stress control, weight control, stop smoking, mind control, relax, motivation and meditation with subliminal messages at Dr. Bonomi’s web site: http://www.drbonomi.com

Author: Roberto Bonomi
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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Why Do I Stress Out Over Everything? – A Primer on Stress and the Solution

Posted by on May 21, 2010

Sooner or later everyone reaches a point in their life where they say “I can’t cope.” Or “I can’t deal with this.” Or “Why am I stressing over everything?” Sooner or later just about everyone begins to see that their stressing is contributing to being nervous, anxious, upset, run down, tired, or even sick. They also see that they need to do something about it.

Of course, such a person will try to make changes in their surroundings, such as finding a new job, going for walks, exercising, eating better, cutting down on the noise level, and so on. But most people then discover that even after the changes are made, they still feel stressed. Besides, some of the stresses are basically memories that keep coming back to haunt them. It is obvious that just a change of scene or going for a walk won’t make the memories go away.

So many of us will start to look for coping strategies.

How Our Meditation Can Help

A well known but often overlooked factor-called resentment-is the subtle tipping point that separates us from our calm center of dignity and sends us over the brink into anger, fear, nervousness, and upset which contribute to a host of symptoms. I have found the antidote to resentment-awareness and forgiveness-and a meditation that helps you implement awareness and forgiveness.

Practicing our meditation with a sincere intent and a true desire to be a better person closes the door on over-reactions and upset, and opens the door to a world of good.

In this article I will focus on the moment of reaction, wherein we fail. By learning how to remain calm or impassive in that instant, we by-pass our stress reactions and bring reason and understanding to bear. This has a very positive effect on our well being and on the situation. When we remain calm and reasonable, our body is not forced to react, and thus has the time and energy to recuperate from previous over reactions.

Moreover, our newfound calmness and reasonableness constitute a new way of dealing with life’s little ups and downs; our new way cancels out prior conditioning and establishes a new conditioning based on a rapport with our inner Ground of Good.

Now that you know where I am going, I would like to lay some groundwork for what is to follow.

A Primer on Stress

Basically anything we react to is a stress. Dr. Hans Selye, the father of stress research, said there are two types of stress: so called “eu-stress,” or pleasant stress, and “dis-stress” or unpleasant stress.

We are all familiar with unpleasant stress and the toll it can take on our body. If you eat something tainted, it stresses your body to react. Cold, wind, rain, or excessive heat stress the body and elicit a response. Spraining your ankle or falling off your bike are stresses that elicit responses. Being mugged, robbed, or mauled by a dog are stresses.

We also know that divorce, losing a job, or being betrayed by another are unpleasant stresses.

The negative or unpleasant stresses cause a whole variety of bodily responses and changes, both specific (like a scab on a wound) and nonspecific (affecting the whole body). These changes take energy and ultimately take their toll on the body. Stress is cumulative, in that it gradually uses up our life force. Yes, some stresses are part of life (like a rain shower, a hot day, or a brisk windy day). They can’t really be totally avoided (except the excessive ones). They are invigorating and without them we would stagnate.

But Dr. Selye discovered that so-called eu-stresses such as going to a party, attending an exciting ball game, or starting new job are stresses too.

These stresses may be pleasant, but they also take their toll on the body just as much as obvious unpleasant stresses do.

Dr. Selye was not saying that we should avoid new or fun situations. They are part of life and are invigorating. But he is saying that we should be aware that any stress ultimately wears us down. Too much stress, either dis-tress (like a divorce or being fired) or eu-stress (moving to a new house) will wear you down quicker. More stress wears you down quicker than less stress. And stress is cumulative.

Stress takes its toll. It may be invigorating, but it also drains us of life force. And our over-reactions (to whatever is, by definition, the stressor) lead to all manner of symptoms.

Bottom line: we must find a way to take things in stride, both good and bad.

In other words, over-reactions are not good. Look at all the over-reactions which are purely physical level: asthma, allergies and auto immune disease-where the body’s extreme responses are more harmful than what the stressor is doing. In other words, pollen cannot really hurt you, but an over-reaction can. Anaphylactic shock is a big over-reaction that can even kill a person.

But how about all of our emotional over-reactions: anger, rage, irritation, hostility, hyper excitement on the one hand and hurt feelings, disappointment and frustration on the other? These emotions are reactions that are stressing us. Many people love to over-react and yell and scream at ball games, for example. Or they love to moan and groan and play the “poor me, what have I ever done to deserve this” game. They are adding stress to their lives through these feelings.

People ague and quarrel all the time because they react angrily. Others react angrily and suppress it, but their reaction is still stressing their body.

Many people get irritated at others, and they secretly enjoy having something to complain about. They feel they have a right to judge others and complain. But their daily bouts of irritation take a toll on the body.

Some people party, study too much and stay up late, depriving themselves of sleep. They are subjecting their body to stress. No wonder they feel drained the morning after the night before. No wonder people come back from a vacation more drained than before they left.

Just as partying and then cramming for a test are unnecessary stresses which we inflict on ourselves, so are our angers, secret hostilities, and impatient frustrations.

Another example. Take work for instance. Of course we have to work. But we should be able to work without becoming angry and upset at our work.

Life will throw things our way. But we should be able to go through life without reacting to everything. What I am saying is that some stress is unavoidable. But too much stress is not good for us. And most of us heap add an extra layer of stress on ourselves through our emotional reactions.

Many of us are experiencing huge amounts of stress unnecessarily because we are indulging emotions all the time, especially anger, hostility and resentment.

Work is one thing; working angrily is another. Encountering a traffic jam is one thing; becoming upset at it is another.

Here is the key to eliminating undue stress from your life. Let go of resentment. Resentment is the little reaction that begins the cascade of stress reaction and misery and suffering. You must learn to watch for it, and let it go. That is what all my writings are about.

Resentment is the elephant in the living room. If you want to control stress, you’re going to have to control resentment.

Resentment and Impatience, Conformity and Rebellion

I also want to make you aware that you have not been properly taught about how to deal with the stress of meanness, tease, injustice, or life’s little irritations.

Your problem may not be willful pridefulness; it may be that you keep being tricked and dragged into emotional reactions, because of a lack of understanding. Not knowing any better, you over-reacted, and now you don’t know how to stop reacting or passing the pain down the chain and causing others to react to you. If so, just learn the secret of giving up resentment, and your emotional reactions will soon diminish.

Look at the harm done to kids when parents react with impatience to the child’s innocent questions or little mistakes. Impatience is a negative reaction. It is an ego indulgence. The impatience then causes the child to react. The child reacts to the injustice and the lack of love that impatience signifies. Thus the child is reacting to the stress of the parent’s lovelessness.

Today I was in a thrift shop. A man was carrying a little girl around. She sat on one arm while his other arm was free to pick up and look at items he was considering buying. He said to her “take it easy.” She reacted with a little upset. Then he said “take it easy” again. This time his voice was loud and impatient. She began to dry and called out for momma. This was a typical example of an impatient adult causing a child to become upset. He is setting her up for a lifetime of emotional reactions and stress.

Therefore, if you want to be free from stress and its debilitating symptoms, you must learn to stop over-reacting. And to stop over-reacting, you must learn to give up resentment, judgment and impatience.

Let me say it again: if you want to stop over-reacting, you must learn to watch out for resentment. As a little child (like the little girl in my example), you could not help but react with upset when people were impatient or cruel to you. But now you can. The difference between you then (as a little child) and now is that now you have added resentment to the upset. Let go of the resentment. Then you will be able to stand back and observe the upset out of existence.

Before giving you some simple things you can do to begin living more independently through grace and forgiveness, I want to cover a very important but little discussed aspect of emotions and their contribution to stress. I want to discuss how emotions overlay and actually incite bodily stress responses.

Remember what we said about the two aspects of our reactions: biology and attitude. There is the purely biological, which we share with other animals, consisting of mechanisms of flight or fight, move toward or move against, sympathetic and parasympathetic response, pro and anti inflammatory responses, other immune responses, and so on.

We said that these reactions are important and necessary for survival. In the long run, they do drain us of life force, but in the short run they keep us alive. They only become dysfunctional:
1) when they are unnecessary, such as when we get angry over slow traffic.
2) When they are out of control, such as when the body begins to attack itself.
3) When the symptoms from the stress reaction are more harmful than what they are reacting to, such as in the case of allergies or sepsis.

We cannot help our natural biological reactions. We can’t stop ourselves from being startled if someone says “boo” behind us. But you do have control over whether you become resentful when they startle you. If you find yourself becoming angry or irritated at them (or at yourself), I guarantee there is resentment behind it.

We must learn to have an attitude which is less emotional and resentful, so that our body is not compelled to react to stresses that we create for ourselves. We can learn not to add emotional reaction to the purely physical ones.

Here is the key to eliminating undue stress from your life. Let go of resentment.

Go back and take a look at the examples I gave of situations that we reacted to with negative emotions. You will notice that underneath the anger, rage, irritation, hostility, frustration, and dejection can be found resentment. Why? Because resentment cuts you off from your inner ground of good. It cuts you off from patience, faith and love. And when a person does not have faith and love, how else can they react but with faithlessness and impatience? And when things start to get to them, how else can they react but with resignation, defensiveness and resentment?

Perhaps now you can have some compassion on your poor old mom and dad. You may have judged them harshly, but now that you have walked a mile in their moccasins, you can see that they worried because they did not have faith (as you don’t). They became impatient because they did not have a rapport with their ground of good (just as you don’t). And they became upset because they were resentful (as you have been).

Another thing: when we get upset, angry and frustrated, it is sustained by negative hostile and destructive thinking. Resentment is what initiates and reinforces the negative thoughts.

There is a vicious cycle involved. The negative thoughts spin negative emotions, and then those emotions spin more negative thoughts, and so on.

Resentment is the “little” reaction that begins the cascade of negative emotion and thinking and unnecessary stress reactions that lead to misery and suffering. You must learn to watch for it, and let it go.

I have a lot more to say on this topic but am now just seeking to make you aware of the role of resentment in exacerbating your emotional issues.

Roland Trujillo M.S., life coach and author, is Director of the Center For Common Sense Counseling and host of the popular Coach Roland internet radio show on Blogtalk Radio. Coach Roland offers solutions and tools for dealing with stress, letting go of baggage from the past, and healing relationships. Roland knows that resentment underlies many of our stress and relationships issues. Roland says: Love is the answer, but to find love we must let go of resentment.” Find out more by visiting http://www.rolandtrujillo.com. For marriage issues, visit http://www.commonsensecouples.blogspot.com. You will find free resources and valuable information. Coach Roland has been helping people for 20 years.

Author: Roland Trujillo
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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What is Stress Costing You?

Posted by on May 14, 2010

Stress: Pressure, strain, or force that tends to distort a body; a factor that induces bodily or mental tension

• Are you one of the millions of people being negatively affected by stress?
• Do you know how much your stress level is costing you in terms of your physical, mental, and emotion wellness?
• Do you know what is stressing you and why? If not, why not?
• Do you know what to do about it?

Stress levels are reaching epidemic levels and little is being done about it. But the good news is you don’t have to wait for someone else to determine your stress levels; you can do that on your own. And, you can immediately take action steps (if needed) to better manage the stress in your life.

Before I go into detail about what you can do to reduce your stress, here is some current research.

Stress Research

• In a 2005 UK study, 1 out of 5 people felt their jobs were extremely stressful, to the point of illness.
• The UK also documented that self-reported, work-related stress accounted for over 13 million lost working days in the past 12 months.
• In a Boston University study, women who avoided conflict with their spouse had four times as much chance of heart disease and early death. Their avoidance actually increased their stress.
• In the American Journal of Physiology Heart and Circulatory Physiology study, it was confirmed that prolonged exposure to certain stressors can result in permanent change to the body’s sympathetic nervous system, including blood pressure and heart rate. Those factors have been confirmed to include social stressors like bullying, job and family-related pressure, and other related elements.
• A Florida State University study linked increased depression and anxiety disorders to long-term stress factors.
• A Health Psychology investigation confirmed the link between stress and a reduced immune system.
• A European Union research project confirmed that work-related stress was negatively affecting 1 out of 3 workers in the EU.

The negative effects of stress are not limited to adults. Stress it is also affecting our children.

So with all this stress in our lives, I want to encourage you to not be stressed about your stress. Why? Because your level of stress is mostly in your control. But first, how does stress manifest itself and what are some areas on which you can reflect, in terms of stress factors?

Influenced by the elements present in our lives, our stress levels are way more complex than being just work- or home-related. Stress manifests itself in many physical, psychological, and behavioral symptoms, which can include headaches, fatigue, feelings of being out of control, and insomnia.

To reduce your stress levels, it is important that you uncover all your potential sources.

• Interpersonal Stress Levels

  All your relationships in your life-work, family, and friends-are either increasing or decreasing your stress levels. Understanding your interpersonal boundaries and preferences can highly influence your stress levels in this category.

• Nutritional Stress Levels

  Our nutritional habits are strongly influencing our overall stress levels. The old saying, you are what you eat, has never been truer. Today, our many unhealthy food choices help create overweight individuals and even morbid obesity.

• Health and Activity Stress Levels

  What you do and don’t do are also highly influencing your stress levels. One study suggests that up to 50% of the population is sleep-deprived, causing our bodies to never fully rejuvenate. Regular exercise has been linked to stress reduction and an increased immune system through the additional endorphin production that exercise helps produce.

• Time-Stress Levels

  Is it just me or have we lost the time margins in our lives? With families plus full-time professions, we no longer have room to maneuver so, when things happen-and they will-you have increased stress related to lack of time margins. Even children are becoming more stressed due to overpacked schedules and demands.

• Occupational Stress

  Much research has been linked to job-related stress. We must also acknowledge the growing percentage of the population that is now self-employed. Whether you are employed or self-employed, if you don’t enjoy what you do, you will have increased stress.

Money-or lack of it-is cited as one of the most common stressors in both employed and self-employed individuals. In addition, environmental conditions such as the pollution of the air, land, and water can impact your overall stress level.

Your stress, no matter the source, will increase if you feel you have no options or no hope of improving your life.

Remember: You can influence the majority of the contributing elements in all the above stress categories.

The Action Steps below offer some strategies for your consideration. We suggest, however, that you don’t pursue trying to reduce your stress until you have the answers to the following two questions. Why? The answers are required to ensure your stress-reduction success.

1. Why is it important for you to reduce your stress and improve your overall wellness?
2. If you are successful in reducing your stress, what will be some key benefits to you? In other words, why should you bother to change your habits?

Action Steps

What is Stress Costing You?

1. What is stress costing you?
2. In your opinion, what is stressing you in your life in the four areas of Interpersonal, Nutritional, Health, and Time and Occupational Stress? Make a list of all the potential items.
3. Lighten up! Individuals who are always serious generally have more stress in their lives.
4. Introduce more humor into your life. When participants watched a 15 minute humorous video, their stress level reduced.
5. In research studies, the immune systems of optimistic individuals were stronger than pessimistic individuals. For certain individuals, an attitude adjustment might require a new way of thinking.
6. You control most of the factors that contribute to your stress levels and your overall wellness. It is your responsibility-not the fault of your condition or situation!
7. Don’t stress yourself over your stress levels. Simply allow yourself to move at your own pace, as long as it is in the direction of improvement.
8. Encourage others to take responsibility to reduce their stress levels because, in many cases, their stress will be adding to yours!
9. Make sure you have clearly outlined the benefits of reducing your stress levels. With good reasons and goals, it will be easier to stay on track.

Until next time, keep Living On Purpose!

Ken Keis

For information on CRG Resources, please visit http://crgleader.com

Author: Ken Keis
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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How to Cope with Stress

Posted by on May 7, 2010

Stress can be addictive, contagious, debilitating, or invigorating. Relentless pressure to perform, personality conflicts, and lack of a sense of purpose can be damaging over time. Identify the causes, learn to control harmful stress, and use healthy stress to your advantage.

Feeling Burned Out

More than 50% of 2,500 workers who responded to a survey acknowledged that they work under a great deal of stress

More then 75% of the respondents said that they feel burned out

Causes of Stress

16% attribute the stress to difficult co-workers

15% attribute stress to unrealistic workloads

11% attribute stress to unreasonable deadlines

10% attribute stress to rushed projects

9% attribute the stress directly to the management

Stress statistics courtesy of CareerBuilder.com and the American Institute of Stress (stress.org)

Stress Addiction

Are you addicted to stress? Is your organization addicted to stress? Let’s be honest, some individuals and some organizations perform better under stressful conditions. Some organizations nurture a stressful culture as a means to continually pressure maximum performance with minimum manpower. Some other organizations leverage the energy associated with bursts of focused stress to overcome significant obstacles, and then minimize stress in between major hurdles to maintain a balanced workforce. How can you tell the difference?

Procrastination in dealing with important tasks is sometimes an indication of personal stress addiction. Some individuals acknowledge better performance under tight deadlines and stressful situations. In some cases this helps to focus on a project and ignore external distractions. If this applies to you, then perhaps it is time to reevaluate your schedule, your personal goals, and your workload. By setting personal goals as commitments to complete projects or workload ahead of schedule, you can create your own deadlines and get ahead of the curve. Procrastination may be a sign that the workload is too light and you need to take on more responsibilities, or challenge yourself with more personal tasks. This will create an environment of balanced stress that you can manage by increasing or decreasing personal additional tasks to accommodate required or assigned workloads.

This does not mean that putting things off until the last minute is always a sign of stress addiction. If you continually put things off to the last minute and the quality of the result is equivalent or worse to the product that would have been achieved earlier, then you are just being lazy and you need a stress inducing boss to get you moving. On the other hand, if items are continually addressed at the last minute simply because you have too many other priorities that take precedence and it is virtually impossible to catch up, then you have an unhealthy stressful environment and it is time to evaluate the conditions.

Have you ever experienced an organization that continually threatens potential layoffs, cancellation of contracts, or incessantly proclaims gloom and doom of current conditions? While organizations may perform better under short bursts of highly focused stressful conditions, it is not something that can be sustained effectively for long periods of time. Individuals within the organization will react differently to stressful conditions and will burn out at varying periods of time. After a period of high intensity it is necessary to allow a period for cooling down, refreshing and reenergizing the troops.

Healthy Stress

The objective of healthy stress is to have specific focused goals with measurable targets and schedules. Healthy stress should create an atmosphere of teamwork and cooperation to achieve specific goals. If it is an extended schedule, then there should also be milestones to identify progress along the way. If it is a short deadline then there should be clearly identified resources for support. At the end of the schedule there should be a recognized period to temporarily relax, recognize the accomplishment and recharge the batteries. After all, not everyone is addicted to stress, but nearly everyone can use the short bursts of adrenaline that come with intense concentration toward a common goal.

Healthy stress provides rich rewards as a result. The rewards may be a sense of personal achievement, a sense of camaraderie, or monetary compensation. The type of reward is not necessarily as important as the recognition of the reward. If there is no reward for the stress, or if the outcome is detrimental to an individual or group, then the stress is not healthy and needs to be addressed promptly. Nurture healthy stress with teamwork, clearly communicated schedules, and easily recognized rewards.

Unhealthy Stress

Some of the leading causes of unhealthy stress are the result of individual personalities infecting an organization. This can be caused by an overbearing boss, a lack or respect or trust for certain members in management, or by unrealistic expectations. Even the best of intentions can create unhealthy stress if it is based on unrealistic expectations. Stress can be slowly introduced if management expects everyone to automatically share the same level of passion, enthusiasm and commitment without first creating bonds and buy in with the employees. Employees will not feel the same amount of passion if there is not a personal connection or a sense of purpose. It is reasonable to require performance, but management should not expect passion without first making an investment in the employee.

Individual employees can also create stress and distraction. Personality conflicts are depicted as difficult coworkers, and typically the perception is a shared one. Difficult coworkers may be described as overbearing, subversive, interfering, unproductive, or uncooperative. These are dangerous labels for one person to place on another. The labels are most often the result of specific actions or comments. It may not be reasonable to expect that every personality will get along, but it is reasonable to require professional respect and cooperation. The first step in correcting this type of unhealthy stress is not to change people’s opinions, but rather to address the actions, responsibilities and expectations of the individuals involved. Keep the focus on the professional requirements and communicate precise expectations, then assess the actions.

Unhealthy stress in an organization can be caused when the atmosphere is continually threatening, overbearing and unrelenting. Stress with purpose is like an adrenaline rush during a short sprint to the finish line. Stress without purpose and without end is like running an engine at full speed and never stopping to refill the tank, you are bound to hit a brick wall or empty your tank eventually. It is far better to plan for the short sprints and the breaks to refill the tank than to find yourself stranded.

Thrive on Stress

Pick your priorities.

Remember your purpose – write down your goals and keep them visible.

Set your schedule and allow some flexibility for the unexpected emergencies.

Communicate your obligations and identify your resources.

Ask for and acknowledge the responsibilities of others, then be prepared to support one another when appropriate.

If there is a personality conflict, turn the focus to professional respect and responsibilities, or address the matter with appropriate professional communication when necessary.

Identify the time of day and days of the week that you perform best under pressure, and be aware that everyone else may be different from your peak periods.

Schedule your periods for managing the pressure and allow yourself periods for cooling down, being creative, or relaxing.

When possible, do something physical before preparing to address a stressful situation, even if it is only a short walk.

When necessary, take a short walk or a few moments to clear you mind after a stressful period so the intense concentration or emotions do not spill over into your other activities.

Laugh, and most important, do not be so critical that you can not laugh at yourself.

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Words of Wisdom

“Reality is the leading cause of stress amongst those in touch with it.”
- Jane Wagner

“If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.”
- Marcus Aurelius Antoninus

“Before you agree to do anything that might add even the smallest amount of stress to your life, ask yourself: What is my truest intention? Give yourself time to let a yes resound within you. When it’s right, I guarantee that your entire body will feel it.”
- Oprah Winfreyr

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John Mehrmann is a freelance author and President of Executive Blueprints Inc., an organization devoted to improving business practices and developing human capital.

John Mehrmann is an author, speaker and industry expert with Executive Blueprints Inc. http://www.ExecutiveBlueprints.com

Author: John Mehrmann
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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