Panache

Stress and a stressful lifestyle have become common knowledge among people. They often complain about it and yet do nothing to change it. However, the prolonged effect of stress cannot be discounted from our lives. Increased cardiovascular diseases, low immunity, and a hustling lifestyle are some of the major results of stress.

But we do not take stress seriously due to our everyday lifestyle. The job-seeking candidates often write that they are good at working under pressure or stress in their interviews or on their resumes. But that is not the case every day. With the change in the economy and increasing responsibilities, it becomes harder and harder for us to cope with increasing stress.

Some of us often choose to live in denial that stress can’t affect us or working through stress is how we would become more competent to lead a better life. As per science, this is an unhealthy way to deal with it and its outcomes.

Understanding Stress

According to The World Health Organization,

“Stress can be defined as a state of worry or mental tension caused by a difficult situation. Stress is a natural human response that prompts us to address challenges and threats in our lives. Everyone experiences stress to some degree. The way we respond to stress, however, makes a big difference to our overall well-being.”

Some points to note from the above definition are:

1. It is a natural human response.

2. It helps us to deal with challenges in our lives.

3. Everyone deals with stress of different kinds.

4. We can respond to stress in our own way.

5. Which can change our overall well-being.

Stress Management

According to Dr Aditi Nerurkar Physician and Author, who deals with stress management and other mental illnesses.

Stress Management is knowing when to stop and be kind to yourself. Making and sustaining healthy boundaries towards yourself as well.

There are 2 types of Stress:

Adaptive Stress: It is the ability of an organism to withstand stress damage after being exposed to a lesser amount of stress. Adaptive Stress can also be called healthy stress when you are nervous for the first day at the job, or before proposing to your girlfriend, before giving that presentation to the client.

Maladaptive Stress: Maladaptive stress is a harmful or ineffective way to deal with stress, such as through avoidance, denial, or unhealthy behaviours. These strategies may provide temporary relief but can lead to more stress over time and affect many areas of life. It can have a lasting effect if dealt with over a longer period.

Understand The Mechanism of Stress

Our brain is monitored and dictated by the pre-frontal cortex regarding decision-making, memory, planning, and organizing.

Under Stress, these functions go from your pre-frontal cortex to the Amygdala part of the brain. Hence, instead of making a reasonable decision. It becomes more of a fight-or-flight response. Such evolution has been the result of us as humans. Ever since the dawn of time when we used to live in a threatening environment as cave people. Our brain needs to be under stress to understand whether to fight or flee under the presence of any threat.

Your brain holds on to the negative experiences you have gone through to keep you safe and in a more comfortable environment or the absence of any threat.

Stress is the friction when you try to get out of your comfort zone but your brain being afraid of the possible threats does not allow you to do that. You could be excited to do it however your brain projects things like what if things went other ways to ensure you stay there where you are.

Such responses from your brain do not mean something is wrong with you. This is a healthy response.

Effects of Childhood Trauma

According to the data, if a person has gone through some trauma during early childhood or any time in their lives, it could mean that their stress management skills could be hindered. They can get scared easily and some things can trigger this trauma response. In such cases, it is hard but possible to rewire the brain and make it more capable of dealing with stressful conditions.

Also read: How does trauma impact you?

Also read: 10 glaring signs you have intergenerational trauma.

Believe it or not! Your brain is flexible.

It has been scientifically proven that you can rewire your brain because of the neuroplastic attribute of the brain. The neurons in your brain keep changing based on the experiences you’ve had in your life. It can have a lasting effect when you look at things with a changed perspective. And have more positive experiences than negative ones.

Some Practices for Better Stress Management

Dr Aditi in her books talks about some crucial practices to make an immediate change to your brain or to your stress functioning. They are conscious breathing and a grateful attitude. Here are some practical practices that you can adopt on the go to control your stress in any situation anywhere.

Breathing Technique

Breathing is a bodily function that can be both voluntary and involuntary. You might have noticed that as soon as you become stressed, you become breathless. In a situation of extreme anxiety, you feel the walls closing in on you and you need more air to breathe.

Therefore, you can have control over your stress once you gain conscious control over your breath. That is also considered a life form in various cultures around the world.

All you need to do is shift your mind from the worry and focus on the air going through your nostrils, filling in your lungs, how long it takes, and when you expel it after a while. This is called mindful breathing. For quicker control, you can stop your breath once you inhale and then exhale slowly after a few seconds.

It would not only give more oxygen to your brain for effective functioning. But it would also bring your attention to the present moment where you need to be.

From what if to What is.

Dr Aditi says that anxiety is a future-focused emotion. Anxiety is built up in our bodies when we are uncertain about what is going to happen. Or how would certain events turn out? And we are predicting negative things happening in the future. We are stuck in a “What if” loop? What if it didn’t turn out positively or in my favor?

In such cases, either by breathing technique or by writing your thoughts on a paper to put things into perspective. Try to bring yourself to the present moment. All you need to do is to shift your mind from What if to What is. And you will immediately feel much better.

Things you are grateful for and why.

Many people keep a gratitude journal with themselves. However, there is a wide variety of people who do not consider gratitude journaling as a viable method to treat stress or anxiety.

It is all about the approach of how people try to perceive things. When you are writing about how grateful you are to have certain things. Add your “why” to it. Why are you grateful to be sitting in the apartment you are sitting in? Why are you thankful for a quiet morning and a sip of coffee?

This practice would lead you to contemplate the time when you didn’t have these and now you have those, hence you would value them more. Thus, making you a more positive person than before.

Also read: How to do Gratitude journaling the right way?

 “In control” vs “Out of control” list

When anxious about a certain situation, try to make a small list. What are the things about the situation that are in your control and what are the things that are not in your control and you can change nothing about them no matter what.

It would not only bring a change in your perspective but it would bring a huge change in your attitude as well. Once you know the things you have control over, you can have a plan and can do it accordingly.

In conclusion, stress is just an emotion in your mind. All you need to do is to manage it effectively like you manage other emotions. Always remember that managing stress is a skill and know that it can be developed through some practice and patience and over a period.