Stress Management Tips and Techniques

Introduction To Stress Management Tips

Stress is a part of day to day living and adjusting to our environment. Family, friends, employment and life experiences can all affect our level of stress. Mild forms of stress can act as a motivator that propels you to complete tasks that excite you. However, if your stress level becomes too high, physical, mental / emotional problems can result. This is when stress management tips come in handy to help you to cope more effectively.

What causes Stress?

How we react to external events is what causes stress. In themselves, events are not stressful. We all differ in how we respond to the events taking place around us and it is our internal reactions, thoughts and choices that either create or alleviate stress. What one person finds stressful another does not. For example, one person may fear speaking up for themselves and worry that this may cause conflicts to arise. Another person though, may view speaking up as a way to achieve their desires and is motivated to do so.

Both positive and negative life experiences can be stressful. Major changes though contribute to higher levels of stress and require stress management tips and techniques to help you to cope at these times.

Major changes that influence our level of stress include:

• Changing homes
• Divorce
• Death of a loved one
• Losing your job
• Changing jobs
• Conflict in the workplace or home
• Increased workload
• Getting married
• Starting a family
• Illness
• Financial issues / problems
• Noise / distractions
• Feeling let down

A combination of two or more of these stressors is more likely to raise your level of stress.

How do you know if you are stressed?

There are a number of symptoms that indicate that you may be experiencing stress. You may notice that you:

• have mixed feelings
• feel anxious
• experience mood swings
• feel irritable
• frustrated
• or are easily annoyed

You may notice a change in your behaviour, for example:

• crying when you think about what is causing you stress
• acting impulsively
• grinding your teeth
• increasing your level of smoking, drugs or alcohol
• Losing interest in your environment or social interactions
• You may notice that it is difficult to concentrate or you suffer a loss of productivity
• You may be preoccupied or worried with thoughts / tasks to complete
• You may feel inadequate
• Loss of appetite or increased binge eating

Stress can also affect the body, you may notice any one of the following symptoms:

• Increased perspiration
• increased heart beat
• feeling nervous
• sleep problems
• digestive problems
• tense muscles
• illness prone

It is important to be aware of the indicators of stress. In the last year, both of my beautiful parents died and then my workload increased dramatically due to changes in my work role. It wasn't until a colleague pointed out that I was behaving differently (snappy, irritable, memory fading) that I stopped and fully realised that I had experienced three major stressors in a period of twelve months, which were contributing to how I was feeling.

Whilst I "should" have been aware that I was suffering the effects of stress, I had not acknowledged it because I was trying to cope with grief and the increased workload. I am truly grateful that my colleague brought it to my attention. This is when I began to empower myself again, by using many of the techniques listed below.

The benefit of using these techniques is to increase your level of happiness and well-being. Remember you are never alone if you are suffering from stress and there is always someone who can assist you. But the first step you must take is to recognise that you are experiencing stress and then decide what you wish to do about it.

Stress Management Tips and Techniques

Here, we will cover some of the stress management tips and techniques that you can use to reduce your stress. Do not hesitate though to seek the services of a professional counselor or your doctor if symptoms persist. Ongoing stress can affect your health and well being. Learn to recognise the signs and choose to help yourselves to lessen stress.

To reduce your level of stress you can:

• Exercise - Practice some form of exercise daily to promote optimal health and well being. This is a wonderful way of reducing the impact of stress on your physical and mental well being.
• Change the way you think. Reinforce positive self-statements. People grow from strength rather than weakness.
• Practice a relaxation method that incorporate the Mind Traffic Exercise. The Mind Traffic Exercise is where you have a pen and paper beside you as you relax where you can dump all of your thoughts onto the paper.
• Learn to recognize and accept your limits. Do not judge yourself or place expectations on how you think you 'should' cope. Each one of us is unique in how we handle stress.
• Find ways to have fun. Start a new hobby or rekindle an old one.
• Eat a balanced diet daily.
• Talk with friends, family, a counselor, teacher or someone you can trust about your worries/problems.
• Develop time management skills. When you have many tasks to complete, setting priorities will help you to manage more effectively. Remember to set realistic goals.
• Practice relaxation techniques on a daily basis. 

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How to Deal with Stress and Anxiety

Stress is part of a person’s daily life. A person who is not enjoying his/her job, someone who is experiencing a great problem at home or someone who is frustrated about something usually experiences this.

Everyone can be a subject to stress and anxiety because this world holds many things that cause negativity. If you see someone who acts like he is not affected by any problem that he encounters, it is because he knows how to handle every problem that come his way.In this article, you will be given different ways to deal with stress and anxiety.

These two negative feelings should be treated immediately because it can cause more problems. It can hinder you from becoming productive with your work and from communicating with the people around you.

Be open to changes
Everything starts with accepting the fact that everything changes. You should be flexible enough to accept that there is no constant event in life. If you are experiencing so much pressure and hardship today, you should not stop believing that better days are yet to come. And on the other side, if you are experiencing a happy life today, be thankful and be open to any changes that might come in the next days.

The best way to be open with changes is to find peace inside you. If you are happy and contented, you have a strong foundation that can stand against any challenges.

Learn how to play
Many people experience so much pressure and stress because they do not understand the importance of spending quality time with their loved ones during their free time. You should also know when to relax and enjoy life. After five days of pure stress and tension inside the office, give yourself a break. Go for an out of town trip with your special someone or eat dinner with your whole family. These little moments are priceless. You can never buy happiness, so you have to make sure that you spend sometime smiling and forgetting all the pressure of working.

Communicate with your Creator
Prayer is the best stress reliever. If you know how to ask for strength from the source of your life, you will surely find yourself learning how to be contented and happy.
They often say that a person who knows how to kneel before his Creator cannot be moved by any negative circumstances.

Open up
Do not let the problem eat you up, spill it. If you have a trusted friend, tell him/her the different things that bother you and experience the feeling of being released from a negative thing that is imprisoning you. You can also cry if it can help you get that burden out of your system.Stress and anxiety are products of negative situations. As a human being, you are created with a heart that can endure every hardship. But when things are getting tough and you can no longer see yourself catching up, try doing one of the listed ideas above.

http://incometherapy.com/how-to-deal-with-stress-and-anxiety/
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Stress Management Shouldn't Create More Stress. 10 Ways To Reduce Unreasonable Stress At Your Workplace.

We all know that stress levels in the workplace are reaching unreasonable levels. And most sensible human beings will agree that we have to take action to fix this problem.

However, some government agencies and, I must say, some consultants are all for creating yet another paper and theoretical exercise that will have little benefit to the employees or the business. Managers don't need lectures on how too much stress diminishes people's creativity and productivity, increases absenteeism, extended sick leave and can result in tribunal payouts of tens or hundreds of thousands of pounds. Managers want assistance not lectures.

Do whatever you can to escape the form filling that supposed ensure you meet certain "stress management standards". Avoid like the plague what are now being called "stress risk assessments". These will require the resources of a full time employee and lead to even more stress!

Rather concentrate on straightforward and easily applied measures to reduce stress and at the same time show employees and regulatory authorities and legal courts that your organisation does stake stress seriously.

Here are just ten you could start with.

1. Ensure your Employee Handbook and Induction has plenty of wording in it that shows that management knows about the adverse effects of too much stress. Explain what people must do if they feel under stress. Go over the top to show that management wants and welcomes discussion reporting of excess stress. Who ever is giving the induction must state this orally too.

2. Have a clear, written and concise procedure that people can follow if they find stress getting out of hand. What can people do if they feel under stress? Who should they speak to? What do they do if it's their boss who is the cause of stress? What help can the business offer? Make sure employees know they also have a responsibility to look after their physical and mental health.

3. Give people clear job descriptions so they know what is required of them and revisit the description every six months to update them. You can do this in the annual or (better) twice-yearly appraisal Involve people in writing and re-negotiating job descriptions. Specifically ask about what can be done to reduce stress and record the answer.

4. Keep referring to stress in newsletters, speeches and meetings. Put stress reduction on the agenda of management meetings and have a set section in the newsletter. Senior managers should include a mention of stress in at least one speech per year.

5. Offer people-management/leadership workshops to managers and supervisors. Many of them don't know how to get the best from their people. Unnecessary tension is caused by ignorance of how to speak to and treat people effectively in the modern workplace. Often supervisors don't know they're a source of stress - nobody tells them. Keep it simple: one day is enough and avoid "models and theories of leadership"!

6. Offer stress management workshops and literature. Even if there are no current stress problems offer the workshops anyway. Even insist people go. Keep it simple - a half-day is enough and avoid all theory! Give people a book or CD on stress management as part of the induction.

7. Offer a time management workshop. It's amazing how people can take better control when they know it's okay to say "no", to scrap a meeting, to scrap a report, to cut short appointments and to find better, quicker less burdensome ways of doing things. Most people get bogged down because they don't think in terms of time management and even when they do, some are too afraid to approach the boss. They will think you'll think, they're lazy or uncooperative.

8. Monitor stress levels.

No, you don't need an 80-question stress climate survey or bureaucratic stress management standards. Just twice a year issue a half-page with one question: "For you personally give three things the organisation could do to reduce unreasonable stress". Make this an anonymous exercise and publish the results with actions taken.

9. Take time to listen and act. If a stress issue is raised, be seen to be taking it seriously. Make time to listen, document the issues and then take action. Whilst keeping confidences publicise what action has been taken.

10. Unfortunately, sooner or later you'll have to prove to some authority that you are doing things to combat unreasonable stress. Therefore keep a running and up-to-date record - just a simple book - of all the things your organisation is doing to reduce stress in the workplace. Record everything. For example, if you run a Recruitment Interviewing Course, record how you amended the content to include an hour or so on testing to see if candidates can cope with the stress of a particular job.

Debate about what stress is, the relative responsibilities of employers and employees and what systems to use will go on and on. You might as well just get on and do what commonsense and good leadership dictates.

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10 Relaxation Techniques To Reduce Stress On-the-Spot

If your hectic lifestyle has got you down, experts say relaxation techniques can bring you back into balance -- some in five minutes or less.

The kids need a ride to school, your husband can't find his shorts, your boss has just scheduled an online meeting, and your best friend desperately needs your help -- all at the same time.

Is it any wonder that you can't find a minute for relaxation? In fact, if you're like most women, you may have even forgotten how to relax.

And though experts say that some stress is good for you -- it can sharpen your senses and your mind -- too much stress is bad for your mental and physical health. At the same time, relaxation can do wonders to restore balance in your life -- and may even reduce some of the health risks associated with stress.

WebMD talked to the experts to learn more about relaxation -- and how to attain it. What follows are 10 on-the-spot techniques you can use -- any time and almost anywhere -- to reduce the tension in your life.

1. Meditate

If you're thinking meditation means twisting your body into an uncomfortable position and uttering "oohs" and "omms" for an hour, guess again. Any repetitive action can be a source of meditation, says Herbert Benson, MD, author of The Relaxation Response and director emeritus of Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine in Chestnut Hill, Mass. This includes walking, swimming, painting, knitting -- any activity that helps keep your attention calmly in the present moment.

When you catch yourself thinking about your job, your relationship or your lifelong to-do list, experts say to simply let the thought escape, and bring your mind back the repetition of the activity. Try it for just 5 to 10 minutes a day and watch stress levels drop.

2. Picture Yourself Relaxed

Is your mind too talkative to meditate? Try creating a peaceful visualization, or "dreamscape." To start, simply visualize anything that keeps your thoughts away from current tensions. It could be a favorite vacation spot, a fantasy island, that penthouse in New York City -- or something "touchable," like the feel of your favorite silk robe or cozy sweater.

The idea is to take your mind off your stress, and replace it with an image that evokes a sense of calm. The more realistic your daydream -- in terms of colors, sights, sounds; even touch and feel -- the more relaxation you'll experience.

3. Breathe Deeply

Feeling stressed evokes tense, shallow breathing, while calm is associated with relaxed breathing, says Michael Lee, author of Turn Stress into Bliss and founder of Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy in Bristol, Vermont. So to turn tension into relaxation, he says, change the way you breathe.

Try this: Let out a big sigh, dropping your chest, and exhaling through gently pursed lips, says Joan Borysenko, PhD, director of Harvard's Mind-Body Clinical Programs. Now imagine your low belly, or center, as a deep, powerful place. Feel your breath coming and going as your mind stays focused there. Inhale, feeling your entire belly, sides and lower back expand. Exhale, sighing again as you drop your chest, and feeling your belly, back and sides contract. Repeat 10 times, relaxing more fully each time.

4. Look Around You

"Mindfulness is the here-and-now approach to living that makes daily life richer and more meaningful," says Claire Michaels Wheeler, MD, PhD, author of 10 Simple Solutions to Stress. It's approaching life like a child, without passing judgment on what occurs. Mindfulness means focusing on one activity at a time, so forget multi-tasking! Staying in the present-tense can help promote relaxation and provide a buffer against anxiety and depression.

Practice it by focusing on your immediate surroundings. If you're outdoors, enjoy the shape and colors of flowers, hear a bird's call or consider a tree. In the mall, look at the details of a dress in the window, examine a piece of jewelry and focus on how it's made, or window-shop for furniture, checking out every detail of pattern and style. As long as you can keep your mind focused on something in the present, stress will take a back seat.

5. Drink Hot Tea

If you're a coffee-guzzler, consider going green. Coffee raises levels of the notorious stress hormone, cortisol, while green tea offers health and beauty, says Nicholas Perricone, MD, author of 7 Secrets to Beauty, Health, and Longevity.

Chamomile tea is a traditional favorite for calming the mind and reducing stress. And black tea may be a stress-fighter, too, researchers from University College London report. Participants who drank regular black tea displayed lower levels of cortisol, and reported feeling calmer during six weeks of stressful situations than those who drank a placebo with the same amount of caffeine.

6. Show Some Love

Induce the relaxation response by cuddling your pet, giving an unexpected hug to a friend or family member, snuggling with your spouse, or talking to a friend about the good things in your lives, says psychologist Deborah Rozman, PhD, co-author of Transforming Stress. When you do, you'll be reducing your stress levels.

Why? Experts say social interaction helps your brain think better, encouraging you to see new solutions to situations that once seemed impossible, she says. Studies have also shown that physical contact -- like petting your dog or cat -- may actually help lower blood pressure and decrease stress hormones.

7. Try Self-Massage

When your muscles are tense and you've no time to visit a pro, try this simple self-massage technique from Darrin Zeer, author of Lover's Massage and Office Yoga. Relax, and travel straight to Zen-land.

Place both hands on your shoulders and neck.

Squeeze with your fingers and palms.

Rub vigorously, keeping shoulders relaxed.

Wrap one hand around the other forearm.

Squeeze the muscles with thumb and fingers.

Move up and down from your elbow to fingertips and back again.

Repeat with other arm.

8. Take a Time-Out

Adults need time-outs, too. So when you sense your temper is about to erupt, Jeff Brantley, MD, author of Five Good Minutes In the Evening, suggests finding a quiet place to sit or lie down and put the stressful situation on hold. Take a few deep breaths and concentrate on releasing tension and calming your heartbeat. Quiet your mind and remember: Time is always on your side, so relax. The stress can wait.

9. Try a Musical Detour

Music can calm the heartbeat and soothe the soul, the experts say. So, when the going gets rough, take a musical stress detour by aligning your heartbeat with the slow tempo of a relaxing song. And you might want to make that a classical tune. Research shows that listening to 30 minutes of classical music may produce calming effects equivalent to taking 10 mg of Valium.

10. Take an Attitude Break

Thirty seconds is enough time to shift your heart's rhythm from stressed to relaxed, Rozman says. The way to do that: Engage your heart and your mind in positive thinking. Start by envisioning anything that triggers a positive feeling -- a vision of your child or spouse, the image of your pet, that great piece of jewelry you're saving up to buy, a memento from a vacation -- whatever it is, conjuring up the thought will help slow breathing, relax tense muscles and put a smile on your face. Rozman says that creating a positive emotional attitude can also calm and steady your heart rhythm, contributing to feelings of relaxation and peace.

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http://www.webmd.com/balance/guide/blissing-out-10-relaxation-techniques-reduce-stress-spot?page=1