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Understanding and Managing Stress

Date: January 24, 2010
Author: Penny Pettman
Categories: Advice
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Stress is destructive to health and relationships. Stress is experienced when a person feels demands and expectations that exceed perceived available resources. Resources may relate to time, money, skill, tools, etc. The perception of the imbalance between the demands and resources and potential future adverse consequences for failing to meet the demand or expectation does not have to be correct in order for the situation to cause stress. That is, false understandings or beliefs can cause significant stress. Therefore any event or thought that causes a person to perceive a threatening demand is a potential source of stress.
It is true that on this planet there are situations that need to be reacted to and in the absence of stress, our species would never have survived. Accordingly, a positive aspect of stress is that it alerts you to a threat and provides you with increased levels of energy and motivation to help in coping with the threat. However mishandled stress or too much stress causes strain and can be devastating for you.
The negative effects of stress are numerous and perhaps we don’t even know them all. However, they include fatigue, irritability, anger, difficulty concentrating, a lower immune system, a variety of serious physical health problems, insomnia, depression, anxiety, loss of personal relationships, over eating and drug and alcohol abuse.
There is no one way to deal with stress. Stress may be reduced, eliminated or managed by addressing one or more of the underlying components of stress. For example you might reduce demands by planning ahead, increasing available resources, just saying “no”, finding ways to increase efficiency. Or, you might reduce the stress emotions by taking a break from the stressful situation, relaxing, exercising, getting a massage, taking a vacation. Or, you might eliminate or mitigate the impact of the consequences of failing to meet the demand by preparing for the consequences (e.g. having a savings account or buying insurance), changing your priorities (so what if the car doesn’t get washed?), accepting what can’t be changed, putting energy towards improving the situation.
You need to have the correct perspective concerning the demands you face. You need to be aware of your capabilities, resources, and the real consequences of failing to meet a demand. You need to see things accurately without distortions. Believing something is terrible when it is only just unpleasant can cause unnecessary stress.
There is scientific evidence that suggests that the experience of stress in the past magnifies how you react to stress in the future because stress actually alters your body and your brain. You can become sensitive to stress and then even the smallest stressor can invoke reactions in your brain and body that cause your brain to treat a small incident as a life threatening event. Because some stress is requisite for humans, your body is designed to provide an appropriate reaction to stress depending on the degree of the threat. However, when you become sensitive to stress due to earlier stress experiences, your body’s response that is designed for life threatening events is activated by ordinary trials and tribulations of life such that you respond inappropriately (in other words, overreact). This sensitivity to stress may begin during childhood. It is likely that the impact is greater when it is initiated during childhood.
It is of extreme importance that you become aware of your body so that you can sense when it is getting stressed and either reduce the stressors (i.e. demands perceived to exceed resources and perceived negative consequences) or take time for meditation, yoga, exercise, gardening, reading, writing, listening to music, going for a walk. Also, the knowledge about being sensitive to stress due to past stress experiences (i.e. the life-death reaction to inconsequential matters) is helpful, if it applies to you, because you can use logic and rational thoughts to understand why you’re reacting as you are and to correct this behaviour if you feel yourself overreacting to stressors.
You are vulnerable to stress and will experience stress; but you do not have to be its victim. You have the ability to control stress and what you permit it to do to you. http://www.yourowndevices.ca

Stress and Anxiety – Use Hypnotherapy to Overcome Them and Find Peace

Date: January 16, 2010
Author: Penny Pettman
Categories: Uncategorized
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Now more than ever, scientific surveys are attesting the primary role played by stress in triggering or aggravating different physical and emotional afflictions. In the June 6, 1983 issue of Time Magazine, the cover story labeled stress “The Epidemic of the Eighties.” It also said that stress is our leading health problem. Indeed one has to recognize that our world has become a lot more complicated and stressful in the last two decades since that article was written.

Numerous surveys indicate that almost everybody is under the impression of being subject to a lot of stress. Authorities in the field estimate that between 75 and 90 percent of all visits to primary care physicians somehow have to do with stress.

Most people report their stress is primarily due to their job. And stress levels have also grown in children and the elderly population because of several reasons including: Peer pressures that often push people to everything from smoking to alcoholism and drug abuse; the wearing away of religion and family values; increased crime rates; threats to personal safety; and last but not least social isolation and loneliness.

Stress can cause and aggravate conditions such as diabetes, ulcers, low back and neck pain, high blood pressure, strokes and heart attacks. This is due to the ever growing sympathetic nervous system activity along with a high level of cortisol, adrenaline, and other hormones. Chronic stress is often associated with lower immune system resistance. Stress can contribute to anxiety, depression, and its various effects on the body’s organs.

The following definition for “stress” can be found in the American Heritage Dictionary:

“To subject to physical or mental pressure, tension, or strain”

The following is the definition of “tension” from the same dictionary:

“Mental, emotional, or nervous strain”

The following definition is given for “anxiety”:

“A state of uneasiness and apprehension, as about future uncertainties”

And the following is the definition of “depression”:

“The condition of feeling sad or despondent”

The following is the definition of “clinical depression”:

“A psychiatric disorder characterized by an inability to concentrate, insomnia, loss of appetite, anhedonia, feelings of extreme sadness, guilt, helplessness and hopelessness, and thoughts of death.”

One thing is for sure, our mind is the first source of our feelings of stress, anxiety and depression. Put differently, what we think about, and our attitudes and points of view about our experiences create our feelings. That way, if we can learn how to change our thoughts, attitudes, and points of view, we can get rid of our feelings of stress, anxiety, and depression and change them for a more positive state of being.

Since the beginning of time, people have tried to find methods that would allow them to eliminate stress. With the pharmaceutical industry there seems to be a drug for everything. And to that end the industry has created a large line of sedatives from Valium to Xanax. If you choose to utilize drugs for relief, please be sure to pay attention to the fine print and learn about the side effects, which commonly include addiction and dependency. Unfortunately, these types of drugs aim at treating the symptoms, but not the cause. So as soon as one stops ingesting them, the symptoms can come back.

A finer method to get rid of tension, stress, anxiety, and depression is to work on the root cause, which as I said previously, is generally our thought processes. There is the good news. Hypnosis is all about relaxation. The AMA accepted hypnosis in 1958 as an effective way to cure stress or stress related symptoms. Moreover unlike anxiolytics, there are totally no negative side effects.

When you are in hypnosis, you are in the Alpha level of consciousness. It’s the daydream like temporary psychological state that we experience as we’re just about to fall asleep at night. And we experience it once again when we awaken again. There are several different ways that will help us guide ourselves into this state of tranquility, from progressive relaxation to visual imagery to listening to hypnosis CD’s.

Once we access a hypnotic state, we can communicate with our unconscious mind, which is the seat of our feelings. And it becomes easier to acknowledge new points of view and ideas that will help us to dissipate anxiety, or even avoid it completely.

NLP, which is a recent sort of hypnotherapy, offers numerous excellent methods for getting rid of stress. Perhaps the technique that works best is called the “swish” pattern – or the “flash” pattern. When you use this method, your unconscious will automatically use negative, stress producing mental images, as triggers for tranquilizing mental images. Otherwise stated, your stressors will automatically cause relaxation!

TO SUM THINGS UP

Tension, stress, anxiety, and depression can be caused by our thoughts. So by changing our attitude and the way we feel about our situation and what we’ve experienced, we can dissipate these feelings at the source. Hypnosis and NLP are natural tools that we can use to help us change our attitude and point of view to swiftly dissipate the root cause of our negative feelings.

Caught in a Stress Storm?

Date: December 27, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
Categories: Advice
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Imagine you’re on your way to meet friends at a bar. You’re late and stuck behind a slow-moving van when the entire street lurches into darkness. Suddenly that man crossing the street in front of you looks like a potential robber. The cars around you seem to be hemming you in. Everyone and everything appears dangerous. You’ve gone from slightly stressed to completely strung-out in an instant.

When you finally get to the bar, your friends are deep in conversation about blackouts, crime and their plans to leave the country. What should have been a light-hearted, fun-filled evening has turned into one riddled with anxiety.

It’s as though a cloud of dark heaviness is hanging above us right now. Most of us are unaware of the extent to which worrying issues are affecting us. But if a high level of stress continues over a long period, paralyzing feelings of being overwhelmed can set in. Many of us could be in the heart of what is termed as a ‘stress storm’. Have you ever been in the situation where, because of stress, you couldn’t remember the name of one of your own family members? Perhaps you’re stuck in a depression, or maybe you’ve accomplished something great but the next morning you don’t want to get out of bed because you’re so down.

These are indications that you are caught in a stress storm – a place filled with fear and confusion, where you’re no longer thinking rationally. If this sounds familiar, read on to understand better what’s happening to you – and how to get to grips with it.

Why are we so Stressed?

In the USA we have a set of stressors to contend with – high crime rates, rising costs of food and gas, and an economic situation in which retrenchments are increasingly common. These compound everyday stressors such as work, family conflicts and financial pressures. We don’t let our bodies or minds relax, and develop distorted perceptions about ourselves – for example, we may think we’re accepted only if we’re performing well.

When people are taxed on so many levels, their resilience rapidly erodes. Most people can deal with one stressful area in their lives – even two – but few people can function optimally when every area of their life is affected by instability and stress.

Stress Poisoning

Our bodies are built to handle stress in short, sharp bursts, but when there is no let-up, stress can in fact be toxic for our bodies. When we’re stressed, our adrenal glands pump out cortisol. This ‘stress hormone’ is preparing our muscles for the fight-or-flight response triggered when our lives are in danger. All energy is diverted from other functions, such as digestion, giving our bodies a burst of energy to ensure we can fight or flee if necessary. Modern stressors, however, such as traffic jams, don’t come and go quite as fast as, say, an attacking buffalo. Consequently, the cortisol and adrenaline that our stressors produce never leave our bodies – our lives are constantly turned to a high-alert setting.

On a physical level – which is where symptoms are easiest to detect and treat – stress may show up as migraines, headaches, muscle aches and pains, skin breakouts (acne, psoriasis, eczema) and stomach problems (including irritable bowel syndrome and constipation). Emotionally, we become more prone to outbursts of temper, mood swings and negativity. Mentally, we feel less able to cope. Our outlook becomes distorted and it becomes very difficult to keep our perspective. Highly stressed people become ‘reactive’. This means they react more to everything in their lives, from the lack of milk in the fridge to the geyser bursting. We become so overwhelmed that we literally get ‘beside ourselves’.

Living on Autopilot

Jane, 27, a fashion planner, knows this feeling all too well. While working in a high-pressure corporate fashion job reporting to a demanding boss, she was being pushed to work longer hours and perform tasks she didn’t feel prepared for.

‘As the pressure built up over about five months, I began feeling increasingly anxious. My short-term memory started to let me down and I would forget things I was meant to do. For example, I’d walk into a room and then go blank, forgetting why I was there. I felt confused all the time and began talking more slowly and slurred my words. I lost a lot of weight and at the height of my stress my right arm would get very tense and feel taut. It’s a scary place to be. It can feel as though you don’t know yourself – as though you’re having a mental meltdown.’

This feeling is not uncommon. Stressed people often describe themselves as being on autopilot – as though they’re participating in the show of their own life, but not starring. They’re overwhelmed and often feel clumsy, awkward and off-centre. They may forget names of people or even the names of simple, everyday objects. This is due to the prolonged periods of cortisol production, but also, because we’re trying to remember too many things.

High levels of stress can affect our relationships too. Some people, like Jane, are too tired to go out and socialize, and often feel they’re a burden on other people. ‘Friends tried to help,’ remembers Jane. ‘I’d lost a lot of weight so they could see I was in distress but they didn’t really know how to help other than telling me to chill out’.

Others may drink more to be more sociable or in an attempt to forget, so the glass of wine suddenly turns into a bottle of wine. According to research women could be more prone to developing stress-related addictions (such as cocaine addiction) than men. The good news, though, is that stress is our body’s way of telling us to do something. But what?

The suggestions below are a good start. Don’t knock them for sounding obvious – at least not till you’ve actually tried them.

Stress Busters

Gain Perspective

Understand that there are certain things in your life that you have control over and others that you don’t. If, for example, you are concerned about the political situation, vote. If you’re concerned about crime, join or start a neighborhood-watch program. Be proactive about things you can influence and let go of those you can’t.

Breathe

At work, if you find yourself getting stressed or anxious, go somewhere quiet and concentrate on your breathing. Imagine your breathing is like waves breaking on a beach. Maintain a regular rhythm. Imagine you are breathing all the way down to your toes when you breathe in, and all the way back up again as you breathe out.

Eat Well

Don’t hand your power over to food and drink. That fatty hamburger isn’t going to release your stress. Rather ask, ‘What will this drink or food do to my body over the long term?’ Cut down on sugar. Sugar gives you a temporary lift followed by a downer. If you’re craving something sweet, try eating fruit or a handful of nuts. Drink lots of water. Stress tends to dehydrate the body. Keeping your body hydrated will lessen stress symptoms such as fatigue and headaches.

Exercise More

One of the most effective ways of dealing with stress is to exercise. Try to do some form of exercise at least three times a week for 30 to 60 minutes.

Develop a Positive Internal Dialogue

This is a powerful way to help ourselves when we’re stressed. We tend to feel anxious about things we have no control over (the future, other people), and most of what we fear never happens. Remain in the moment. If you start to stress about tomorrow, remind yourself that you can only live today – tomorrow does not yet exist.

Talk to a Professional

Jane consulted a psychologist, who helped her see that getting through her stress storm meant removing herself from her stressful job. ‘I took three months off, stayed home and just slept, watched TV and did nothing.’ She saw her psychologist for a few months and gradually became her old self again, but this time with the tools to recognize and avoid another stress storm.

Manage Your Stress With Ease

Date: December 20, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
Categories: Advice
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Studies from the 1950s, 60s and 70s predicted that with advances in technology we would have a lot more leisure time by the year 2000. How wrong they were! Today we are expected to produce a lot more, of a higher quality, as fast as possible and all with less support than we had 30 years ago. In this information age we spend more time living inside our heads than in our bodies; we move less and think more and it is taking a major toll on our health. The effects of pressure have become so prevalent in our lives that they have even been given it a name: stress.

Stress is an internal phenomenon. You might say, My office is stressful or My shopping mall gives me stress or You try having four kids and not being stressed! But while these are contributors to the stress process they do not create stress. There is no such thing as external stress. Stress is in your thoughts, feelings and beliefs and how you choose to behave in response to an external pressure. If you feel that a situation is more demanding than you are capable of handling, then you will experience stress.

The three major causes of stress

Acute Pressure

Acute Pressure is pressure that only lasts for a short period of time. As an example, imagine you are a cat strolling through the backyard, minding your own business, when suddenly a rabid dog jumps over the fence and charges straight toward you. Your body would react immediately by activating a series of neurological, biochemical, hormonal and physiological actions, all designed to help you avoid the dog and survive. This automatic response is commonly referred to as the fight or flight response. The stress response in the case of our cat runs its course very quickly, eg the dog bolts over the fence and charges at the cat (the external pressure), which causes the cats brain and hormonal system to release a series of stress hormones (the stress response), which in turn puts the cat in a physiological state to either fight the dog or run away (the fight or flight response). After escaping the dog, the cats stress hormones return to normal and it is soon strolling through the backyard again. This is an example of acute pressure causing stress. The short-term effects of acute stress include an increase in heart rate, blood pressure, breathing rate, body temperature and adrenaline output as well as feelings of anxiety, nervousness and tension.

Chronic Pressure

Unfortunately in todays world, we humans are not as fortunate as the cat. Every day we deal with situations that cause continuous stress. Alarm clocks, unexpected bills, mortgage repayments, traffic jams, work, family and partner commitments, all of which can be harder to escape than the rabid dog and unlike the rabid dog, they come back time and time again. This creates a situation where we are constantly stuck in the middle of the stress response, where our stress hormones are elevated for long periods of time. Although this is not immediately life-threatening (as is the acute pressure situation of the cat and the dog), over the long term it can lead to obesity, reduced sex drive, weakened immune system, loss of memory and poor feelings of well being. If we cannot remove or escape from acute stress, it soon becomes chronic stress.

Imagined Pressure

Our subconscious minds cannot distinguish between a real and an imagined event. Therefore, even though some of our fears may be anticipated or imagined, rather than actual, they still activate the bodys stress responses. If these fears are not dealt with they will soon become a source of chronic stress.

A large proportion of the stress we experience is caused by either a fear of failure or fear of success. Fear of failure can be traced back to a fear of loss in some form. Loss of control, reputation, money, livelihood and even life. Fear of success on the other hand can be traced to a fear of your own greatness, which may actually also lead back to a fear of loss. Loss of freedom, loss of privacy, loss of leisure time, loss of having a life.

FEAR = False Expectations Appearing Real. It is thought that as much as 90 per cent of all fears never eventuate and that the other 10 per cent often dont turn out to be as bad as we expect. You need to be aware that fear is a negative thought and the more you focus on it, the more likely it will manifest itself in your life.

The best way to deal with your fears is to categorise them as things you can control and things you cannot control. It is pointless to worry about things that you cannot control. They are what they are and whatever will be will be. There is nothing you can do about them. Focus instead on the things you can control. Begin by putting them into perspective. Ask yourself, If this fear were to eventuate, how stressful would it be on a scale from 1-10?

Only 1-2 per cent of all fears are really worth worrying about. The others, which are more likely to really be inconveniences, should be confronted and dealt with before they create further dis-EASE in your life.

There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.Shakespeare

Outcomes of stress

The effects of stress can be either positive or negative, depending entirely on how you choose to view the external pressure.

Positive Outcomes of Stress include:

Increased physical, mental and emotional performance
Growth
Change
Creativity
Fun and enjoyment

The human body loves positive stress as it provides a stimulus for growth and improvement.

Im sure you know of people who just seem to be cruising through life, merely existing and not truly experiencing. These people do not have enough positive stress in their lives. Unfortunately, if we are not growing, we are dying, and these people are simply waiting to die. The key to living an amazing life is to fill it with positive stress so that you are continually growing and developing.

What is a source of positive stress for one person may be a source of negative stress for another. Your experience will depend on your stress threshold and the coping strategies you employ. To determine whether an event causes you positive or negative stress you need to be aware of its affect on your body.

Negative Outcomes of Stress include:

Heart disease
Cancer
Diabetes
Obesity
Illness and injury
Burnout and breakdown

Exposure to too much stress for too long will reduce the ability of your immune system and enhance your susceptibility to dis-EASE. The first sign of any dis-EASE in your life is a good indicator that you have surpassed your stress threshold. As with all forms of dis-EASE, before you can address your stress you must first confront the underlying issue(s) causing it. If these issues, thoughts, feelings, beliefs and behaviours are not dealt with they can end up ruling our lives and creating self-destructive patterns, which will eventually lead to burnout or even breakdown.

Identify your optimal level of stress

To achieve an optimal balance of stress in your life you should look to involve yourself in situations which are neither too relaxing nor too stressful, but somewhere in between. If something is too easy you will not become sufficiently stimulated to produce a quality performance or growth, and if it is too difficult you will become over-stimulated which will also affect your ability to produce a quality performance and lead to dis-EASE. Becoming an expert in your own stress management is simply a matter of putting yourself into situations that provide you with enough stimulation to perform at your peak.

Coping Strategies

By listening to your body you will be able to implement positive solutions to reduce the effects of stress in your life.

Positive Coping Strategies:

Planning ahead
Thinking positive and empowering thoughts
Eliminating toxins
Exercising
Eating well
Resting, relaxing and rejuvenating
Evaluating

Negative Coping Strategies:

Too often people will deal with the effects of stress by using either stimulants to kick start the body or suppressants to slow it down. Unfortunately, most of these stimulants and suppressants are toxic. Continuously pumping your body with toxins is one of the fastest ways to inflict damage on yourself. Toxins can take the form of:

Stimulants

Caffeine
Nicotine
Recreational drugs
Sugar

Suppressants

Alcohol
Prescription drugs
High fat or processed foods

Behaviours

Work addiction
Sex addiction
Exercise addiction
Food addiction (overeating/under eating)
Television addiction
Gambling

The problem with these coping strategies is they do not address the root cause of the stress. They simply mask the symptoms and thus become detrimental to your health.

Are you suffering from stress?

5 Stress Management Tips for Effective Communication

Date: December 12, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
Categories: Advice
Comments: Leave a reply

Not enough time, boss pushing for work to be completed, children are loud, bills to pay, shopping to be done, housework to do, partner asking for your help… and to top it all off you’re suppose to be nice to people by communicating effectively with them? Yikes!If you’re like me, you find it hard to communicate in stressful moments. Stress management techniques don’t always do the trick. In response to stress, you either become aggressive towards other people to release stress or you become submissive to hide the stress.Showing aggression towards another person temporarily feels okay, but then reality kicks in as you feel even more stressed from having hurt the other person. When you are submissive and hide your stress, it internally eats at you as your emotions get suppressed, which then hurts your relationships.When under stress, your communication style will change in response to the situation. You can go from a cool and collected person one moment, yet when a stressful situation impinges your tolerable threshold your calm style likely shifts to the aggressive or submissive behaviors.What behavior you fall back on in stressful situations is the one you have been comfortable with in the past that will have “protected” you. It’s a natural human extinct built within us that we use to block out external factors and listen to internal ones. You probably now are able to realize that stress causes you to block external factors, such as other people’s feelings, as your interpersonal communication skills decline. You begin to only worry for your internal factors.When someone has surpassed their tolerable stress level, telling them to get their “act together” or how ineffective their current communication is, does not work. It won’t work for you either. Communicating better in intense conflict is a matter of managing stress otherwise it is next to impossible to deal with conflict.Stress motivates us to take action, but it too often works against us. I’ve come up with the best five ways and techniques to manage stress that you can use to deal with difficult conflict:1) Stop the stress from rising in the first place. The best technique to deal with stress is to stop it from occurring altogether. You can incorporate other stress management techniques listed below into your stress plan before you get stressed in conflict.2) Breathe. When your stressed levels rise, you breathe shallowly. This causes you to enter the fight or flight response that hurts your ability to effectively communicate. When your stress levels rise, take several deep, slow breathes and you will instantly reduce your stress levels.3) Accept responsibility for how you feel. It is tempting and too easy to release your stress on other people. Do not treat people inappropriately. If you treat people in a way they don’t want to be treated, you build their stress levels, which they will be happy to put back on you.When you accept responsibility, you live in truth. you eliminate blame. You do not become a victim of others. You take control of your feelings. Your new levels of responsibility builds your self-control and ability to manage stress.If someone causes you stress, you need to address the person by explaining to them how you feel, why you feel that way, and what can be done to fix the problem. Do not stress out the person by focusing your reason for being stressed directly on the person, but focus on the problem. Be problem oriented and not person oriented.4) Take time out. Walking away is a guaranteed stress management technique to refresh your mind. If you can afford to go on a Caribbean cruise, go for it! For others who cannot do that, go for a walk or workout at the gym. Being active releases hormones that counter stress. Being away from the stress also takes your mind off the problem and gives you clearer thoughts and feelings. Be sure to address the problem after your time out, however, otherwise you will only have temporarily avoided the real issue.5) Be flexible. Stress is like the sunrise and sunset. It is inevitable. Therefore, the best way to deal with it is to change your behavior and communication. You need to be able to recognize when others are stressed by reading their verbal and nonverbal language then adjust yourself accordingly. Be flexible by going a bit out of your way for them to assist their temporary needs and wants. Don’t run around the world for them, but do be more aware and respondent of them. This can lead you to less stress.Bonus Tip: Ask others about your responses in stressful moments. It is useful to ask others what you do when you enter that threshold level where you begin to block out external factors. Just ask them what you are like and how it makes them feel when you are stressed. You are to ask other people about this because assessing yourself when you experience heavy emotions is an inaccurate source of information.Stress shouldn’t make you miserable. We were given the ability to be stressed to get things done otherwise we would sit on our lazy behinds all day. Learn these ways to manage your stress to effectively communicate, and you will better manage your relationship communication in stressful moments.