Stress is a complicated emotion. Some would describe it a great motivator, while others know it by the horrible knots that it turns their stomachs into. Some people think stress is just a normal part of life, and they will always have to live with it. However, stress is much more than just an emotion. Stress has been linked to heart disease, obesity, unhealthy weight gain and loss, anxiety and panic attacks, depression, suicide, and many other serious grievances. Stress can be a good motivator, but when a person is under severe amounts of it, and they do not know how to effectively deal with it, the complicated emotion can bring some serious repercussions.
No one can successfully and completely eliminate stress altogether. Life just doesn’t make that possible, unfortunately! Even those who don’t have stressful jobs, still have to undergo the stress of relationships, bills, and more. As for kids and teens, they may not have to worry about paying the hydro bill and the mortgage, but they still have the stress of school, homework and peer pressure to deal with. We have to face the fact that stress will never go away. We might have a stress free day, or even a stress free week, but I don’t think it can last much longer than that!
Dealing with stress has never been an easy thing to do. Our brains seem to want to stress; it’s almost like we feel that if we are not stressing out over our problems, then we aren’t being responsible. Don’t let yourself be fooled into this way of thinking. Stress is not healthy emotion, especially in high amounts! One of the things you can do when you feel yourself getting overwhelmed, is grab a pen and notebook. Write down all of the things that are stressing you out, and after writing everything down, close the notebook and sit back and take a couple of deep breaths. Writing things down can help you work through your emotions, because it is a way of letting it out. After a couple of minutes, open up the notebook again and brainstorm some possible solutions for the stressful situations.
Another thing that you can do to deal with your stress is to remember that worrying and stressing over things doesn’t ever help the situation at all. Who came up with the idea that if you don’t worry and stress out, the situation will get worse? Parents, think about the times you have been up, worrying that your kids have not come home yet – did your worrying bring them home safely? How about when you don’t have enough money to cover a bill? If you stress enough over it, will the money magically appear? No! If you are in a situation that you have no control over, then remind yourself of that, and put things in perspective. If you have some control, then do what you can, to the best of your ability, and don’t worry about what you can’t do. That part is beyond your control, and guess what? If it is beyond your control, then it ceases to be your responsibility. Isn’t that a freeing thought?