Editors of Adams Media - 100 Ways to Stay Calm: Simple Tips and Tricks to Relax Your Mind and Body

100 Ways to Stay Calm

Simple Tips and Tricks to Relax Your Mind and Body

Adams Media, a division of F+W Media, Inc.

Avon, Massachusetts

Today is the first day of a new year in your life. It doesnt matter if today isnt December 31; its still the first day of a new year of beating stress! Weve provided 100 ways you can take control of the stress in your life, at home, at work, in relationships everywhere! Stress can creep into all the areas of your world, but that doesnt mean you have to tolerate it. From the yoga studio to the Internet to your doctors office, theres help out there for you. So go after it!

This collection will uncover the mysteries of stress: what it is, its different forms, and what it means to you. Once you know what your own personal definition of stress is, you can move toward overcoming it. Does stress take more of a toll on your mind or your body? Do you release stress through bad habits, such as nail biting or binge eating? Do you watch your diet and get enough regular exercise? If you have bad habits you need to work on, or if you have good habits youd like to increase, we will help you do it.

We will also introduce you to some fun and energizing ways to beat stress. Several you may already be familiar with; others will be brand new to you. These strategies include: massage; meditation; alternative therapies such as herbal remedies; and even attitude adjustment. You never know what might work for you until you try.

Settle in, take a deep breath, sip your favorite tea, and learn to reduce your stress, enjoy your life, and keep calm!

You know youre under stress when you rear-end the car in front of you on the way to work (oops!), make it to work three hours late and get fired (no!), then have your wallet stolen on the bus ride home (oh, thats just perfect!). But what about the stress when you get engaged to the love of your life? Or, when you finally get the promotion of your dreams? Is it stressful to graduate from college, or start an exercise program, or binge on chocolate-chip cookies? You bet it is. Whats so stressful about a few chocolate chip cookies? Nothing, if you eat one or two chocolate-chip cookies now and then as part of a well-balanced diet. Plenty, if you deprive yourself of desserts for a month, then eat an entire bag of double-fudge chocolate chunk. Your body isnt used to all that sugar. Thats stressful.

Most people have a preconceived notion of what stress is in general, but what does stress mean to you? Discomfort? Pain? Anxiety? Excitement? Fear? Uncertainty? These are mostly conditions stemming from stress. But what is stress itself? Stress is such a broad term, and there are so many different kinds of stress affecting so many people in so many different ways that the word stress may seem to defy definition. What is stressful to one person might be exhilarating to another. Stress has become a way of life for many, but that doesnt mean we should sit back and accept the insidious effects of stress on our bodies, minds, and spirits.

Youve probably tried stress management techniques before. Perhaps you just havent found a stress management technique that fits your unique life. Your personality, the kind of stress you are trying to relieve, and the way you tend to handle stress all factor into your stress management success. For example, someone who is physically drained by too much interaction with people may not be helped by strategies that encourage increased social activities with friends. Someone else who is stressed by the lack of a support system might find profound benefit in increased social activity. It all depends on who you are.

So whats the point of stress? Stress is a relatively complex interaction of external and internal processes caused by something relatively simple: the survival instinct. Life is full of stimuli. Some we enjoy; some we dont. But our bodies are programmed, through millions of years of learning how to survive, to react in certain ways to stimuli that are extreme. If you should suddenly find yourself in a dangerous situation you step in front of a speeding car, or you lose your balance and teeter on the edge of a cliff your body will react in a way that will best ensure your survival. You might move extra fast. You might pitch yourself back to safety.

You may not feel like the stress in your life is quite so bad just yet. But what will happen if you dont begin to manage your stress right now? How long will you allow stress to compromise your quality of life, especially knowing you dont have to let it? Thats where stress management comes in. As pervasive as stress may be in all its forms, stress management techniques that really work are equally pervasive. You can manage, even eliminate, the negative stress in your life. All you have to do is find the stress management techniques that work best for you. Learn them and turn your life around.

Unless you live in a cave without a television (actually, not a bad way to eliminate stress in your life), youve probably heard quite a bit about stress in the media, around the coffee machine at work, or in the magazines and newspapers you read. So, what exactly is stress? Stress comes in several guises, some more obvious than others. Some stress is acute, some is episodic, and some is chronic. Acute stress is the result of change. Episodic stress is the result of lots of acute stress one change after another after another. Chronic stress, on the other hand, has nothing to do with change. Chronic stress is long-term, constant, unrelenting stress on the body, mind, or spirit.

Humans desire and need a certain degree of change. It makes life exciting and memorable. So heres the big question: How much change can you stand before the changes start to have a negative effect on you? This is a completely individual issue. No single formula will calculate what is too much stress for anyone because the level of acute stress you can stand is likely to be completely different than the level of stress your friends and relatives can tolerate. Essentially, this is a see what works for you kind of scenario. If staying out late on both Friday and Saturday night every weekend leaves you feeling depleted on Monday morning, youre upsetting your routine too much, thus causing stress. Dial it back to just one night out per weekend and see if that suits you better.