5 Simple Steps To Managing Stress Effectively

Left unchecked, high levels of stress can soon lead to an episode of anxiety or depression. Help is at hand with these five simple, effective and wholly natural techniques for managing stress quickly and effectively.

One of the most damaging ways to trigger a severe episode of stress, depression or anxiety concerns the way meanings are applied to an event or events you face. If you apply a single, worst-outcome meaning to an event, you will arouse powerful emotions within you and your mental health will suffer. Please try not to assign single negative outcomes to problems. Single negative outcomes are rarely true and are a recipe for stress, depression and anxiety. Generate multiple outcomes to problems and work towards more positive solutions. Rarely will a single, negative outcome be true and if you take a step back and take your time to assign a meaning, you will generate more positive solutions and reduce stress enormously.

Use mild language to describe how you feel. Using strong, powerful words can pour oil on the fire when it comes to stress. They intensify your feelings and increase your stress levels. So here are three examples of substituting powerful words with milder ones you can use instantly. You can then generate your own substitute words to lower the intensity and reduce stress. Instead of using the word "hate" as in "I hate this job!" use "I dislike this job." Instead of saying never, "I never get this right!" use sometimes "Sometimes I don't get this quite right." And instead of saying useless "I can't do this I'm useless!" say "I can do some things easily and some things I find more difficult." Do you see how this takes away a lot of the intensity? Try it, it is a very powerful way to reduce stress.

During an episode of stress, depression or anxiety, a belief that you are helpless can creep in. You say things like: "I can't do anything, things are totally beyond my control and there's no point in trying to do anything about it because nothing I do ever works." This is a very powerful and limiting belief. If you believe that you are helpless, then you will act accordingly because you won't take action to change things. Why would you if you strongly believe it is a hopeless cause? Helplessness is learned and it is also flawed. Many people are blind to the power they possess and a belief in helplessness keeps them in the dark. But just as helplessness is learned, it can be unlearned and a good way to start is to resolve to take action to create the outcomes you want. Keep writing down positive outcomes and keep taking action each and every day to move towards them.

Start and end each day in a positive way. Listen to upbeat music, and avoid reading or watching anything too heavy. For example, starting the day by watching an hour-long news bulletin filled with images of war, crime and disasters is not a good way to brighten your mood. Instead, turn off the TV and play some easy- listening music. 70's disco works for me, as does R & B. It certainly beats watching war and violence over breakfast! Also, try not to listen to heavy music or read something heavy - a horror story for example - before you retire to bed. These are simple stress management techniques to cut down your exposure to negative influences but they are highly effective and will improve your moods very quickly.

A major trigger for stress in many people occurs when they are facing a change or even a number of changes to their lives. Change is a constant in life and refusing to accept change can trigger the fear response and this causes stress levels to rocket. A crucial skill in managing stress successfully is being able to deal with change whenever it occurs. So, when you are faced with a change, try to find the positives associated with it and embrace change instead of resisting it. Every change presents an opportunity for you to grow and there are always positives to find in even the most trying of circumstances. Change by itself doesn't cause stress, what causes stress is more to do with how you react to change and if you react in a frightful, negative way, you will trigger stress and cause yourself a great deal of harm.

You can significantly relieve stress by using these 5 stress management techniques as often as you can. Try and apply at least one of them every day and you will see a big difference.