The Best Ways to Relieve Stress

Stress has become part and parcel of everyone’s life nowadays. Millions of people face the brunt of it each day, leading to increased physical and mental problems. Not having a work-life balance, family obligations, finance, and relationship issues all contribute to it. Some people deal with it better, while others struggle to do so. So what leads to this difference? A lot of factors contribute to it. Some of the common ones are past experiences, personality types, coping styles, level of support, and environmental factors. 

But before we delve further into the way of relieving this condition, let’s first understand what it is. “Stress is the way your body responds to any adverse situation.” This adverse situation can be anything that pushes you out of your comfort zone, leading to the activation of the body’s fight and flight response.

Hence, learning to manage and reduce it is very important for healthy well-being. Feeling stressed out can lead to serious physical ailments like high blood pressure and heart diseases if not managed well. It also leads to mental health disorders like anxiety and depression. 

In order to relieve your symptoms, you must identify all the factors that lead to it and eliminate them if possible. If it’s not possible, it’s important to come up with ways and techniques to manage them better. Stress management is not that difficult. All you need is a few techniques and a few changes in your lifestyle.

Here’re a few powerful ways that can help you manage these feelings better:

Get More Exercise

When you feel stressed, get moving. Yes, it’s that simple. Exercise is a great stress reliever and helps prevent various mental and physical ailments. Various studies suggest that exercise helps a lot in reducing stress, anxiety, and depression. Exercise helps in improving the mood by releasing feel-good hormones called endorphins, which reduce the feeling of suffering and makes you feel upbeat. 

Exercise also helps you take your mind off those things that causes you this feeling. By focusing on the body’s movements, you can stay grounded in the present moment. Any form of exercise like brisk walking, jogging, swimming, biking, strength training, and weight training can work for you, if done consistently. So make sure you pick up at least one of them, preferably the one you enjoy. This will ensure consistency leading to better results.

Focus on Nutrition

Your diet plays a vital role in affecting your mental health. Bad feelings can be directly linked to your food intake. So, if your diet has high amounts of processed food and sugar, you are bound to experience higher stress levels. The reverse is also true. Stress can also make you reach out for processed foods and sugar. Hence, it’s important to reduce the intake of these foodstuffs. 

Also, make sure you have a well-balanced, healthy, and nutritious diet consisting of vital nutrients, vitamins, and minerals. Your diet must contain an adequate amount of magnesium and B vitamins. So, make sure you include foods like vegetables, fruits, whole grains, fish, nuts, and seeds.

-Avoid Screen Time

With people being forced to work from home due to COVID 19, the average screen time has increased considerably. The increased screen time has led to increased stress levels in people, eventually leading to mental health issues. This can also hamper your sleep cycle, thereby aggravating it even further.

Though you can’t exactly avoid using these gadgets, you can definitely reduce your screen time. In order to do this, you need to set specific hours for using these devices. So, if you are a working professional, make sure you log out of your office portal by 8:30 p.m. every night. Make it a point to entertain no official work or emails after this time. Another important thing to note is that you don’t use your phone or any other devices just before sleeping. Ensure that you keep a gap of at least two hours between using these gadgets and sleep-time.

Set Aside Time for Self-Care

Self-care must be your priority in this fast-paced world where you are often required to multitask. Switching between various roles requires a lot of mental and emotional strain, which causes a lot of pressure and tension. Hence it’s important to have certain tools and techniques that can help you manage your emotions better. Various studies have proven the fact that self-care can actually reduce the risk of feeling stressed and burnout. 

So, what exactly is self-care? Well, self-care is any activity that leads to your mental well-being and happiness. It can be anything that helps you relax and unwind. Self-care habits can include going to a park for a quick stroll, reading your favorite book, exercising, doing yoga, meditating, and going for a pampering session at a spa or salon. Basically, anything that uplifts you can do the trick.

Surround Yourself with Friends and Family

Having a support system is extremely important for your mental well-being. Friends, family, and community can help you get through stressful times in a better way. It’s so important to have that support from someone when everything seems to be crashing down. In those cases, you need to have the strong support of people who uplift and support you. 

Though you may feel like isolating yourself in times of despair, it’s definitely not advisable. Instead, you should call your friend or family member and pour your heart out to them. If you don’t have your family and friends with you, you can join a support group. Support groups are a great way to connect with like-minded people and share your feelings and emotions. Another way to relieve your stress is to join a charitable trust as a volunteer. Having a bigger purpose and contributing to it can be a great way to relieve tension.

Don’t Be Afraid to Say “No”

Learning to say no is vital for maintaining your mental health. Though saying yes may seem like an obvious option to avoid conflict, it can prove detrimental to your peace of mind. Taking on more than you can handle will eventually lead to burnout. Putting others’ needs before you will only lead to emotional distress, resentment, and anger. This will cause a conflict within you, as what you want differs from what you are actually doing. 

So, make sure you learn the art of saying no. Know that you can only do so much. Recognize that putting your needs over others isn’t selfish rather, it’s self-care. Also, make sure you establish healthy boundaries. It can mean anything from canceling the evening party with your friend or telling your boss you can’t take on another assignment. Know that you can only serve others when you are in a good state of mind.

Practice Mindfulness

Have you ever noticed what really causes stress for you? You are stressed not because of your problems but due to the thoughts you create around them. It is because your mind is worrying about the events of the past or the future. This means it can be solved easily by grounding yourself in the present moment. How? By being mindful. 

But exactly is mindfulness? Mindfulness refers to the technique or practice that helps you stay aware of the present moment. It’s an act of being aware of what you are doing and what’s happening in the present moment. Mindfulness can be cultivated in your daily life by practicing mindfulness meditation. You can easily find it online on Youtube or even learn it via an offline class. The practice of mindfulness trains you to stay present, thereby helping in keeping at bay all the anxious and stressful thoughts.

Deep Breathing Exercises

Have you ever noticed how your breath moves when you are stressed? It’s shallow, short, and fast. You breathe from your upper thoracic region. When you are stressed your sympathetic nervous system gets activated. Your body gets into fight and flight mode. Your heartbeat becomes fast, and your blood vessels become constricted. How to fix this?

An easy way to fix this is by doing deep breathing exercises which include abdominal breathing, belly breathing, diaphragmatic breathing, and paced breathing. All these exercises help you focus on your breath, thereby slowing it down. It helps you shift from a sympathetic to a parasympathetic nervous system.

Learn Stress Management Techniques from a Trusted Therapist With DocVita

If you have tried these stress-busting techniques and it’s not getting any better, it might be time for you to reach out to a trusted therapist for help. We at DocVita have various specialists from different fields that can help you manage and cope with your emotions better. All you got to do is hop on to DocVita’s book from therapist page and book your session.