Coping With Stress, Anxiety and Depression

Here are 12 positive ways of coping with stress, anxiety & depression.

Anxiety is a serious mental problem which if left untreated can lead to high stress levels. What happens when a person gets stressed out? Usually, they tend to not need to go out anywhere or see somebody till they “snap out of it”. But every person is unique & each may have a different threshold of finding relief. As I’ve gotten older I found that treating myself…by myself was not a wise choice. My relatives & friends could probably have helped, had I let them. Most people don’t like discussing their anxiety, stress & depression for various reasons. This, unfortunately amplifies the problem more times than not. The sooner you can admit to yourself & others that you've a problem, the sooner you can begin to resolve it.

1. Listening To Music
Music offers us relief from stress in several ways. It often helps us to open ourselves emotionally & let loose feelings that may be causing the stress. Music inspires us to examine our lives, ourselves & our relationships.

2. Playing With Your Pet
Having pets often provides one of the greatest stress relief techniques known. Research shows having a pet can help improve your health & even your marriage. According to researchers, when people interact with their pets, it lowers their blood pressure & slows their heart rate reducing stress levels.

4. Going Out With a Friend (shopping, movie, dining)
Humans are social animals & our social interactions & social behaviors are a quantity of the most important & interesting features of our lives. basically spending time with a friend doing something pampering can be stress relieving.

3. Laughing or Crying
Whenever they are under stress the limbic system is activated & it's one of the major centers responsible for emotions & feelings. The parasympathetic system is stimulated, with the symptoms sometimes being low blood pressure, slower respiration & relaxed muscles.

5. Taking a Hot Bath or a Hot Shower
Generally, hot water quiets & soothes the body, slowing down the activity of internal organs. It calms the lungs, heart, stomach, & endocrine system by stimulating nerve reflexes on the spinal cord. Water seems to have special powers in getting rid of stress & rejuvenating our body.

6. Writing, Painting, or Other Creative Activities
One of the factors which may be lead us toward a stressful lifestyle is not being able to express our creativity. lots of people find that creative activities help them safely release their stress. You don’t have to be formally trained & you don’t have to have special, expensive equipment. &, it certainly doesn’t matter if you’ve seldom done these things before.

8. Exercising or Getting Outdoors to Enjoy Nature
Exercise can decrease the production of stress hormones & counteract your body's natural stress response. The same regular exercise routine that helps prevent disease & builds muscle can also help you better manage stress. It pumps up your endorphins, can be considered meditation in movement & it improves your mood.

7. Praying or Attending a House of Worship
Recently, psychologists have become more aware of the positive effects that a person's faith may have on his or her life. A relatively large amount of literature is devoted to the stress-buffering role of different religious variables in coping with significant negative life stresses & daily stress. Though research has shown that stress can have negative consequences on a person's life, stress may actually help one advance in his or her spiritual walk. Faith can also positively affect stress & help a person to cope.

9. Quiet Discussions With a Spouse or Close Friend
Take a break from the stress & talk out your problems with a trusted listener. Sharing burdens with a loved one helps reduce your stress load, even if temporarily.

10. Gardening or Making Home Repairs
Gardening is work, but it's satisfying work. It can be a great antidote to stress. It helps a person to unwind after a stressful day at work by concentrating on picking out weeds or pruning the plants is great.

12. Having Sex (a great stress reliever)
Brace yourself for some startling news: Having sex is relaxing. Participants in a recent study were less stressed out by public speaking or a math check if they'd had sex than if they hadn't. In addition to effectively taking your mind off of your worries for a decent period of time, sex provides some other stress management benefits such as mood enhancement, reduced blood pressure & heart rate, deep breathing, a physical workout and a sense of touch & social support.

11. Practicing Deep Breathing, Meditation, or Muscle Relaxation
Meditation, or if one prefers, conscious breathing. is an age-old remedy that can actually counter the body's response to stressful stimuli. The body reacts in the same way for all stressors, real & imagined. In point of fact, the mind can play a significant role in turning off the stress response as well. All one needs do is begin to breathe, consciously.

1. Criticizing Yourself (negative self-talk)
Negative thoughts may be mild or mean, & when mean, it's difficult not to believe them. When thoughts are mostly negative due to low self-esteem, feelings of anxiety, anger & sadness are experienced more often.

Some negative coping responses for stress, anxiety & depression are listed below.

2. Driving Aggressively
Aggressive driving can be caused by your own mood, reactions, & ability to deal with stress on & off the road. Aggressive driving is triggered by anger...yours or another driver’s. Aggressive drivers are more likely to speed, make unsafe lane changes, ignore the right of way, & violate traffic signals.

3. Chewing Fingernails
Nail biting is generally described as a common stress-relieving habit. The habit of biting one's fingernails occurs during periods of nervousness, stress or boredom.

5. Eating Disorders or Drinking Excessive Amounts of Coffee
When they encounter stress, they tend to seek things that are less stressful. A common theory is that eating disorders are (unhealthy) ways to regulate difficult emotions. These emotions include anxiety, sadness, loneliness, boredom, anger, shame, guilt, hopelessness, & more. The eating disorders themselves are self-destructive but yet offer the sufferer some perceived relief.

4. Becoming Aggressive or Violent (hitting someone, throwing or kicking something)
Scientists have found biological evidence that stress & aggression feed off of each other, contributing to a “cycle of violence” that can be tragic.

7. Consuming Excessive Amounts of Alcohol
Stress is considered a major contributor to the initiation & continuation of addiction to alcohol as well as to relapse. In addition, the younger anyone starts drinking alcohol, the more likely he or they is to reach for a drink to relieve stress when older.

6. Smoking or Other Tobacco Use
If you smoke to reduce stress, you are only adding to your stress, according to psychological studies in the October issue of the American Psychological Association's American Psychologist. Evidence shows that the apparent relaxant effect of smoking only reflects the reversal of the tension & irritability that develop during nicotine depletion. Far from acting as an aid for mood control, nicotine dependency seems to increase stress.

8. Yelling at Your spouse, babies, or Friends
Some people attemp to rid themselves of stress by yelling at others. Some yell at those closest to them. Other yellers randomly pick different victims for each stressful event. Although it may relieve the yeller, yelling causes a vicious ripple of stress in somebody within hearing distance.

9. Taking Recreational Drugs
Certain drugs, both recreational & medicinal, can lead to symptoms of anxiety due to either side effects or withdrawal from the drug. Such drugs include caffeine, alcohol, nicotine, cold remedies, decongestants, bronchodilators for asthma, tricyclic antidepressants, cocaine, amphetamines, diet pills, ADHD medications, & thyroid medications.

think about your responses to see how you cope with stress & anxiety. What positive ways of coping can you pick instead of negative ones? Negative methods of coping have harmful side effects. By choosing positive ways to control stress & anxiety, you can avoid harmful side effects & improve your overall quality of life.

10. Avoiding Social Contact
Data from a new Swedish study shows strong new evidence that high levels of stress combined with a lack of close friends or relatives can significantly reduce life expectancy. The researchers propose that stress, if not buffered by emotionally reassuring relationships, may lower resistance to disease.