Who has time or money to go to a “shrink” these days for stress? And yet stress can damage our inner peace, our mental equilibrium, our emotions, or the ability to be relaxed, and can cause us health problems.
We need to do something about stress, but in a time and cost-effective way, and we can do that ourselves.
Clarifying the concept of stress
Unless we have been unlucky enough to have experienced true trauma by way of the loss of a loved one, a nasty accident, or some environmental catastrophe – then most of our stress is usually self-made. Yes, we make it ourselves, and we are very good at doing that.
So seeing that we learn to stress ourselves, we can also learn how not to stress ourselves. Look at the components of stress mentioned above – emotional, physical and mental stress. They are all connected and interact with each other, and usually result in a negative behavioural outcome such as misunderstandings, disagreements or avoiding difficult situations.
Recognising stress
Usually we know we are under stress when we feel emotions of fear, anxiety, anger, frustration or another disturbing emotion. We may also notice that we are not behaving as usual, we are showing anger, frustration, avoiding situations we fear, or reacting and behaving negatively towards others.
We need to take notice of these clues. Awareness is vital if we are to keep our stress at a manageable level.
Steps to take to rid yourself from short term stress.
Try asking yourself these simple questions –
• Recognize that you are disturbed, and identify your disturbed thought.
• Is there any evidence for the truth of this thought? Is it true?
• Or, is there evidence that this idea is not true? Is it false?
• Is there an alternative perspective/explanation to the problem?
• What’s the worst thing about the problem? Is it the end of the world or just a temporary pain in the butt?
• Am I going to be fretting about this problem in a year’s time?
Six months? Three months? One month? Next week? Tomorrow?
• What is the most realistic outcome; what will happen next?
• Can I live with that if it happened?
• What is the effect of me continuing to think negatively about the problem?
Then ask yourself some positive questions –
• What good thing could possibly come from this situation?
• What can I do about it? Look for solutions.
• What would be the effect of me thinking in a more constructive way?
• What’s a more adaptive way to view the situation?
• If a good friend of mine had the same problem how would I advise him/her.
• Take your own good advice.
When doing this exercise, focus on one negative thought at a time.
More positive and helpful thoughts, emotions and behaviour will come as a result of you challenging your negative thoughts and beliefs.
You may not always work through all of these questions. As you become better at recognising, identifying and getting rid of your unhelpful thoughts, you will find you will shorten the process and think more effectively, and you will not get so stressed.
Practicing this exercise every time you are disturbed will –
• Cut down your stress level, and
• Help you deal with any low frustration tolerance or tendency to blow things out of proportion, both of which contribute to stress.
• Help you gradually build up more and more stress-busting skills and lead a more balanced and happy life.
• Help you learn not to react impulsively.
• Help you tolerate stress, and take things in your stride.
No need to be stressed at all actually, even if you don’t really like what’s happening. ☺
A good resource for thinking skills is “Change your thinking” by Sarah Edelman, or any good book on Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy.
© Kathleen Crawford 2017