We all react to a change or challenge and stress is that normal and healthy reaction, but we must have stress management techniques that allow us to control this reaction and thus not affect our health.
Know different techniques to avoid this reaction
What are stress management techniques?
They are techniques that are used to evaluate the way in which they act in the face of stressful circumstances, helping to face the unhealthy actions that are generated when we present them with techniques that allow us to visualize the solution to the problem or conflict presented, in a more calm and healthy.
At some point in our lives, we have all felt stress in reaction to a personal or work situation that we have not been able to solve or resolve at that time, this, if it is not controlled at the time it occurs, many people are so affected that they are unable to carry on with their daily activities normally.
For all the above, it is important to know that stress is extremely harmful to mental and physical health, generating problems such as high blood pressure, stomach deficiencies, headaches, anxiety, depression, etc. Therefore, it is important to know the stress management techniques, to manage efficiently and avoid these problems.
These techniques allow you to deal with the stress that is generated every day, helping to control the feeling of restlessness by not having immediate answers on how to face a situation or conflict.
First, we want to give you some basic concepts about this normal and healthy reaction to some change or challenge that we believe we cannot handle, but if not treated in time, it can become a disease and therefore cause serious consequences to our health.
The WHO defines stress as “The set of physiological reactions that prepares the organism for action«. Therefore, it is considered a natural reaction to any change in our lives; however, there are some factors that we must take into account:
- Eustress: It is an activation of the human body that is needed to reach the successful end of some complicated situation. It is also known as positive stress.
- Distress: They are the consequences produced by an excessive situation that exceeds the control of the person, causing irritability and anxiety by not knowing how to control said situation. Also called negative stress.
Types of stress
There are three types of stress that can affect our daily lives and can occur in different circumstances:
- Acute Stress: It is the classic type of stress in people, it is produced by the different responsibilities of the near past and the most probable future conditions or situations. It can be handled perfectly when it is presented in small doses, since they help you activate yourself and resolve the circumstances that arise effectively, but when it increases, a feeling of exhaustion is produced in the body.
- Episodic acute stress: This type of stress manifests itself when there is incessant worry, because it makes people see the disaster as if it were very close and imminent, that is, they anticipate that everything will turn out very badly in each situation presented.
- Chronic: It occurs over long periods of time and is exhausting stress, because it hits those who suffer from it every moment.
Causes of stress
There are multiple causes of stress in people, but they can be characterized in two ways:
- Exogenous: Environmental, annoying noises, changes in temperature and food, etc.
- Endogenous: Produced by the body, such as frustration, anxiety and emotional overload. Imagining situations or events that can cause stress when many times they are not.
Generation of stress at work
- Work that generates great efforts and with a high degree of difficulty.
- Activities of great responsibility for a single person.
- Lack of initiative and creativity.
- Complex decision making.
- Sudden technological changes that cannot be handled fluently.
- The non-creation of a work life plan.
- Job threats.
stress symptoms
- At the cognitive-subjective level: Generation of worry, insecurity, difficulty in making decisions, fear of the unknown, negative thoughts towards ourselves and how we act towards others, fear of not knowing how to demonstrate our abilities, fear of losing control, difficulty concentrating and thinking.
- Physiological level: Excessive sweating, muscle tension, palpitations, tremors, rapid heartbeat, stomach and gastric discomfort, difficulty breathing, lack of saliva production, constant headaches, dizziness, etc.
- Engine: Excessive smoking, eating or drinking alcoholic beverages, nervous tics, aimless movement, stuttering, uncontrollable urge to cry, becoming paralyzed.
Stress management
To have a healthy mind and body, we must effectively deal with the stress to which we are exposed every day. With the help of the stress management techniques, we can combat the reactions that the body presents in any stressful situation.
Each organism is different, therefore, they react very differently from each other in any situation, some have physiological, emotional, cognitive and behavioral reactions as we explained in previous paragraphs.
And, if they do not know how to handle them, they can cause various clinical manifestations and can even become chronic and lead to psychosomatic exhaustion. Below we will present some techniques that we must practice to master stress.
Practice physical exercise
Maintaining an excellent physical condition is wonderful for stress prevention, therefore it is necessary to exercise regularly to increase the physical resistance of the human body, to counteract the effects of stress, helping to rest better and distract the mind from problems. psychological.
Any physical exercise mobilizes the body and helps improve the physical capacity of each individual and thus have excellent conditions to combat stress, increasing cardiovascular, respiratory and metabolic functions.
Among the physical exercises that we recommend you do to have a healthy mind and not get bogged down in problems are: yoga in all its varieties, practicing pilates exercises, learning to use reiki, body and mental relaxation exercises, breathing and doing high-intensity physical exercises such as cardiovascular, weight lifting, swimming, athletics, among others.
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Balanced diet
Doug Larson said: "Life expectancy would increase by leaps and bounds if vegetables smelled as good as bacon."This means that if we develop good eating habits that help us achieve adequate nutritional status, we can prevent the effects of stress.
An example of healthy eating that we can mention is the Mediterranean diet, since it involves several vitamin complexes that help maintain a healthy balance in our meals. This diet involves olive oil as its base, which provides us with a large amount of acids. monounsaturated fats, fruits, cereals, fish and lean meats are also present.
Systematic desensitization
It is a technique that allows managing actions related to anxiety or fear that are generated in various risky situations for people, which consists of practicing the progressive relaxation of Jacobson. Where an individual is trained to perform a series of contraction-relaxation physical exercises, allowing them to determine the level of tension in a given part of the body and thus be able to relax that area when tension occurs again.
Stress inoculation
This technique works the cognitive and behavioral part, where its practice is similar to the one we showed you in the previous point. In this case, through breathing and relaxation techniques, they are applied to relax the tension generated by any stress situation presented, where the person makes a list where the situations of greatest stress appear.
physical relaxation practices
Carrying out relaxation exercises provides a direct connection between the body and the mind, helping to have a balance and a balance between psychological and physical tension.
This means that you cannot be physically relaxed while suffering from emotional tension. Therefore, these techniques help people learn to reduce or even eliminate emotional tension through physical relaxation, even when the situation that causes the stress is still present.
breath control
Making the practice of controlled breathing daily helps the human body to always have an adequate way of breathing, so that when a stressful situation occurs, the individual automatically controls his breathing and thus correctly handles the situation presented.
We must remember that situations that generate stress cause the acceleration of breathing, which affects the functional capacity of the lungs, producing a lack of oxygen to the brain and an increase in general tension in the body.
But controlling breathing consciously, even if we don't have stressful situations, helps us to make breathing automatic when it occurs.
Meditation or mental relaxation
Meditation is an activity that is carried out to control the mind and body, which consists of an individual focusing his interest on something physical or word, phrase or even the same breath in order to reduce any thought to the least. or feeling that cause distraction or cause tension.
This practice helps reduce stress and anxiety, as it produces a feeling of mental well-being and helps the mind calm down from so many thoughts, whether positive or even negative.
It is very beneficial for the body because it enhances emotional balance, helping to achieve a state of full consciousness and tranquility, to face any situation that arises.
Biofeedback
Biofeedback is one of the stress management techniques, which aims to control it from a physiological perspective, allowing the participant to have their own control over certain biological actions and events.
That is, voluntary training consists of teaching the individual, through meditation, some biological processes, providing him with different information that helps him control these processes, and then training him in voluntary control of normal situations that arise.
Techniques for stress management and self-control
This technique consists of ensuring that the individual can control his behavior through training in his ability to know how to handle the different circumstances that accompany him, both to the previous situations and to his behavior in said situations.
Being able to manage these procedures helps us to have control of our behaviors generated in stress situations, not only for those that have generated problems, but also to be able to anticipate possible problematic behaviors.
Social support
Having good social relationships with individuals with a positive mind and the ability to resolve conflicts in a healthy way helps to have a better adaptation and integration in reality.
Therefore, you should always relate to people who help you face problems in an intelligent and patient way, where you manage to share conflicts and perhaps make you see that the problems are not as serious as the mind wants to believe.
Distraction and good humor
A source of healthy entertainment and cultivating good humor is a wonderful measure to avoid situations like these or to eliminate them if they have arisen.
Having a good attitude towards life helps us see things from different points of view, which can contribute to finding solutions to possible conflicts generated by stress.
One way of distraction is to go for a walk every afternoon to different places, meet friends, play sports, go to the movies or the theater, etc.
Cognitive Techniques
stress management techniques used to transform the way people think, that is, it restructures wrong or negative thoughts in relation to various situations that arise in the individual in order to support them, in addition to restructuring these thoughts.
Techniques for stress management and problem solving
A problem is generated when an effective solution cannot be found for a certain situation. If you constantly fail to find a solution to a certain problem, it becomes a chronic discomfort, which generates a situation of stress, producing anxiety and a feeling of helplessness by not being able to find a solution, making it difficult to find new solutions.
Through these problem-solving techniques, we try to help people decide what are the appropriate responses to any situation that arises, which consists of:
- Identification of the problem situation in a clear, precise and concise manner.
- Analysis of possible solutions to the problem from various points of view.
- Evaluation of an analysis of the solution alternatives to choose the most favorable one.
- Execution of the steps to resolve the problem.
- Obtaining results when carrying out the steps of the chosen solution.
Assertive Training
Through this technique, self-esteem is developed and it is possible to avoid any reaction to a situation of this type.
This technique consists of inculcating the person to be an assertive individual, where their ability to communicate before others in terms of making their emotions, desires and needs known in a clear and precise way, thus avoiding misunderstandings in any situation.
The goal is to achieve the proposed objectives while respecting the other points of view of the people around him.
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