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Friday, March 31st
While it may seem like some people float through life carefree, no one lives a life that is free of stress. In fact, living a carefree life has more to do with how people handle stress than it does the absence of stress itself.
For example: There are two women stuck in a traffic jam on the interstate. Both have to pick up children at the sitters and get home to make dinner before their husbands get home. But while one woman has resigned herself to take out and is sitting contently listening to a book on audio, the other woman is frantically pounding the steering wheel and looking for a non-existent break in the traffic. As you can see, the situation is the same for both women but the way they handle the stress of being stuck in traffic is completely different.
You too may find yourself stressed about situations that don't seem to bother other people or maybe you tend to glide through stressful events that would have others frazzled. This is because no two people react to the same stressors exactly the same. In fact, the things that cause stress can be entirely different from person to person. This is why it is very important for you to recognize what causes you stress personally so that you can learn how to reduce the amount of stress in your life.
To learn what causes you stress, you need to recognize the symptoms of stress and be able to pinpoint what triggered them. Since many symptoms are not immediate, such as trouble sleeping, you might have to really delve into your life to figure out where the majority of your stress is coming from. Sometimes what is causing you stress is constantly on your mind so it's not that difficult to figure out. Other times, though, stress can be caused by several things that happen throughout the day and not one certain event. In these cases, you will have to learn the immediate physical symptoms of stress so that you can address and eliminate these stressors.
Immediate Physical Symptoms of Stress
When you are dealing with a stressful situation, your body releases chemicals to help you deal with that situation. These chemicals affect your body in subtle ways that you can detect. This will help you figure out what situations you personally find stressful. Here are a few of the symptoms that you might feel when faced with immediate stress:
When you notice these symptoms, take a break from the situation. Go into the other room, take a few deep breaths, and calmly think about how to handle the situation at hand. After a few moments, the task at hand might not seem that stressful at all and you might be able to handle it more efficiently than you would have if you would have stayed.
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