What is Stress?
Stress is an expected human response to challenging or dangerous situations. Stress is often described as a feeling of being overloaded, wound up tight, tense and worried. Experiencing stress is part of being alive. It can sometimes help to motivate us to get a task finished, through increasing our alertness, energy and productivity.
Stress for long periods of time can be harmful to both the body and mind. Becoming over-stressed can interfere with our ability to get on with our normal life.
When we face a stressful event, our bodies respond by activating the nervous systems ‘fight or flight’ response. The body does this by releasing hormones such as adrenalin and cortisol and these hormones increase our heart rate, breathing, blood pressure, metabolism and muscle tension.
This works well for short-term threats but if the stress response goes on for too long and becomes greater than our ability to cope, it can lead to physical and mental health issues and cause problems with relationships and work.
Stress can be caused by our circumstances or by our own attitudes and expectations. Some people seem to thrive on stress but many others report high levels of stress with negative effects on their health.
The damaging effects on the mind and body are as follows:
- Headaches, other aches and pains
- Sleep disturbance, insomnia
- Upset stomach, indigestion, diarrhoea
- Anxiety
- Anger, irritability
- Depression
- Fatigue
- Feeling overwhelmed and out of control
- Feeling moody, tearful
- Difficulty concentrating
- Low self-esteem, lack of confidence
- High blood pressure
- Weakened immune system
- Heart disease
How Gestalt therapy can help with stress
Managing stress
There are many different ways to manage stress, including identifying your triggers, relaxation techniques, lifestyle changes and seeking support from others or a Counsellor or Psychotherapist.
Learning how to handle stress in healthy ways is very important. Fortunately, it is easy to learn simple techniques that help. These include building awareness around behaviours that contribute to stress, recognising when you are becoming stressed or have already become stressed and learning how to reduce stress once it has occurred. It is also helpful to explore what drives the stress in your life. Is it insecurity, fear of failure or a need to have things perfect?
Following are some tips on how to look after your mind and body in order to manage and reduce stress in your life.
- Identify warning signs
- Identify triggers
- Establish routines
- Spend time with people
- Look after your health
- Notice your self-talk
- Practice relaxation
If you feel you are unable to manage the stress in your life seek support from a professional Counsellor or Psychotherapist to assist you.
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