Stress Awareness Month

April - Is stress awareness month so I felt it was a good opportunity to talk about stress and mental health, the impact it can have, and how we can create resilience to overcome stress. 

Stress can be a feeling of being under too much emotional or mental pressure. This can be a result of many things overload, pressure, demands of everyday life, work, and potentially our triggers. 

Stress can have a huge impact on how you feel, think, behave, and how your body functions. It is important to know when you are stressed what the patterns are that lead you to become stressed and work towards reducing the trigger and indeed the impact. 

We all feel stress in our lives it is part of our make up however have you ever wondered how some people deal with pressure and stress differently. Truth is we are all different and have had different life experiences so finding what works for us is key. 

It is not just major life events that can cause us stress like losing a job, relationship breakdown, money issues, or moving house these all cause us stress and we potentially can recognise them as stressful. 

For the most part, we can cope with one of these situations at a time However it can be when difficult situations and challenges mount up it can become a real struggle to cope. Feelings of stress can be overwhelming, take over your thoughts and prevent you from thinking clearly. 

Again it can be different circumstances for people as no one is coming from the same life experience and resilience can often be key to how we cope in these situations. 

Recognising that we are stressed can play a huge part in reducing the feeling and accepting and acknowledging the feeling can bring awareness to you and those around you. Try not to deny it and call it for what it is, I automatically feel better when I can identify an emotion. Now we can do something about it. 

Get some breathing space, you can do this anywhere at any time. Taking a few moments to just breathe sounds simple however it can be highly effective. 

Slow down, it might feel weird but actually, slow everything down your movement and your thoughts. This allows your brain to think and come up with ways to manage stress. 

Once you feel less stressed work out what is important. What needs to be done. Plan what you need to do. Writing is an effective way of doing this and number in order of priority. 

Give yourself more time. Reduce your commitments and give each one more time. I mean actually add time in between things such as appointments, classes, or whatever is on your to-do list so you are not rushing as much. 

An all-important one is to get out into nature even for a 10-minute walk. This has been scientifically proven to reduce stress. I understand the last thing we want to do when stressed is to leave everything and walk outside however this decreases our stress levels, and increases our brain activity therefore potentially giving solutions or clarity to a situation that you may not find staying in the place you were at. 

Always reach out for support, This can be a game-changer, whether, for a listening ear, solutions, problem-solving whichever you need don’t do it alone. 






Emma Weaver

www.mentalwealthinternational.com

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