It’s Entirely Natural - Articles

One of the biggest problems we have today is dealing with stress. Everyone gets stressed from time to time. Stress is actually a normal function of the body.

Under certain conditions stress can be helpful. One in four people suffer from the adverse health affects that stress can cause. It is estimated that seventy to ninety percent of adult visits to doctors are due to stress-related complaints. These problems cost an estimated 300 billion dollars annually in healthcare expenses.

Even though everyone can suffer from stress, the way we experience can be very different. There are some common symptoms and causes, however. What causes one person to be highly stressed may not bother another in the least.

When we are anxious, hurried, worried or feel threatened, our bodies begin to tense up. This reaction probably benefited us in caveman days—the well-known “fight or flight” reaction which prepared us for battle and allowed us to hunt prey. In the modern environment, the stress hormones released do not dissipate in the way that they did in our early history—we feel stressed, but don’t engage in physical activity. As a result, these stress hormones attack the organs and create long-term problems if not dealt with adequately.

Constant worry or mental anguish creates chronic tension. This tension begins to take a toll on the body, mind and emotions. This chronic tension can result in anger, depression, fatigue, physical pain, irritability and many other unpleasant and undesirable reactions.

If we can identify what it is that causes stress, then we can effectively manage it. There are several common approaches to alleviating stress that can help most people. These approaches don’t have to use drugs, but a natural approach that can produce long-term beneficial effects.

One of the best ways to reduce stress is to plan ahead. We can’t know everything that will happen, but there is an advantage to getting there on time or even a bit early. Be prepared—and not just if you’re a Boy Scout. Plan to arrive early for appointments; if you’re held up in traffic, you still arrive at the meeting stress-free.

Be prepared also means: make sure that you have enough gas in your car, enough change for the bus, enough of the basic supplies at home such as food staples, and have extra keys made for those times when they get misplaced. Getting things ready ahead of time removes time-imposed stress. Prepare a lunch the day before. Pick out your clothes the night before.

Be prepared to wait. If you have a few minutes before the appointment, have a book or magazine handy. This will help you to deflect concerns about the upcoming meeting.

Get organized. Create a place for everything at home and at your workplace. Put things away when you are finished with them so that you know where they are. Learn to say no and to delegate responsibilities and chores when possible. Taking on too much will surely lead to stress. By making these simple adjustments you are taking a natural approach to stress management.

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Scott Meyers is a staff writer for It’s Entirely Natural, a resource for helping you achieve a naturally healthy body, mind, and spirit. You may contact our writers through the web site. Follow this link for more information on Stress Management.

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Tags: Anger, Depression, fatigue, hormones, Stress Management

Managing stress is becoming more important as our environment becomes more tension-inducing every year. From traffic jams to work-related stress, there are more stimuli that can make the heart race and the adrenaline flow than at any time in the past.

What is the best way to improve physical and psychological well-being?

• Exercise is a proven stress-reliever. It releases endorphins that counteract stress hormones, and improve mood. It’s always difficult to start an exercise program, so it makes sense to start gradually and work your way up. Stretching and flexing the muscles in the neck, back, shoulders, arms and abdomen help to take away tension and make it easier for the muscles to relax. Exercises that improve cardiovascular function benefit the heart and lungs and affect the blood. This causes chemical changes in the body and the release of and balance of hormones that improve overall mood. Starting and sticking with a regular exercise plan also encourages a healthy concept of self, giving one a better outlook on things and a line of defense against stressors.
• There are also relaxation techniques, or exercises that are extremely helpful in managing and reducing stress. One such technique is trying to touch the shoulder to the ears. Hold your shoulder for a few seconds and then let the shoulders drop. Rotate one shoulder toward the rear and then the other, do each shoulder up to ten times and then do both shoulders together.
• Another exercise that is good for relaxing and good for the body is to lie down with knees bent, press the back down so that all parts of the back touch the surface, while doing so pull in hard on the stomach muscles. Then just relax them. This helps to let go of tension as well as firm abdominal muscles and strengthens the back. Many people find specific exercise programs such as Pilates, tai chi and yoga to be very relaxing.
• Getting adequate sleep can do wonders for the body and mind. Just going to bed a half an hour earlier at night, or taking a short nap during the day, can reenergize the body and recharge the mind, If you’ve had enough sleep, you can make clear, thoughtful decisions.
• If a nap is not possible make sure you take time to relax or take a break. Even a fifteen-minute respite from work, school, or regular daily activities is advisable for quiet, privacy and introspection.
• Taking a brisk walk or even just going outside or to another room, the change in scenery can eliminate existing stress or to counter it before it gets to be too much.
• It is also necessary to eat properly. Eat an adequate and nutritious breakfast each day. Hunger cannot only leave you less able to cope with stress but can also be considered a stressor in itself. It is also important to make sure to eat a well balanced diet for optimal health.

Avoiding or reducing the consumption of caffeine containing substances is a simple and effective way to reduce tension and stress. Caffeine stimulates the sympathetic nervous system in a similar fashion as stress as do other substances like alcohol and tobacco that people often use as a means of reducing stress.

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Scott Meyers is a staff writer for It’s Entirely Natural, a resource for helping you achieve a naturally healthy body, mind, and spirit. You may contact our writers through the web site. Follow this link for more information on Stress Management.

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Tags: caffeine, exercise, hormones, relaxation techniques, sleep, Stress Management, yoga

What do you do if you have a problem with anger, but you’re not willing to pursue the traditional routes to fix yourself. You’d rather not go to a counseling center to talk about your anger issues, or to a clinic for rehabilitation or to a camp to straighten yourself out. You prefer not to get drugs to calm you down, or to make you happy. You want to take this anger monster by the tail and win over it on your own, the natural way. Good for you!

There are a lot of alternatives to deal with anger problems. As long as you realize that you have an anger issue and make a decision to change that, you’re already taking a step towards winning the war against anger.

For starters, you can try to live a healthy lifestyle. What does that have to do with not angry? What you eat is what you are! You need to eat healthier foods to cleanse your body of its toxins. Eating right will generally make you feel better and relaxed, stabilize your hormones, and decrease the chances of you getting sick. Certain foods can cause us to be more irritable than others. Greasy and high-fat foods can steer you to anger.

Try going out and playing a sport. Committing to a sport can take your mind off things, exercise your body, trigger pleasure-chemicals in your brain, and give you a sense of achieving something and an activity to look forward to. You can also develop relationships or make new friends with your new sport, to help you heal faster. Consider swimming: it is deeply relaxing and it requires you to move all of your muscles and for you to focus. Try team sports, like volleyball, basketball or football, so you can meet new people and have fun in a group.

Another thing you can do is keep a journal. Start your own anger therapy by writing down your thoughts and feelings, or writing them down as poetry or music lyrics. Keeping a journal is a good outlet whenever you are feeling the angry. Write down why you are angry, to whom you are angry–just let it all out! Afterwards, you can throw whatever you wrote down if you do not want to keep it. The point is not to keep the work, but that you don’t keep the anger bottled in.

You can also try redirecting your anger towards creating new things, or doing some other calming activity. If you are feeling angry, you can express it through art – you can paint or make a sculpture. Or you can go out and take a walk in the park, clear your head for a moment before you analyze what happened that made you angry, so you can avoid taking rash actions and be calm and collected and level-headed when making a decision.

Lastly, you can enroll in yoga or meditations classes, where they teach you how to purify your mind and spirit. These classes will let you get in touch with you inner self, and relax your mind and body as well.

What do you do if you have a problem with anger, but you’re not willing to pursue the traditional routes to fix yourself. You’d rather not go to a counseling center to talk about your anger issues, or to a clinic for rehabilitation or to a camp to straighten yourself out. You prefer not to get drugs to calm you down, or to make you happy. You want to take this anger monster by the tail and win over it on your own, the natural way. Good for you!

There are a lot of alternatives to deal with anger problems. As long as you realize that you have an anger issue and make a decision to change that, you’re already taking a step towards winning the war against anger.

For starters, you can try to live a healthy lifestyle. What does that have to do with not angry? What you eat is what you are! You need to eat healthier foods to cleanse your body of its toxins. Eating right will generally make you feel better and relaxed, stabilize your hormones, and decrease the chances of you getting sick. Certain foods can cause us to be more irritable than others. Greasy and high-fat foods can steer you to anger.

Try going out and playing a sport. Committing to a sport can take your mind off things, exercise your body, trigger pleasure-chemicals in your brain, and give you a sense of achieving something and an activity to look forward to. You can also develop relationships or make new friends with your new sport, to help you heal faster. Consider swimming: it is deeply relaxing and it requires you to move all of your muscles and for you to focus. Try team sports, like volleyball, basketball or football, so you can meet new people and have fun in a group.

Another thing you can do is keep a journal. Start your own anger therapy by writing down your thoughts and feelings, or writing them down as poetry or music lyrics. Keeping a journal is a good outlet whenever you are feeling the angry. Write down why you are angry, to whom you are angry–just let it all out! Afterwards, you can throw whatever you wrote down if you do not want to keep it. The point is not to keep the work, but that you don’t keep the anger bottled in.

You can also try redirecting your anger towards creating new things, or doing some other calming activity. If you are feeling angry, you can express it through art – you can paint or make a sculpture. Or you can go out and take a walk in the park, clear your head for a moment before you analyze what happened that made you angry, so you can avoid taking rash actions and be calm and collected and level-headed when making a decision.

Lastly, you can enroll in yoga or meditations classes, where they teach you how to purify your mind and spirit. These classes will let you get in touch with you inner self, and relax your mind and body as well.

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Scott Meyers is a staff writer for It’s Entirely Natural, a resource for helping you achieve a naturally healthy body, mind, and spirit. You may contact our writers through the web site. Follow this link for more information on Anger Management.

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Tags: Anger Management, hormones, toxins