Stress has the potential to be an extremely negative force in our lives, with evidence showing that being in a state of stress massively undermines the ability to focus, causes more knee-jerk reactions to things, contributes to exhaustion and poor immune function, and more.
Unfortunately, high states of stress are far from uncommon, with more and more of us having to deal with a substantial amount of stress on a daily basis – whether with regards to questions such as whether to look into probate in Missouri, or with regards to how best to manage your finances when you have few if any emergency savings put aside.
While stress can be a very complicated thing to unravel, and can be difficult to get away from, it’s important to keep in mind that there are also totally “unnecessary” forms of stress that may creep into your life, but which you may be able to deal with significantly easier than with some other types.
Here are some examples of ways that unnecessary stress can creep into your life.
Through the vicious cycle of poor sleep and increasing caffeine consumption
If you listen to what many leading researchers, particularly in the domain of sleep, have to say, you’ll quickly notice that sleep deprivation is essentially at “epidemic levels” around the world.
Today, most people are working longer on average than they have throughout the past century, while things like shift work and zero hour contracts have broken up much of the normal workday routine of the recent past, and electric lighting and digital devices are disrupting everyone’s circadian rhythms.
For many people, therefore, it’s normal to get by on too little sleep and to have copious amounts of caffeine in order to try and mitigate these effects and remain functional.
In many cases, though, this leads to a vicious cycle of increasingly poor quality sleep due to the caffeine, more caffeine to cope, high stress levels from the combination of the caffeine and loss of sleep, and so on.
Beginning to regulate your sleep patterns and to cut back on your caffeine consumption may be difficult, but it can have powerful benefits, including with regards to reducing your stress levels.
Through becoming too caught up in your own mind and too prone to rumination
Most people, over the course of everyday life, will end up generating and exacerbating a lot of stress in their lives, simply through their own thoughts and cycles of rumination.
The mind has the ability to magnify all issues to the point where they seem insurmountable, to keep you fearing the future and worrying about the past, and to stop you from having a moment’s peace.
Engaging in practises that help you to step outside of your own mind can be extremely effective.
Consider, for example, taking up a yoga or mindfulness meditation practice, going for regular walks in nature, getting involved in physical exercise, or all of the above.
Through routinely skipping meals or failing to nourish yourself properly
Skipping meals or eating highly processed foods can contribute dramatically to elevated stress levels, as these behaviors will naturally cause your blood sugar to rise and crash throughout the day, while also increasing the levels of stress hormones in your body.
Simply having regular meal times, and eating nutritious food at each meal, has the potential to work wonders.
