Share Your Thoughts & Ideas About Managing Stress

I listen to heavy metal, deathcore especially, I dont know why, but listening to heavy metal just helps take the stress away. I recommend it

Machka9 wrote: »

ReenieHJ wrote: »

@Machka9 Huge hugs to you! As the PP mentioned, it's amazing how resilient we can be. Would we choose it that way? Oh he!! no. But I'm a believer in 'everything happens for a reason' and 'looking for a silver lining', as dorky as that all sounds. It keeps me going through the toughness of life.
I'm sorry your lives were altered in such a challenging way but it sounds like, in many ways, you've triumphed and trudged through onto the other side.

Probably the roughest part is over, but the legal stuff is still going and the specialists tell me that he will likely start deteriorating soon ... like with senility/dementia. It's often how brain injuries of his severity at his age go.

I'm spending this year (with my spare time from no uni) trying to get everything streamlined and in order so that we could move if necessary and so that I don't have to deal with as much as I suddenly had to deal with when he had the accident.


I guess that's another way I deal with stress. I get stuff done. For me, adding things like yoga and meditation just take up time I could be doing stuff. If I have time, I would rather accomplish something. I would rather put away the laundry, tidy the kitchen, pay the bills so that I'm all caught up for the month, and things like that. When I do things, it means there are fewer things whirling around in my head. I can sleep better and I feel a little more in control.

@Machka9: I have a neurological issue and this book gave me hope and a path forward:

The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science

It is available in my library system.

A really quick and effective calming technique I use is ‘the breath waltz’. Breathe in through your nose for four seconds, hold for four seconds, breathe out through your mouth for eight seconds. Do this three times and on the third exhale also tap your leg. It works in traffic, in meetings, anywhere really.

Hi there.
I BELIEVE a shared load is a lightened load.
I BELIEVE that self love is the second most important love, because for me God's love is first. Then, without loving yourself first by giving yourself quality self care, you become deficit in your ability to love and care for others.
I BELIEVE because you're the only YOU that you've got, that you owe it to yourself to do a brief inventory daily of "INPUT" in your life which will help you pin point debris that has silently sneaked its way into you, your routine, and relationships to cause damage. Finding and recognizing it gives you a chance to kick it out of your life.
DON'T SPREAD YOURSELF TOO THIN. It's okay to say "NO". Trust me, the world will continue without you in every single event. And your body will thank you for the break.

How do you manage the stress in your life?

• Yoga
• Meditation
• Walks in nature*
• Self medicating with food - working on this though
• Listening to music
• Puppy cuddles from my friend's dog

*missing this bit at the moment as live in the city suburbs and it's a bit limited whilst we're in lockdown but working with that I've got

What would you like to learn more about for managing stress?

• How to better deal with emotional eating - already worked through a good self-help book but I want to try and keep it up and manage it better as times of stress I still sometime turn to food.

What other resources would you like to see?

• It would be great if MFP could interact with Calm to log "wellbeing" time, it's often one of my non-scale goals.

@Machka9 Just read your story and wow! My thoughts go out to you and your Hubs.

During my last doctor’s visit, I told my doctor that I was finally ready to do something about the excess weight and was considering joining another weight loss program. She recommended this app in conjunction with the other program. I did the other program for a few days, didn’t like how it tracked so I cancelled my membership. I have continued to use this app for a little more than 2 weeks and as of yesterday, have lost 9 lbs.

I work about a mile away from home and currently it takes me about 5 minutes to drive to work. I can’t wait for the warmer weather so I can walk or ride my bike.

I was diagnosed with tendonitis in the shoulders and arms. Once I’m feeling better and no longer have pain shooting down my arm, my goal is to get back into kickboxing. It’s a great way to relief stress and get a full body workout. As I’ve said in the past, it’s better I punch a bag than punch a person.

bellacelina2 wrote: »

I listen to heavy metal, deathcore especially, I dont know why, but listening to heavy metal just helps take the stress away. I recommend it

ninerbuff wrote: »

Machka9 wrote: »

One thing I wanted to find, during some of the busiest most stressful times over the past few years, was 5 minute stress relievers.

As mentioned above, when I could I would try to do some strenuous exercise because that burned off some of the frustration and got the endorphins going

Or I would try to do little things that needed to be done, over which I had some control, because that helped me feel slightly more in control of the situation.

I searched for other de-stressing ideas and unfortunately, so much of what I read about de-stressing and trying to relax was about adding extra things to your day. Taking a yoga class, going for a 1-hour massage, travel, etc. Those things are great if your stressful situation isn't very time consuming. But when your stressful situation takes up most of your day and when you cannot get away from it, the last thing you want to do is to add more!

So I began collecting stress relief ideas. I've got many I've collected listed in a blog on my website, but I don't think I can share that here.

Where I'm going with this is an answer to the original post: we want to know what resonates with our community!

What about brief stress relievers or stress relievers that can be easily incorporated into a busy day? For example, I found that getting up from my desk at 11 am and climbing several flights of stairs helped. Climbing the back stairs of a tall office building is incredibly boring but gave me time to think and sort things out.

What about stress relievers that may help, in some way, solve the problem? For example, when my husband came home from the hospital, I started ordering groceries online and having them delivered. I've done that for almost 3 years now and it is fantastic. I've also had someone to do our lawns from time to time and have had a house cleaner come in.


Just a few of my thoughts.

If you want intensity and it winds you out quite quickly, then if you can get your hands on a boxing bag and some gloves and wail away some frustration or anger, at the same time improving your fitness. I've had many a client just want to box with me for 30 minutes because they've told me how much it destresses them and they aren't hurting anyone in the process.

I've been thinking about it a bit more and I think, in general, I find that calming options do not help me destress. If anything they make me feel more stressed because I keep thinking about all the other things I should be doing or could be doing.

Whereas, listening to loud music (for me it was often Mars, the Bringer of War from The Planets by Holst), running or cycling hard ... or if I had the option of a boxing bag and gloves ... actually release the stress. I don't think so much about all the other things going on in my life because I'm in the moment and if there is exercise involved, I feel like I've accomplished something. If nothing else, I've burned some calories!

Alex wrote: »

We Want to Hear From You!
How do you handle stress? What can we do to help?

April is Stress Awareness Month. At MyFitnessPal we’re using this occasion to talk about how stress affects the body, and even changes how you eat. Personally I have done a lot less cooking and eaten a lot more takeout this past year.

Our goal throughout April is to help you manage stress through nutrition & movement. We’re thinking things like yoga routines, audio meditations, calming recipes, stress-relief plans, and tips on reducing anxiety through nutrition.

But what do you think? People experience stress and find relief in different ways—we want to know what resonates with our community!

Reply in the thread below and tell us:

• How do you manage the stress in your life?
• What would you like to learn more about for managing stress?
• What other resources would you like to see?

Thanks in advance for your input!

stress is not an individual problem it's a political and a social societal problem stress is caused through external structures, especially those which put un attainable expectations on persons and others that perpetuate oppression like racism. Capitalism is also a huge reason for stress.

To reduce stress we need societal changes, not more walks or bubble baths, or other things that privileged people only can afford...

Reading things doesn't necessarily trigger *realizing* them, but realizing certain things (in my gut) helped me reduce and manage stress. There are quotes or short statements that help me hang onto those realizations:

"People are disturbed not by things, but by the views which they take of them." - Epictetus

When something undesired happens, consider what I have done to create, promote or allow that situation. (Not for self-blame, but as a way to identify the factors I control or influence, so may be able to use as levers for change.)

I don't think this helps anyone else, though, because it's the "realizing in the gut" that matters.

For me, some important realizations arrived when I was going through chemotherapy for breast cancer. It's an unpredictable process. I was worrying and planning and obsessing in advance . . . usually, as it turned out, about things that never happened. I'd gone through that unpleasant anxiety for nothing; it just made my possibly-short life less pleasant. On the flip side, other things happened that I'd never anticipated, and I dealt with them reasonably well. The anxiety/obsession part came to seem optional. Rational planning and preparation can be helpful; once that's done, I need to let it go, skip the anxiety/obsession/worry on the emotional front. That's a stress reduction.

These days, once I've made reasonable preparations and plans (for anything), I'm working to have the minimum number of preferences and expectations. That helps me enjoy pretty-good things that happen, when once I would've been comparing them negatively to my preferred or expected ideal, such that the present moment would be less satisfying by comparison. Being open to enjoy what comes (if possible) leads to more moments of enjoyment.

Realizations are pretty squishy, but they're important to me because of the idea inherent in that Epictetus quote, for me: I pretty much 100% control my own thoughts, attitudes, and reactions. Perfectly? No. But increasing that self-management is a practice.