Stress management, ways to reduce stress.

Q9. What is meant by "Stress"? What are the ways to reduce the stress?

Stress is the "wear and tear" our bodies experience as we adjust to our continually changing environment; it has physical and emotional effects on us and can create positive or negative feelings. As a positive influence, stress can help compel us to action; it can result in a new awareness and an exciting new perspective. As a negative influence, it can result in feelings of distrust, rejection, anger, and depression, which in turn can lead to health problems as well as problems sprouting up in relations and work place. With a job promotion, or change in the working environment, or changes taking place in the managements or the working colleagues, changes in the principles and policies of the organization etc or even a new relationship and changes taking place in the personal live of a person all would be factors causing stress. We experience stress as we readjust our lives either at our work place or in personal lives. In so adjusting to different circumstances, stress will help or hinder us depending on how we react to it.

As we have seen, positive stress adds anticipation and excitement to life, and we all thrive under a certain amount of stress. Deadlines, competitions, confrontations, and even our frustrations and sorrows add depth and enrichment to our lives. Our goal is not to eliminate stress but to learn how to manage it and how to use it to help us. Insufficient stress acts as a depressant and may leave us feeling bored or dejected; on the other hand, excessive stress may leave us feeling "tied up in knots." What we need to do is find the optimal level of stress which will individually motivate but not overwhelm each of us. There is no single level of stress that is optimal for all people. We are all individual creatures with unique requirements. As such, what is distressing to one may be a joy to another. And even when we agree that a particular event is distressing, we are likely