Good morning, everybody. It is 1 .33 a .m. It's
NeoGentrics, your favorite podcast host, here
with more food for thought, thoughts if it were
you, informational tips as always. Now, last
time we covered what anger is and how to manage
it. among other things as well now i didn't cover
depression and i did go back over my notes and
as it turns out i did cover everything so i won't
be revisiting that topic however i did mention
that i was going to cover sleep but something
came across that prevented me from doing so today
so i'm going to go ahead and cut to the chase
we're going to cover what stress is its symptoms
and its triggers and then after i'm going to
cover how to reduce stress in certain ways so
that Your hair, unlike mine, won't turn white.
I'm 24. My hair shouldn't be turning silver.
Unless it's a genetic thing, then I'm just ultimately
screwed. Anyway, what is stress? Now, this is
the question for today. From my knowledge, it
is effectively coping with stress and managing
stress and finding ways to reduce unnecessary
or unhealthy levels of stress that are more important.
It's a skill basically everybody needs. Negative
stress, tension, anxiety. They're extremely common
problems in modern life. Most people will suffer
from potentially dangerous or debilitating symptoms
of stress and stress -related issues at some
point in their lives. So no one is stress -proof.
Just keep that in mind. Alright. Stress is a
response to an inappropriate level of pressure.
That's the basic definition of what it is. You
can encounter stress from a number of sources,
including but not limited to personal stress,
which may be caused by the nature of your work,
changes in your life, or personal problems, which
is a very common thing. Stress in family or in
friends, which in turn may affect you and make
you irritable. Also may affect you and I'm not
covering workplace stress at the moment, but
I will cover that later Stress can be described
as distress Distress that is caused as a result
of demands placed on physical or mental energy.
It can arise as a result of factors included
Including the following so I'm gonna go ahead
and cover a few things here The first thing is
anxiety. Anxiety is caused when life's events
are felt to be threatening to an individual's
physical, social, or mental well -being. The
amount of anxiety experienced by an individual
depends on how threatening these life events
are perceived to be, individual coping strategies,
or how many stressful events occur in a short
period of time. In which case, it also can cause
a mental issue as well. Next on the list would
be tension. Yeah, that's right, tension. It's
a natural reaction to anxiety. Believe it or
not, most of these aren't singular, like they
cause other issues as well. As far as tension
is concerned, it's a part of primitive survival
instinct where psychological changes prepare
the individual for that fight or flight instance
that I mentioned before under the anger podcast.
If you haven't heard it, go back and listen to
it, episode 62, okay? This sympathetic response,
as it is known, results in a chemical called
ATP being released in the body and causes muscles
to tense ready for action. Don't ask me what
ATP stands for. For the life of me, I couldn't
pronounce the word if I tried. Actually, let's
go ahead and give it a shot here. Adenosine triphosphate.
Yeah, that's close enough. If you don't know
what that is, go and look it up. Blood vessels
near the skin tend to constrict to slow bleeding
if injury is sustained and to increase the blood
supply to the muscles, heart, lungs, and brain.
Digestion is inhibited, the bladder relaxes,
the heart rate and breathing speed increases,
and the body sweats more as a result of tension.
The person affected becomes more alert and their
eyes... um dilate and a surge of adrenaline gives
rise to an increase in energy keep in mind this
is false energy your body doesn't actually have
it these responses are extremely useful in situations
of physical danger but unlike um unlike for primitive
humans many of the anxieties of modern life are
not ones that can be solved by fight or flight
reactions or by a physical response Okay, modern
day stressful situations tend to continue for
much longer periods of time and an immediate
response doesn't relieve the anxiety provoking
situation. Therefore, prolonged states of anxiety
can lead to symptoms of stress which prevent
the individual from returning to his or her normal
relaxed state. Keep this in mind. So prolonged
stress can therefore be detrimental to health
and well -being. But I think we've already expressed
that pretty well. Let's go over our physical
signs of stress. Okay, in addition to feeling
uneasy tense and worried physical sensations
of continuous stress can include these Then I'm
about to name some you may be familiar with some
you won't and some you might be grossed out by
But the simple fact is that they are still signs
of stress Dizziness indigestion or heartburn.
Yeah, that one can be caused by it tension headaches
Aching muscles, trembling or eye twitching, diarrhea,
frequent urination, insomnia, tiredness, and
impotence. I'm not going to explain what that
one is. You're going to have to look that one
up yourself. And palpitations. Unaware that they
are suffering from stress and visit the doctor
with symptoms of indigestion, muscle pain, headaches,
etc. Severe stress can lead to panic attacks,
chest pains, phobias, and even fears of being
seriously ill. Continued stress can lead to feelings
of lethargy, lethargy, I'm saying these words
wrong today, I'm sorry, I'm so tired. Lethargy,
tiredness, migraines, severe stomach upset, and
sleeplessness. As with such symptoms, you should
seek the help and advice of healthcare professionals.
Once the symptoms are recognized, however, as
being caused by stress, it is possible to control
and reduce the stress levels. This can be done
through learning a number of stress -relieving
techniques, which we will cover later. Now let's
take a slight deviation for a second here. Stress
has inducing events and situations in which it
can cause major problems. Different people find
different events and situations more or less
stressful than others. Individuals have a range
of events or situations that are particularly
stressful to them, but most people would agree
that major events such as losing a job, divorce,
money problems would be way more stressful as
far as anything else goes. Of the most stressful
situations in life come as a result of unplanned
changes in personal circumstances. Now, I have
a list here that was compiled based off of some
research by a psychologist. And on a scale of
1 to 100, how bad, or I guess one way to put
it is... Which events would be considered high
stress factors as such in a person's life? With
death of a spouse or partner being at 100 % and
minor violations of the law being at 11%. And
believe it or not, holidays and Christmas range
between a range of 12 and 13. Pregnancies range
at a 40. Sexual problems range at a 39. Same
with death of a close friend. You got between
37 and 39. Marital separation and death of a
close family member between 63 and 65%. Personal
injuries at 53. Even getting married ranges at
50%. So, you know, different things can cause
high levels of stress. Life changes can have
a direct effect on health, both either good or
bad. Now, people who have a life change score
of 200 to 300, as far as the scale goes, I didn't
cover the entire list for sake of time, half
exhibit health problems in the following year.
And of those with a score over 300, or at least
with 75%. become ill in the following year the
most stressful change is the death of the spouse
as i mentioned earlier widowers have a 40 percent
higher death rate than normal and have had higher
rates of illness and depression and as i mentioned
before as depression is concerned it can cause
mental instability to the point where suicide
is actually an issue so It's not only unpleasant
events that can be stressful. Almost any change
in circumstance can cause stress as we readjust.
If possible, it is wise not to have too many
changes in life at the same time, in which case
you become mentally unstable. Okay? So. In addition
to stress being caused by events, certain situations
can lead to people feeling stressed. Although,
as mentioned before, the degree of stress will
depend almost amongst others and other things
on that individual's coping strategies. Depending
on how they choose to handle the stress can determine
how well or how high the stress level is. The
environment can make up stress. For, how do I
phrase this? For example, noise, crowded places,
poor lighting, pollution, other external factors
over time, things that we have no control over
can cause a person to feel anxious and irritable,
therefore causing stress. So, yes, the environment
can make us stressed, but it's up to you to decide
how you wish to handle it to determine the degree
of stress that you're in. A stress in the modern
day life can also be a source of stress as well.
We now communicate with people in many different
ways through the internet mobile phones of various
broadcast media and the expression expectation
of a quick response has increased You know using
my podcast as an example here We also have many
more commodities available to us and some people
feel an expectation to maintain a certain lifestyle
and level of consumerism In addition, for many
women, it is now the norm to manage a full or
part -time job and to be the primary caretaker
and nurturing person in the family. I don't know
when this happened, but it did, so deal with
it. All of these changes mean that stress is
now unfortunately commonplace in both our personal
and professional lives. This should not be the
norm, but that's the case. program of stress
management uh fussing over stress focusing on
stress prevention as much as much as relief um
is an essential part of modern day living and
it's definitely something that a lot of people
should do um it's not a skill that should be
avoided with that it brings this segment to a
close now in my next episode i for this podcast,
I will cover 10 tips for dealing with stress
for those who have to deal with it and how to
manage it, okay? All I've covered in this podcast
was what is stress and what causes it. Just to
keep it simple, that's all this is about. Now,
thank you for listening and enjoy the rest of
your day.