3 techniques for managing stress

Stress tends to creep up naturally, but most of it is unnecessary. It precipitates from almost all aspects of life, from work to health, but it also affects almost every aspect of your life. This is why it's important to ask what role stress plays in your life. If you're always stressed, what purpose does it serve, and is that purpose still necessary? Here are three ways to quickly reduce your stress.

Make a list of the things you do for fun, like seeing friends or reading a book, and carve out more time for them.

• Set up fun as an appointment on your daily calendar, so the allotted time won't get filled up with obligations.
• See friends who relax you or make you laugh, and dump the ones who criticize or pressure you.

Few people ever return from a long walk saying how stressed they feel.

• Getting outside to walk or ride a bike for at least 30 minutes every day is relaxing and stimulates chemicals that can boost your mood.

Maybe you pile on stressful activities so that you don't have to think about the future, a sour relationship, or a loss. It would be easier on your system to focus on resolving those issues, perhaps with the help of a counsellor.

• With the help of a biofeedback therapist, for example, you can learn to monitor and control your physical response to stress. For instance, once you can see that your muscles contract when you are getting a headache, you can learn how to relax those muscles, helping your body avoid pain.
• Another therapy is hypnosis. A trained therapist can help you learn how to move into an extremely relaxed state, releasing tension and stress. The hypnotist may then make simple suggestions to help you deal with setting limits on work, for example, or to help you give up stress-inducing habits, such as smoking.

Try these simple techniques today and you can quickly reduce your daily stress.