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Habits to Beat Stress and Anxiety: Must Read Material
Stress and anxiety are two of the most frequent mental health problems in the world. There are an estimated 40 million adults in the United States alone suffering from them. (1) Many people believe that stress starts with a high-intensity event. Most cases of long-term stress and anxiety begin with small events. They gradually add up until they finally tear you down. This is commonly referred to as ‘burnout.’ Understanding habits to beat stress and anxiety helps all of us to put a solid, proactive plan in place.
While there are occasions where it is caused by a single traumatic event or experience, most of the time it isn’t. Regrettably, it is not usually properly or effectively treated.
Many people will turn to activities like alcohol or drug misuse to cope when they are stressed or anxious. They don’t recognize what they are going through and how to manage it healthily.
This style of coping leads to other health problems, such as addiction. It also fails to address the source of stress or anxiety. These are clearly coping methods that, when used in moderation, might enhance your mood . Unfortunately, they will not cure the problem in the long run.
Meditation
Many individuals believe that meditation is an effective approach to reduce stress and anxiety (2) since it can be done anywhere and at any time. However, many people who meditate prefer to think about other things while doing so, which defeats the objective of the activity. You will benefit from learning mindfulness meditation if you want to correctly meditate to relieve tension and anxiety.
Mindfulness meditation focuses on breathing techniques that help you become more aware of your current emotional state by concurrently focusing on your sensations, thoughts, emotions, and what’s going on around you. Consider it as living in the present moment, with no thoughts of the past or future. This activity can considerably reduce feelings of tension and anxiety if done for 5-20 minutes once or twice a day.
Food
When it comes to eating habits, certain foods can lead your body to imitate the feelings you experience when you’re stressed. Caffeine in coffee, for example, can raise your heart rate and make you fidgety. Caffeine might also make it difficult to get a good night’s sleep. If you don’t get enough sleep, you won’t be able to deal with the stressors of the day, which can lead to worry.
Sleep
Anxiety may be significantly decreased just by getting a good night’s sleep. Eating modest meals throughout the day rather than one huge meal at dinner time might also help minimize feelings of tension and worry. This is due to the fact that it maintains your blood sugar levels throughout the day. This means you’ll have enough energy to go through whatever the day throws at you.
You can also feel sluggish and sleepy if you don’t eat enough and let your blood sugar drop too low. To function effectively, your brain need fuel (food). Due to a shortage of fuel, the brain is unable to create the chemicals that regulate emotions. This can make you feel stressed and anxious, as well as irritable. Have you ever heard the term ‘hangry’? So now you know what it is and why you don’t feel well when you don’t eat enough. Many foods help us feel better in specific ways. Those things we crave, such as sugary or fatty foods like cake and chips, are the most conspicuous.
However, these simply make us feel better in the short term and are not healthy for our long-term health. Foods that support the brain and its critical processes are what we need to keep anxiety at bay. Oily fish (3), green veggies (4), whole grain carbohydrates, and berries are among these items. (5) If you don’t consume a nutritious diet, you won’t be firing on all cylinders, which can lead to mistakes, insufficient sleep, inability to concentrate, and a variety of other issues. Eating healthy foods may be tedious at times, but you will feel better in the long run, both in terms of anxiety and overall health. Win-win situation!
Gut Health
Another strategy to combat stress and anxiety with what you eat is to ensure that your gut contains plenty of ‘good’ bacteria. There has recently been a lot of study that has discovered that these bacteria are involved in the production of hormones that make us feel peaceful, relaxed, and even happy. (6) Gut health is important to us all. Read more from the link for a detailed discussion on gut health.
Prescription Drugs
Antidepressant medications mimic these hormones to alleviate anxiety, stress, and sadness. But, compared to pharmaceutical medications, how much better is it to get them into your body naturally? Anxiety, depression, and even suicide are common adverse effects of drugs that are designed to help you feel better (7).
Physical Activity
Another crucial factor is to obtain enough activity during the week, whether it’s running, jogging, weight lifting, or other activities. This activity not only offers you more energy throughout the day, but it also reduces stress by giving you a helpful way to deal with bad emotions rather than bottle them up until they explode. (8) This is one of the most effective strategies to permanently eliminate tension and anxiety, but you must be able to sleep soundly at night.
Sleeping well at night might be tough for a variety of reasons, but not getting enough sleep means you’ll wake up weary, which will exacerbate anxiety. Being on the defensive all day, unable to concentrate, and maybe making mistakes that might lead to situations that make you feel even more tense and uncomfortable. This could endanger your life, especially if you’re driving and lose attention.
Anxiety can be exacerbated by a lack of sleep (9). Unfortunately, not being able to sleep is a common symptom of anxiety, so this might exacerbate the situation. (10)
It’s better to get into a regular schedule if you want to achieve adequate restorative sleep. Go to bed without cell phones, iPads, or television in a dark room. Try to go to bed at the same time every night, eat your last meal two hours before bedtime, and allow yourself time to unwind in the evenings. When you sleep, your body undertakes some biological housekeeping, which includes wiping out the build-up of anxiety-inducing hormones (11).
Practice Appreciation
Finally, practicing appreciation every day is likely to be the habit that will benefit you the most in life. It’s sometimes difficult to see all of the beautiful things in your life when you’re anxious and upset. Gratitude for your capacity to see and hear things that others cannot, or for your sense of taste while dining with friends and family.
These are these simple pleasures of life. However, many people who have them take them for granted until something happens to make them appreciate them more. The practice of spending time being grateful for all of life’s basic pleasures not only relieves stress. It also raises serotonin levels, which, as previously said, contributes to better sleep quality. Furthermore, cultivating thankfulness improves our appreciation for all of life’s small pleasures.
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References
- World Health Organisation Mental Health https://www.who.int/health-topics/mental-health#tab=tab_1
- Effectiveness of a meditation-based stress reduction program in the treatment of anxiety disorders https://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/abs/10.1176/ajp.149.7.936
- Omega-3s for anxiety? https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/omega-3s-for-anxiety
- Longitudinal association of vitamin B-6, folate, and vitamin B-12 with depressive symptoms among older adults over time https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2904034/
- Foods that can reduce anxiety https://www.ucihealth.org/blog/2018/11/food-anxiety
- Serotonin, tryptophan metabolism and the brain-gut-microbiome axis https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25078296/
- Suicide and Antidepressants https://www.drugwatch.com/ssri/suicide/
- Exercise for Stress and Anxiety https://adaa.org/living-with-anxiety/managing-anxiety/exercise-stress-and-anxiety
- Sleep Disturbance and Short Sleep as Risk Factors for Depression and Perceived Medical Errors in First-Year Residents https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6084763/
10.Tired and apprehensive: anxiety amplifies the impact of sleep loss on aversive brain anticipation. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23804084/
11.Deep Sleep Gives Your Brain a Deep Clean https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/deep-sleep-gives-your-brain-a-deep-clean1/