Stress Management: Unhealthy Responses to Stress and How To Change These Bad Habits In Six Simply Steps

There are many stress management techniques.

Generally speaking they can be divided in to big groups:

* Healthy and effective ways to manage stress.
* Quick fix or unhealthy ways to control stress.

Majority choose those good, effective and healthy ways to manage stress. But some prefer quick fix or unhealthy ones.

Those unhealthy, like overeating, excessive smoking ( check out
natural remedies for the treatment of nicotine addiction ) or alcohol consumption may seem as a temporarily effective way of taking the mind away from whatever is causing the stress.

This makes the person feel somewhat better for a while, and therefore bad habits could be mistakenly considered as stress management tools. Such stress coping tool probably would not cause a problem if applied rarely but used regularly it becomes a bad habit or addition.

Unhealthy ways of coping with stress

These coping strategies may temporarily reduce stress, but they cause more damage in the long run:

Smoking
Drinking too much
Overeating or undereating
Zoning out for hours in front of the TV or computer
Withdrawing from friends, family, and activities
Using pills or drugs to relax
Sleeping too much
Procrastinating
Filling up every minute of the day to avoid facing problems
Taking out your stress on others (lashing out, angry outbursts, physical violence)

If you tend to deal with stress in less-than-healthy ways, you are compounding the negative impacts of stress on your health by exacerbating the stress levels and creating new problems in your life and health.

Indeed, it goes without saying that these addictive habits not only keeps a person more stressed but are also dangerous to a long-term health. If stress is to be treated effectively, any associated addictions and habits also need to be addressed.

We learn our habits, therefore we can unlearn them.

We must take active steps to do this, though. For example if it is the habit of smoking it can be deeply ingrained and it takes time and commitment to achieve lasting changes.

Breaking bad habits is never easy, and breaking an addiction is even more difficult. You will only do it if you are motivated , so you must be absolutely clear about whether you really want to do it and why.

You could ask yourself following questions:

- Is the habit/addiction harmful to me?

- Is the habit/addiction dangerous either to myself or others?

- Is the habit/addiction embarrassing, irritating or upsetting to me?

- Is the habit my problem or someone else's? If it's someone else's, maybe I need to start by negotiating other changes.

- If I persist with the habit, what are the three worst possible consequences?

- If I break the habit, what are the three most important gains?

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The usual reason for failing to break a habit is going about it half-heartedly.

You must be certain that you want to change.

To increase your resolve, think about the disadvantages of the habit and about the advantages you will gain by breaking it.

For example, you can calculate how much money you will save buy not buying cigarettes and then think what else you can treat yourself to instead.

Promise yourself your reward for being successful. Motivate yourself and the rest will follow.

In order to deal with the problem you need first to become fully conscious and aware of it.

Why do you do it, how do you do it, what do you do with your body? This will help you to understand what is going on with your body and help you to become aware of what you feel you gain from the habit.

You should then monitor the habit. To do this, ask yourself these questions:

- How often do you do it?

- When do you do it?

- What is going on when you start to do it?

- What do you feel when you first think about doing it? i.e. what triggers it?

Start to keep a habit diary.

- First of all you need to prepare yourself. You need to be ready to continually remind yourself WHY you are trying to drop the habit.

- You then need to be on your guard. Watch out for the situations you are most likely to carry it out.

- Develop a STOP strategy. When you feel tempted or catch yourself slipping into your old habit, you need something to jerk you out.

This can be having a list of your reasons for giving up handy; it can be a more helpful replacement action, such as having a small object to play with in your hands rather than a cigarette if you feel the need to do something with your hands.

It could be eating a fresh celery stick or carrot if you find that you smoke to avoid binging and putting on weight. It could be a replacement breathing exercise if you smoke to avoid a nervous reaction to a situation. There are any number of strategies, which can be developed to help distract you or help you cope. Think them through carefully and prepare a few for when they are needed.

- Enlist the support of others. For example, tell your friends you are giving up smoking and ask them to help you by not smoking around you or by meeting at non-smoking venues, not offering you a cigarette, etc. Also make sure that they are not to nag you, as this can be unproductive.

- Continue to monitor.

- Reward yourself for success.

If you have something to do instead of the habit on each occasion that you are tempted, it will make things much easier.

Be aware of when you are tempted and try to find some alternative but related activity.

For example, if you need to drink alcohol or smoke in a social situation to have something to do with your hands, then occupy them with some other object or activity. Simply hold a glass of sparkling mineral water, etc.

It is important to be consistent when trying to break any habit.

You are trying to make a habit of NOT doing something anymore, so doing it consistently until it becomes automatic is very important.

Develop routines to keep you on the right path.

Do not fall into the trap of 'just this once won't hurt' - it WILL!

Keep thinking of your advantages and your rewards for persisting.

Use both long term and short term rewards.

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