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Sep 24, 2024

Everyone can benefit from learning ways to manage and relieve stress. Stress is cumulative, meaning that it gradually adds up and sometimes it’s difficult to see the impact of the amount of stress you’re under until you’re having difficulty coping with it or it’s manifesting as mental health symptoms such as anxiety or physical ailments.

Healthy Habits for Stress Relief

Everyone can benefit from learning ways to manage and relieve stress. Stress is cumulative, meaning that it gradually adds up and sometimes it’s difficult to see the impact of the amount of stress you’re under until you’re having difficulty coping with it or it’s manifesting as mental health symptoms such as anxiety or physical ailments. It’s important to gain self-awareness and insight by reflecting on how you’re living your daily life. 

A few questions you may begin to ask yourself include:

  • Are you taking care of yourself?
  • What are your stress triggers?
  • What behaviors contribute to your stress level?
  • Are you a people pleaser and tend to put your feelings and needs last?
  • Do you ignore the subtle signs that you need to take better care of yourself before you eventually get really stressed out?
  • Are you putting too much pressure on yourself?
  • Do you invalidate yourself, your experiences, and your feelings?
  • Do you neglect your physical and emotional needs?
  • How do you talk to yourself? Does it come from a place of compassion or does your inner critic take over?

It can be difficult living in a society where being readily accessible at all times (good ole cell phones and apps) and productive translates into worth; a culture that, intentionally or not, prides itself on independence, productivity, and general busyness. Getting as much done in as little time as possible might seem like the way to succeed, but it’s not the only measure of success. This “hurry sickness” or time urgency is a set of behaviors that can affect people's emotional wellbeing and can cause issues such as trouble concentrating, anxiety, and worry. It can affect our relationships and can even cause medical problems including heart problems (Healthline, 2021). It’s important that we notice when we need to slow down. In some cases, we may even need a lifestyle overhaul! 

Our worth isn’t dependent on how productive we are. Our worth isn’t dependent on how busy we keep ourselves, how clean our house is, whether we cook dinner every night of the week, or how perfect we try to be at work. We are all inherently worthy because we are people, we exist, and we are here.

Our culture, however, tends to function in this way: earn rest by being productive. This way of living is burning many of us out, causing fatigue, contributing to mental health issues such as depression and anxiety, and affecting our physical health. Unmanaged stress can affect all aspects of your life; from our mental and physical health, our relationships, our work, home life, our self-concept, general wellbeing, and pleasure. In order to get a better grip on our stress levels and keep it down, some of us may need to take a long, hard look at ourselves and begin to unlearn the toxic and unhealthy ways we’ve been taught to live. Likewise, we can stop feeding into this unhealthy lifestyle and challenge the status quo starting with ourselves. By implementing and sharing your experience of personal growth, you are a catalyst for greater change! 

Below are 25 ways that you can start to take steps toward a healthier lifestyle. 

  1. Give yourself enough time in the morning to get ready for the day. Try to not rush or hurry through your day! Create a balanced schedule.
  2. Reduce multitasking and practice doing one thing mindfully at a time. Remember this is a process and you may need to remind yourself when you begin to revert to old behaviors. Try not to judge yourself. It took a lifetime to build the habits you have now and it will be a process to learn new ways of doing things.
  3. Find ways to manage your time in ways that work better for you.
  4. Don’t let something or someone in your life continue to negatively affect your mental and physical health.
  5. Take a mental health day when your body and mind tell you to.
  6. Take breaks and pace yourself throughout the day such as taking a walk or actually sitting down and eating your lunch without distraction.
  7. Practice mindfulness throughout the day, whether it’s when you’re cooking dinner, watching your pets or kids play, or listening to music on the drive home. Bursts of mindfulness throughout your day can make all the difference and it can even help promote a sense of gratefulness and appreciation of the little things in life.
  8. There are apps now, like the Mindfulness app on the Apple watch where you can take a minute to focus on your breathing. Find something that works for you.
  9. Get moving! Exercise is a great way to relieve and manage stress. It can even help you sleep better! Just 20 minutes of exercise, 4 times a week that increases your heart rate has been shown to reduce anxiety over time. Exercise can include your favorite sports or activities, taking walks, at home workouts, weight lifting, cardio, swimming, running/jogging yoga, stretching, playing outdoors with your pets or kids.
  10. Listen to your favorite music! Or check out new music!
  11. Read a new book or reread or listen to your favorite book.
  12. Get outdoors. Spending time in nature has been shown to promote wellbeing.
  13. Talk out loud to yourself, in private, when you need to ventilate about something frustrating or stressful. It’s a great release and you’ll be practicing self-validation and meeting your own needs which is a big part of learning self-compassion. It helps you express your emotions instead of bottling them up.
  14. Have a creative outlet! Art in all forms is good for general wellbeing and enjoyment.
  15. Look at how you’re setting boundaries with others and adjust accordingly. Learn to say no and challenge the manufactured guilt. Avoid or limit your time with people who stress you out.
  16. Prioritize and pare down your to do list. Delegate tasks, don’t take on too much or overcommit yourself.
  17. Learn and practice assertive communication skills so you are clear, direct and get what you need more efficiently.
  18. Learn about people-pleasing and if you are a people pleaser, learn how to unlearn these behaviors so you can come back to your authentic self.
  19. Get enough sleep! Getting sleep restores your mind and body and helps you ward off stress and better handle stress when it arises.
  20. Make an effort to eat nutritious foods more often. The body and mind are connected so it’s important to take care of our bodies in order to help take care of our minds and emotions. Also, limit alcohol, caffeine, sugar, recreational drugs.
  21. Physical intimacy with yourself and/or with your partner is a great stress reliever and a very healthy thing to do for our wellbeing and stress reduction.
  22. Alone time is important and it’s necessary to decompress.
  23. Connect with others. Spending time doing something fun with family and friends or just simply being in the company of those who love you will help with stress management. Affection also increases oxytocin which helps with stress reduction.
  24. Take control of your space. Organize and make your environment comforting and relaxing to you!
  25. And make time for fun and relaxation a part of your day! It’s important to spend time doing what you enjoy; delving into what interests you. It’s not only a great way to live your life, but it can take you out of your head and get you mindfully distracted on something meaningful to you.

Taking small steps may start to change your life for the better, may improve your self-esteem, authenticity, improve your relationships, and affect how you work in a more balanced way. When people in your life, colleagues, family, and friends notice a positive change in you, that’s when you know your lifestyle changes are working!


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Work Cited:

“Hurry Sickness: Symptoms and How to Cope.” Healthline, 20 Jan. 2021, www.healthline.com/health/mental-health/hurry-sickness#how-to-cope. Accessed 28 June 2022.