Stress Effects Your Overall Well-being!
What is stress?
There are various ways of defining stress but simply put, we experience stress when we are expected to deliver more than the amount of resources we have. In psychological parlance, stress is defined as the ‘flight or fight’ response which is inbuilt in our system to survive as a species.
How does it manifest in us?
Thinking about the fight or flight response, let us visualize that we are in a threatening environment and if we describe what we are experiencing. There will be a feeling of dread in the mind, one would be breathing fast and shallow, one would be experiencing palpitations, a lump in the throat, a knot in the stomach, trembling, sweating etc. This is an example of one being acutely stressed. However, when one is stressed on a continuous basis one can experience numerous aches and pains in the various muscle groups including the neck muscles, facial muscles and back muscles. There is a general dysfunction in the body which can manifest in the form of various ‘somatic symptoms’. These somatic symptoms are also referred to as medically unexplained symptoms. These can range from chronic headaches, disturbed bowel habits, disturbed sleep etc.
What are the sources of stress?
If you think about a person being at the centre of their world. Let us begin with the environment they live in, if there is noise pollution, air pollution, and traffic congestion, which applies to most urban dwellers in our country, this can be a source of continuous stress for most of us. If we consider the people in that person’s world, they can be a great source of stress. For example, handling a difficult boss at work or a turbulent and rocky marital situation etc. But above all, the person’s personality can be the greatest source of stress, for instance, if one is a perfectionist by nature (which is a common personality trait amongst the so-called successful people) one can have very high standards or very high expectations from oneself. If a job can be done with relative ease by someone who is not a perfectionist, the same job can take a longer time and can be a source of distress by virtue of their own nature. To top it all, our culture which introduces competitiveness from the very outset, in childhood, is the foundation for the development of a stressful/stressed life.
What can stress do to us?
Stress is the root cause of all modern day ailments. If we look at the physical conditions leading to modern day morbidities including hypertension, diabetes mellitus, Ischemic heart disease etc. The main cause is unrelenting, continuous stress. For instance, a chronically stressed person will indulge in bad lifestyle choices like excessive smoking, drinking and over-eating.
Stress is the most important precipitating factors when it comes to the development of mental health disorders. Including depression (of which there is an epidemic of in our country), all the anxiety-based disorders like panic disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, generalized anxiety disorder etc. Stress is also an important factor in inducing relapse of illnesses like schizophrenia and bipolar-affective disorder. Stress is the root cause of people developing a dependence on substances such as alcohol and other drugs, this is in an attempt to self-medicate.
What can we do to manage stress?
First and foremost, one needs to tackle the source of stress as far as practically possible and then look at quick fixes like relaxation training, meditation etc. It has become very fashionable for people to think about quick fixes than to address the root cause of stress and try to eliminate them or minimize them.
