“You must learn to let go. Release the stress. You were never in control anyway.”
-Steve maraboli

Introduction

Stress can be best defined as the body’s coping response to emotional burdens and demands. Surprisingly, stress is very essential in several conditions. For example, according to Health Guide, When working properly, stress helps you stay focused, energetic, and alert. In emergency situations, stress can save your life—giving you extra strength to defend yourself, for example, or spurring you to slam on the brakes to avoid a car accident.

The real issue, however, that needs to be dealt with is chronic stress. Chronic stress disrupts nearly every system in your body. It can suppress your immune system, upset your digestive and reproductive systems, increase the risk of heart attack and stroke, and speed up the aging process. It can even rewire the brain, leaving you more vulnerable to anxiety, depression, and other mental health problems.

Health problems caused by stress include:

Depression and anxiety
Pain of any kind
Sleep problems
Autoimmune diseases
Digestive problems
Skin conditions, such as eczema
Heart disease

Citation(S): https://www.helpguide.org/articles/stress/stress-symptoms-signs-and-causes.htm

Common Symptoms

According to Mayo clinic, some of the common symptoms of stress that can affect your body, mind, emotions, behaviour etc are:

Physical Symptoms

Headache
Muscle tension or pain
Chest pain
Fatigue
Change in sex drive
Upset stomach
Sleep problems

Emotional Symptoms

Sadness or depression
Irritability or anger
Lack of motivation or focus
Anxiety
Restlessness
Feeling overwhelmed

Behavioural Symptoms

Overeating or undereating
Angry outbursts
Drug or alcohol misuse
Social withdrawal
Exercising less often

Citation(s):https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/stress-management/in-depth/stress-symptoms/art-20050987#:~:text=Common%20effects%20of%20stress%20%20%20%20On,%20Tobacco%20use%20%203%20more%20rows%20

Major Causes of stress:

The causes or situations that trigger stress are known as stressors. Several situations in life can induce lasting stress that is detrimental to the overall wellbeing of a individual. These are the several major stressors in adults and children.

Work Pressure or Job Loss:

Work pressure may account for an enormous amount of stress in a large number of individuals. It might just be one of the leading causes of stress among the adult population. In today’s day and age, excessive competition and a never ending demand for services has rendered people incapable of doing anything except work. Added to all these are the poor working conditions and over- exceeding expectations that curate up an insane amount of stress.

Job loss is an exceedingly conducive factor to the ever surmounting stress load. In today’s capital world, losing a job is like losing a limb and an obvious cause for distress.

Death of Close People:

Passing away of a loved one can be an exceptionally huge factor for stress.

As already stated that stress is a kind of coping mechanism that evokes a sort of fight or flight reaction when required, loss of a person close to you may be an incentive enough for the body to evoke stress which can last for a long period of time.

Relationship Challenges:

Alternating curves on the relationship graph add to stress exponentially. No human is perfect and therefore no relation that he forges is. Relationships are full of ups and downs, which added with other social stressors can affect an individual badly.

Among other things compatibility might be one of the added causes of stress, no human can be 100% compatible with another, everyone needs their own space, even people in committed relationships.

Money Worries:

In a capital world like ours, money is the Ambrosia.

People hanker after money like anything. There is such a cut-throat competition to be at the helm of money matters that it has rendered us all anxious. Money worries is one of the biggest causes of stress nowadays.

Other major causes of stress include:

Social pressure such as bullying

Parental divorce

studying for exams, choosing a career etc.

Image result for studying for exams, choosing a career stress cartoon

Simple Stress Management:

Although chronic stress requires proper medical intervention, some self care, meditation and heedfulness works wonders. Here are some things that can help reduce stress.

Spending time in nature
Saying your prayers and connecting with spirituality
Practicing yoga
Spending time with friends and family
Writing in a diary
Doing your exercises
Practicing art
Reading books
Sleeping well
Eating well
Prioritizing tasks
Picking up a new hobby
Taking up therapy if needed
Thinking positive

“Convince yourself everyday that you are worthy of a good life. Let go of stress, breathe. Stay positive, all is well.”
― Germany Kent

“Society taught me that no matter what size I am, I will never be good enough. I’ll always be too skinny, too fat, too short, too tall. Too this, too that.”
– Unknown

People from all walks of life, battle different forms of insecurities every second of the day. Insecurities basically sprout when all the broken fragments of society i.e. us, force other people to adhere to the so called norms of the society to ‘fit in’.

One of the biggest insecurity people encounter is with regard to their body and looks. The fact that beauty is absolutely subjective, seems to escape our minds while establishing the perfect body type , nose and lip shapes.

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Body Image

Body image refers to the subjective idea that a person has of his own body, it may or may not be actually the way he/she appears. According to Psychology Today, “Body image is subject to all kinds of distortions from the attitudes of one’s parents, other early experiences, internal elements like emotions or moods, and other factors.”

Negative body image may start forming when you notice, say, a minor flaw in your body and then overthink it out of proportions, so much so that it leaves an indelible impression on your mind.

Body image of a person influences his/her social interactions and some level of mental functioning. Negative aspects of body image can lead to severe social and behavioural distortions.

Also quoted from Psychology Today, “Thoughts and opinions about one’s body can start forming as early as 3 years of age. Often this is a direct result of a parent’s relationship with their own bodies. How a parent sees herself is influential and can mould a child’s ideas about their body.“

Although its as hard to be Ken as it is Barbie but the negatives of body image have been largely found in women. The statistics of men are found to be lower in this context.

Insecurities

According to statistics about 80% women and 34% men are insecure of and dissatisfied with their body. Body insecurities cause people to break down.

These insecurities stem mainly from the desire to look a certain way and fit a certain beauty standard. Teenagers feel the need to be perfectly thin or perfectly proportionate and muscular, lack of which could lead to a state extreme mental trauma.

Also, people instead of focusing on their own physical and mental growth, divest a large portion of their time in useless comparisons with other people, which leads to them cornering their mental selves even further instead of something positive coming out of it.

Give Yourself a Hug

Everyone in this world is insecure of one thing or the other. Body insecurity is a serious peril that people need to overcome, in order to enjoy this limited life to the fullest. Body insecurity and the negativity that it gives rise to prevents people from seeking joy in their life, it constantly looms like a dark cloud over their head.

People dealing with such issues need to look for the silver lining in this dark cloud. People need to stop striving for perfection sand embrace themselves, flaws and everything.

People suffering from insecurity need to strengthen their will and imbibe and assimilate the fact that,’ All bodies are beautiful’, completely.

Every circle of darkness in life is followed by an impending circle of light. We must have a firm belief in the goodness of things and have a strong self confidence.

Wound your arms tightly around yourself and let your love heal you. Give yourself a tight hug!

”Healing may not be so much about getting better, as about letting go of everything that isn’t you – all of the expectations, all of the beliefs – and becoming who you are.”
–Rachel Naomi Remen

Reference(s): https://www.psychologytoday.com