What is stress?
Stress is the normal response of our mind and body to alert us to danger and therefore keep us safe. In the modern world stress can happen when we feel there is too much on our plate and that we cannot cope with it all.
Stress is the feeling that we cannot cope with the demands placed on us. Some stress is helpful and keeps us safe and motivated. However, when we are exposed to constant and persistent stress levels, stress can become chronic and become a risk to our health.
Stress is a normal and helpful response to life stressors. It can energize us to deal with problems or it can become a problem if it becomes too much and overwhelms us.
Managing stress
Managing stress is all about finding a balance. If the level of stress is too low, a person can become unmotivated or bored. If it is too high, a person can experience stress-related problems such as not being able to concentrate, avoiding certain situations, or become physically ill.
Everyone has an optimum or healthy stress level, but it varies from person to person. The trick is to know when stress has become too much for you and what helps you strike a balance.
Learning to manage stress better has a lot of benefits: it can increase your performance and productivity, improve your physical health and generally help you to feel better and more relaxed.
Use what you have
We all have and need resources at our disposal to help us manage in times of stress. Just like for stressors, resources also vary from person to person.
Resources can be:
- Environmental (e.g. a beautiful lake nearby, leisure amenities, access to a good health system)
- Social (e.g. close ties with family members, a loyal friend, a trusted healthcare provider)
- Financial (e.g. steady income, savings)
- Personal (e.g. personal strengths)
Use your resources to deal with challenges.
Our personal strengths and talents are also an important resource to help us combat stress and limit its impact on our lives.
We have partnered with Silvercloud to offer you free access to a Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) self-help programme, designed by clinical experts using proven methods for helping people, all with the aim of empowering you to think and feel better.
This programme is based on the principles of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT).
CBT consists of two key steps to feeling well:
- Understanding what’s going on inside you
- Making changes to feel better
The key idea behind CBT is that your emotions, thoughts, behaviours and physical sensations are connected, and affect each other.
To Simply choose your programme on SilverCloud. When prompted to sign up, you will need an access code to enable you to create your account and use this resource. The access code is kwnelselfhelp