Three simple strategies to reduce our stress levels now!

We’re so unconsciously reliant on automatic response patterns we learned as children, that we don’t often appreciate that we have the agency at every moment to purposely choose a different way.

Whether we are living with stress symptoms, or even if we are dealing with a significant health challenge already, we still have that opportunity to take the quantum leap that can transform our karma, our attitude, our enjoyment of life, and our health.

Our capacity to adapt to stress differs between individuals. This almost always goes back to childhood and relates to how well grounded we were and how valued we felt growing up…

The patterns are ingrained psychologically and physically where they sub-consciously remind us how to react. Not only do our habitual responses no longer serve us, but they can be outright threats to our health.

Stress is the single biggest reason why people do not live a lot longer, and enjoy their lives more, than they should.

Why this is so, plus symptoms and causes of stress.

Prevention - A new mindset …

If our thoughts are not us, who are we? …

“I don’t trust my inner feelings, inner feelings come and go.” Leonard Cohen …

Do we have a self-limiting belief? Eg “I can’t because …”

Ask ourselves, what is the consequence of believing that thought? How does it make us feel? How do those feelings affect our daily lives?

Now consider how would we be if we didn’t have that thought? …

According to the Washington Post, President Trump told 30,573 lies or misleading claims during his presidency. Whether we believe that this behaviour was self-serving, malicious, or necessary depends on your point of view. Perhaps the Washington Post has slightly exaggerated the case? Afterall, even for someone as apparently accomplished at manipulation as Donald Trump, over 20 false statements on average for every day of his term does seem slightly excessive. That would mean barely anything he said was true?

Who do we believe? Can we believe anything anyone says? Do we need to? …

One of the best things we can do for ourselves is to accept ourselves as we are in this moment. There will likely be some things we don’t like about ourselves, things that aggravate us. Maybe there is some dark secret or desire, some icky thing, that we still crave at times, but we feel guilty when we think about it…

Nietzche said “He who has a why to live for, can bear with almost any how.” …

I recently heard a palliative healthcare worker say that “suffering is like a wedge between the world you want and the world you’ve got.” …

When you decide to make gratitude an intentional practice, for example by keeping a gratitude journal, you start to look out you look for the highlights in the day…

The really great thing is that the more you look for these moments, the more they appear, and the more full your life is. Like attracts like. It’s a law of life…