Stress is a nagging thing that no one wants to have in life. However, it can sometimes seem like an inevitable feeling because of external factors in world events and your own immediate environment. As obligations pile up, you may react with stress, but chronically undergoing this can have major repercussions on your mental and physical health.
While you cannot always control factors around you, you can deal with stressors healthily. It’s also important to note how habits you may have can also contribute to this. According to health coach Maamoun Hossayrami of MH Coaching, a “balance of medicine, nutrition, and exercise” is necessary for stress management in congruence with cutting out unhealthy things you might be doing.
Here are some habits that could add to your stress:
Skipping meals
There are many reasons people tend to skip meals, either because they feel like they have no time, don’t feel that hungry, or lose track and forget altogether. Often, people also skip meals because of the stress that causes a lack of appetite. However, skipping meals in itself is one of the biggest causes of stress as well.
Most adults who skip meals are noted to do so because of stress-induced appetite loss, but by doing so, they become more prone to fatigue, irritability, and less focused. A fourth of individuals end up feeling more sluggish from the lack of eating, and those who make a habit of this are more likely to develop chronic symptoms of fatigue, restlessness, and even possibly gastric issues.
Spending too much time on your phone
You may think that you don’t spend “too much time” on your phone, but even those who aren’t entirely active spend a few hours a day on their gadgets, with an average of four hours in general. Numerous factors come into play here, with different stimulators coming at a consistent torrent that keeps your mind active and not allowing it to relax and be focused on one thing. Exposure to the screen itself has detrimental effects that contribute to stress.
Usage can decrease sleep, impede productivity, and significantly affect mental well-being. Often, because it’s so handy and compact, it’s easy to reach for your phone and not give yourself enough time to decompress and disconnect from the populated and often toxic space of the digital world.
Being too sedentary
It’s one thing not to get enough exercise (which would affect how effective your stress management is), but its repercussions are magnified if you have a mostly sedentary lifestyle. That is a big risk for people who spend most of their days sitting or lying down and not having to do much movement. Not only does this affect your physical health directly, but it also increases your risk of feeling stress and anxiety more.
Numerous studies cite different specifics, but the general agreement is that being sedentary doesn’t allow your mind to actively combat psychological combatants like depression, anxiety, and frustration. It can be crucial to find simple ways to move more and incorporate some activities into your day.
You may realize that you’ve been doing these things and not paying much attention to them. However, it’s essential to find support and essentially circumvent these tendencies so that you can have a more peaceful mind.
