Do you ever feel like stress works to get the best of you? Coping with stress is often challenging. It can be downright daunting. No matter what, if we’re not dealing with stress, it is dealing with us.
So often, we want to live as if we are oblivious to the stressors of life. It is just easier sometimes to numb and disconnect from what is going on, thinking that is how we should handle things. Unfortunately, that recipe will get you nowhere and will probably lead to health issues.
Stress is the number one reason we visit medical doctors. Since we are not coping with stress, we allow it to build up in our lives. Then at the least opportune moment, it sneaks up on us and slaps us hard, getting our attention.
For years, I thought I was good at coping with stress. I did not let it show that I had any stress in my life. I prayed, went to church and put on the happy face to everyone I knew. Unfortunately, I was fooling myself into thinking that I had life together. I was fooling everyone, but then in 1991, when I went through Conversion Disorder, it all came front and center.
One of the things I soon learned was instead of coping with stress, I had to learn to deal with it. I had to learn how to relax and stop to take time out to enjoy life. Little did I realize, I had fooled myself into believing that I had stress under control when in reality, I did not.
We are so quick to numb and disconnect when the going gets tough that we don’t realize just how much we are hurting ourselves and keeping joy out of our lives. Yes, experiences from days gone by help coax us into doing this, and if we don’t learn from those experiences, we continue to build more harmful layers. Coping with stress is where we learn how to deal with these things and acknowledge them.
Coping with stress is not just about throwing back a beer or watching the game on TV. It is about stopping and noticing everything around us and within the mind and body. It is about allowing ourselves the time to stop and rest, not keep pushing every minute of the day. We all know that, but we often fail to practice it.
When you are coping with stress, you’re acknowledging its presence in your life. You are actively working towards allowing yourself time each day to be with it, learn from it, and then work to find a way to let it go.
Yes, you can fool yourself into thinking you deal with stress, but if you’re not careful, that practice will bite you in the backside. Coping with stress is learning how to be aware and conscious, not numb and disconnected from your mind and body.
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