How To Break The Vicious Cycle Of Stress

Many of the people I have worked with tell me that it's impossible to laugh or be happy when they are stressed.

The fact is that laughter is one of the fastest ways to change your emotional state. From watching your favourite comedy movie to reading a good joke, a good belly laugh can go a long way to cure the day-time blues.

The Centre for Disease Control estimates that more than 80 percent of visits to primary care physicians are due to stress related illnesses. Learning effective stress management can make you healthier and add up to 10 years to your life.

Here are some simple stress management techniques to reduce stress and increase happiness.

Wake-up and laugh

First thing in the morning before you get out of bed sit-up and just start to laugh. At first it may feel a bit fake but if you persist you'll soon start laughing at how silly it feels. This is a great way to begin each day with a laugh.

Decide to be happy.

Intention is the best indicator of how you'll feel in future, so make a choice to increase your happiness. Deciding to be happy will direct your thinking toward activities that will bring joy into your life. It also attracts people who want to share in that joy.

Make happiness one of your core values.

Your choices are based on your values. If you regulate happiness to a low priority in life, other choices will take precedence. Where's happiness located on your list relative to work, taking care of others, spending money, worrying about things, etc?

Happiness is an inside job.

You are the only person who has the power to decide whether or not you'll be happy. No external situation can make you happy or unhappy - not another person and certainly not any thing. It's how you choose to respond to a person or an event that determines how you feel.

Think about happiness.

People who are unhappy dwell on their problems and find fault with themselves and others that's not thinking - that's wallowing. Thinking involves solving your problems, and determining how to bring out the best in yourself and others.

Think about what you want.

What do you think will make you happy? Picturing positive outcomes allows your brain to orient itself to mapping out steps to move you in the right direction.

Practice appreciation.

Look for three things each day for which you are grateful and write them down on your calendar. The more you practice appreciating what's good about your life, yourself and other people, the bigger your happiness bank account will become. Then when negative events affect your balance, you'll have plenty of positives in reserve.

Practice forgiveness

Bad things happen to good people. Good people make bad mistakes. There's nothing you can do about it other than forgive and move on to making yourself happy again. When you hold onto bad feelings from the past, you prolong your suffering. Don't give unhappy thoughts a home. Let negatives drift away.

Do it anyway. If you don't take action to make your life better because you don't feel like it, you're enslaving yourself to your bad feelings. It's especially important to do something to feel good when you're feeling bad.

Being proactive rather than reactive will stop your body from flooding you with stress chemicals and allow it to restore healthy biochemistry.

Practice being happy

Happiness is like an emotional muscle - it gets stronger the more you exercise it. Keeping yourself happy is like staying in shape. You'll become better at it the more you do it. It will become easier to do. And eventually it will become a habit that you'll really miss when you don't do it.

Make others happy

Doing good things for others will keep your relationships working well because what goes around almost always comes back multiplied. Knowing that you're a person who makes other people feel good also will give you a deep sense of satisfaction about who you are as a person.

Attitude creates gratitude.

People appreciate those who have a good attitude. A poor me attitude only gets you poor results no matter how much you do for others. If you want to be respected for your efforts, be the person who provides lots of positive reinforcement for the contributions of others.

Keep your spirits up. You can face any challenge in life if you have faith in yourself and a higher power. To renew your energy, you need to make time to replenish your spirit through meditation, prayer or communing with nature.

Final Stress Management Tips for increased happiness

The secret to happiness is really no mystery. Happiness is a natural state of being that appears when you're not busy being unhappy. Allow yourself to flow through life like a leaf in a stream, whenever an obstacle comes you way find a way to flow over it, or around it and then continue on with wherever you're headed without a second glance behind you.

To your great life and health!