Stress is one of the least pleasant feelings in the human range of emotions. It can consume your thoughts, sap your energy, and cause you to snap at everyone around you. It can feel like your heart is racing and can lead to irrational behaviour. Worse though, it can actually be physically bad for your health – the ‘fight or flight’ response of your body putting a strain on your heart.

Stress can arise from a variety of causes. Various ‘stressful even rating scales’ have rated ‘stressors’ (things that can cause stress) in order of severity. There are obvious ones up the top such as ‘the death of a love one’, ‘moving home’ or ‘losing a job’ but at the same time there are some more obscure culprits on there such as ‘Christmas’.

While these are all legitimate however, they all miss a few key factors that can make a situation worse. First of all, it’s often not one large stressful event that can drive you to a breakdown, but several smaller ones with a lack of time. When I have article deadlines, a dog to take to the vet, a workout to do and a friend coming round at 5 – that’s often when I feel at my most stressed. Then all it takes is something like a traffic jam on the way to the vets and I’m at my limit – thumping the interior of the car and ranting at my unfortunate friend on the phone.

Another factor is the perceived controllability of the event, where knowing that you can’t do anything to affect the results can really make it harder to bear. Like that traffic, or waiting for a girl to call and wondering if she’s ignoring you on purpose…

The latter example outlines another way that stress can be increased – emotional investment. If you feel someone you love is going to get upset, or that something you really, really want to do isn’t going to happen, then the stress gets greatly increased.

Sometimes though stress comes seemingly from nowhere, an imbalance of hormones or just a bad day. That’s when sleep definitely is the best option, tomorrow’s another day and sleep can help you to deal with a host of problems. That’s where the expression ‘sleeping on it’ comes from.

Remember stress can be exacerbated by tiredness or a lack of vitamins and nutrients in your body too. A quick nap and a meal then can be a great way to make yourself feel better quickly – recharging your batteries and preparing yourself to deal with our list of stressors. While you might feel like you need a drink however, avoid this as much as possible. You shouldn’t drink in a low mood and it’ll just set you back further on your to do list.

Knowing the possible causes of your stress can help you feel better immediately as well as helping you to deal with it. Knowing that you’re not alone in feeling that way can also help alleviate it a lot. It’s perfectly natural and it’ll abate with time.

Mack LeMouse

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