G. Chamath Pabasara Gunadasa
Stress Matters: Introduction to Stress
What is the Stress?
Stress is the most common issue in the modern competitive world. Human lifestyle is changing rapidly, creating a challenging environment filled with numerous responsibilities. In the 21st century, mental health is considered an important factor that allows a person to develop successfully. However, in the past, mental health did not have a strong place in communities. With a rapidly changing lifestyle and a challenging environment around people, there are risks of mental health diseases, and the World Health Organization (WHO) explained that there are more than 1 billion people suffering from mental health diseases. However, stress is considered a common reason to create mental health diseases, which potentially leads to the risk of anxiety and depression.
This article focuses on providing an introduction to stress to enhance awareness, understand how stress impacts individuals’ mental and physical health, and explain the need to address stress.
Introduction to Stress
The World Health Organization defines stress as a situation where a person struggles to meet demands because expectations exceed their capacity. Stress creates emotional strain and discomfort when someone faces challenges. In simple terms, stress happens when people cannot match their ability to the demands of their environment. Stress does not mean avoiding challenges. Instead, it is about being unable to manage demands. Stress can cause many mental and physical health issues, such as anxiety, depression, digestive problems, headaches, muscle pain, heart disease, poor sleep, changes in eating or drinking habits, and increased consumption of unhealthy foods and drinks.
People do not need to be in extreme situations to feel stress. Psychological studies suggest it is normal to feel some stress or emotional strain, but if these feelings last a long time, they can become a disorder. Everyone faces stress daily due to a busy and competitive lifestyle. As technology advances, expectations rise, and people strive for perfection. Typically, stress is not seen as a disease, but constant stress can harm both mental and physical health. Psychologists explain that stress also contributes to various diseases.
How does Stress Impact Physical and Mental Health?
- Headache
Stress has a significant impact on both the mental and physical health of individuals. Most previous studies and psychologists explain that stress causes headaches. A headache refers to a slight pain in the head, and it can be due to stress, such as migraine or a tension-type headache.
- Sleep Disorder
As well as when an individual suffers from stress, there is a risk of a sleep disorder. Sleep disorder refers to an individual experiencing a lack of sufficient sleep. This is mainly because when an individual suffers from stress, it causes an increase in their brain activity and leads to irregular sleeping patterns and a significant reduction in sleep quality. This lack of sleep causes an increased risk of various mental and physical health diseases, which reduce an individual’s well-being.
- High-Blood Pressure
The stress is leading to high blood pressure. High blood pressure is also called hypertension, and this is a long-term condition where the pressure in blood vessels rapidly increases. When an individual is facing stress, it causes the release of various hormones, and this potentially leads to high blood pressure. As well as stress, it highly contributes to the development of heart diseases. Heart diseases, also called a heart attack, occur when blood flow from the heart decreases or stops. This leads to creating infractions in the heart. When individuals suffer from stress, it causes them to maintain unhealthy behavior, which increases the risk of heart attacks.
- Fatigue
As well as stress is leading to fatigue. Fatigue is a situation where an individual feels weak due to a lack of energy for a long period of time. As this article mentioned earlier, stress limits the sleeping capability of individuals, creating irregular sleeping patterns. This causes a reduction in their energy to perform daily activities as they feel drained.
- Depression
Depression is a major illness that individuals face due to stress. More than 3.7% of the world population suffers from Depression. Depression refers to an individual feeling a low mood and feeling helpless. People who experience Depression often experience overthinking, do not understand self-worth, feel hopeless and helpless, and feel guilty, which reduces their mental well-being significantly.
- Anxiety
Anxiety is another key mental health situation where individuals feel unpleasant and feel drained over an unpleasant situation. When an individual is facing anxiety, their focus on their well-being significantly reduces. This focus is reducing because individuals do not understand their self-worth. This potentially creates various risks of mental and physical diseases.
- Other issues
Stress can cause significant damage to the immune systems of individuals. This is mainly because stress promotes unhealthy behavior, including irregular sleeping patterns, reduces healthy eating behavior, and reduces individuals’ hygienic behaviors. Most individuals who face stress are experiencing various diseases because of this unhealthy behavior. This indicates the impact of stress on a weakened immune system.
As well as stress causes damage to the digestive system. When an individual suffers from stress, it can cause damage to their digestive system, potentially leading to sicknesses, including Diarrhea and Nausea. This is mainly because when an individual consistently faces stress, it leads to unhealthy eating patterns backed by significant development of hormones.
As well as some individuals experiencing reduced beauty due to stress. This is caused by lack of sleep and unhealthy eating patterns, and this mainly includes hair loss and Acne. Individuals also face failure to develop relationships with families, friends, or society because of stress, and they struggle to manage their daily activities effectively.
How to Overcome Stress
Stress can be overcome in various ways. These can be explained as follows.
Communication: Communicate feelings with others.
Counseling: Seek help from a professional counseling service. If someone is suffering from stress for long-term, this is highly recommended.
Avoidance Strategies: Limit late-night mobile phone usage and social media use to mitigate the effects of social media on people.
Entertainment: Listening to songs, watching funny videos, and walking outside allows individuals to change their focus of individuals, which potentially reduces stress.
Changes in lifestyle: Changes in lifestyle have a significant impact on reducing stress. This involves get sufficient sleep, eating healthy foods, drinking sufficient water, and regular exercise.
Conclusion
Stress is leading to the creation of various mental and physical health diseases and potentially hinders the well-being of individuals. Stress is the most common issue in the modern competitive world. Human lifestyle is changing rapidly, creating a challenging environment filled with numerous responsibilities. In the 21st century, mental health is considered an important factor that allows a person to develop successfully. Stress is considered emotional strain and pressure, as well as mental discomfort that occurs when an individual is facing a challenging situation. When an individual faces stress, it can hinder their ability to ensure their well-being. Therefore, addressing stress is vital to ensure individuals’ health and well-being.
