What is Your Stress Level?

Shirley Noah Leave a comment
What is Your Stress Level?
Stress Level

How Can You Measure Your Stress Level?

How often do you practice the power of appreciation and an “attitude of gratitude” throughout the day?

Do you practice a stress management method, meditation, etc?

When do you feel “stressed out”?

Stress is your response to unusual demands made on you.  You can respond positively or negatively, which is distress.  Because the  effects of your stress level depends on your response to the demands, you may often be your own worst enemy.

Stress causes hormones in your hypothalamus (an are of your brain stem) to be secreted.  As a result, this causes the pituitary gland to stimulate the production of adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH).  ACTH travels through the blood stream from the pituitary gland to the adrenal gland.  The adrenal gland stimulates the release of cortisol.  Cortisol activates your brain’s reward center and increases levels of insulin in the blood stream, stimulating the desire for high-fat high-sugar foods.

Here are Ten Ways to Lower Your Stress Level:

 

1.  Ask for help.  It’s OK for you to ask family and friends to help you out.  You do not get a Super Man award for trying to do it all.  In fact, you may be so overwhelmed that staying committed to your healthy lifestyle is much harder than when you have others to help you along the way.

2.  Keep exercising. Exercising can be tough when you feel as though you are being pulled in a thousand different directions.  As you are aware, exercise is a big stress reliever.  Even if you can’t keep up with your normal exercise routine, go for a quick walk or stair climbing.

How to Measure Your Stress Level and 10 Ways to Reduce Stress ~ ShirleyJNoah” Click To Tweet

3.  Trust.  In Stephen Covey’s book Speed of Trust, he says people must be able to trust before they feel it. Why trust? The simple, often overlooked fact is this: work gets done with and through people. This book offers an unprecedented and eminently practical look at exactly how trust functions in every transaction and every relationship—from the most personal to the broadest, most indirect interaction.Rest is important.  Sleep and rest help us recharge our batteries.  This is when our body does repair work we need so much.

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What to Eat to Prevent or Reverse Disease

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Be Proactive in Preventing or Reversing Disease.

Eat to Prevent or Reverse Disease
Eat to Prevent or Reverse Disease

This is why I recently read How Not to Die, by Michael Greger with Gene Stone and founder of Nutrionfacts.org a self-sustaining non-profit organization.   Their mission is to empower individuals to share what to eat to prevent and reverse disease and make it accessible and available to everyone.  In the book Greger lays out specifics for preventing, arresting or reversing our leading health killers.  He has found that people don’t die of old age but die from disease, most commonly heart attack.

Perfect reading to Prevent or Reverse Disease

The book is fantastic, and I highly recommend it to everyone who is looking to prevent a premature death.  He states that our diet is the number one cause of our diseases.

Back in 1903, Thomas Edison predicted that “the doctor of the future will give no medicines, but will instruct the patient in the care of (the) human frame in diet and in the cause and prevention of diseases”.

There is a pandemic of chronic diseases dominated by a diet of animal sourced and processed food or for example:

  • Meat
  • Dairy
  • Eggs
  • Oils
  • Soda
  • Sugar
  • Refined grains

Use Whole Plant Foods and Minimize Animal Based Foods

When we eat to prevent or reverse disease we should maximize the intake of whole plant foods and minimize animal based foods and processed junk food.  Dr. Greger simplified the equation to that of a  traffic light-just as the road signal green means OK to go, yellow caution and red-stop.

Green=unprocessed plant food

Yellow=Processed plant foods, unprocessed animal foods

Red=Ultra processed plant foods processed animal foods Read More

Is Social Media and Technology Stressing You Out?

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Social Media and Technology May Be Stressing You Out: Here are 5 Tips to Retrain Your Your Mind

It has only been a little more than the last decade since the launch Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. Along with that came the iPhone, iPad, Pinterest and Instagram.  Since then social media and technology stress and technology has grown by leaps and bounds.

Survey findings suggest that more than eight in ten Americans are attached to their gadgets on a typical day (86 percent say they constantly or often check their emails, texts and social media accounts). Read More