How to Stop Suffocating in Stress

Or 20 ways to survive finals week

What are some stressful situations that occur far too frequently? Schoolwork, tests, extracurricular competitions, relationship drama, and college applications are all stressors shared by most of Overlake’s high school students. In the midst of all this, we can feel suffocated in stress without any means of escape in sight. A lot of Overlakers don’t want to confront stress because they fear doing so will make them more stressed! This mindset regarding stress management is, in fact, incredibly harmful, so take a deep breaths, tune out, and destress with these methods from Overlake’s learning specialist, Susan Lin.

Health is mental and physical, and stress in either of the two can influence stress in the other. When someone is mentally stressed, their physical health may decline, while physical fatigue can also cause mental stress. Managing psychological and physical stress is incredibly important! Susan Lin says destressing breaks “can be three minutes, five minutes, it doesn’t have to be […] very long.” The following methods are all from stress management tip lists that can be found in the school counselor’s office, so drop by if you’d like more information. Her favorite studying methods of the ones listed are the to-do list with prioritizing and the Pomodoro timer. According to Susan, the most important step is simply “getting started, and knowing my tasks, [which] are the hardest things. […] Once you get started, you can do it!”

So what are these methods?

For physical stress:
Aerobic exercise/change it up
This will help you to use up the adrenaline and cortisol released in the stress response. Exercise so that your heart rate is up for at least 10 minutes. Even if you don’t go to full aerobic exercise, change what you’re doing. Get up and get moving — do stretches, jumping jacks, take a walk, dance crazy, get a fidget toy, go get a hug, sing.

Deep breathing
Breathe so deeply that your stomach goes out. Inhale slowly for 4 seconds, exhale for 4 seconds. Practice daily for at least 10 breaths in order to train your body to relax.

Progressive muscle relaxation
Tense and then relax muscle groups one at a time. Tense your muscles in one group for 5 seconds, while breathing deeply. Do as many times as it takes for the muscles to stay relaxed. Start at your feet and then work your way up feet, legs, abdomen, shoulders, neck, and face.

Sleep!
Your body and mind heal themselves from stress when they are asleep!

For mental and emotional stress:
Think the truth
Sometimes, how we think about a challenge produces more stress than is necessary. Follow this simple process for checking and challenging any particular thought. When you feel stressed, notice your thoughts. Ask yourself: Is this true? What’s the evidence that it’s true? If it’s not completely true, change it, and practice thinking the truth.

Mental practice
Imagine yourself successfully taking the test, making the presentation, or doing whatever it is that makes you nervous. Instead of practicing anticipated failure, make your mind practice success. Then expect the success you have imagined.

Take breaks from thinking about the stressor
Adrenaline will be released when you think about something stressful. Discipline your mind and give yourself a break. Those breaks can be spent listening to music, meditating, practicing mindfulness, getting a snack, playing with a pet, etc.

Peaceful imagery
Imagine a peaceful memory or place. Imagine what it looks like, sounds like, smells like, and how you feel. Imagine it until you feel peaceful. Before you begin a stressful challenge, such as a test, take a few seconds to remind yourself of that peaceful place.

5 senses break
Spend some moments to simply focus on one of your 5 senses. Then proceed through the rest of your senses in turn: What do you see? What do you hear? What do you smell? How do you feel? What do you taste? This gives your brain a rest by refocusing on your body, combating both anxiety and depression.

Gratitude
The best way to be grateful for what you already have is to make a list every day. Humans tend to take the good stuff for granted. A gratitude list can help prevent this from happening. Some people think they should only list the big things (ex. home, job, family, or savings account). But you can also express gratitude for simple, mundane, boring, everyday things.

Seek support
Talk to teachers, friends, family, school counselors, and learning specialists. Get coaching on how to manage your particular stresses!

For mental and emotional stress but you don’t have time for all that:
Too many times we find ourselves overwhelmed with too much work and too little time, causing more stress with no time to resolve. Good news, though — the previously listed methods can be done in under 3 minutes! Don’t feel rushed to finish fast while doing them, all of the mental destressing methods really just take a couple minutes or seconds of head-down time.

For academic management:
School can cause a lot of stress in students’ lives. While destressing is extremely important, homework or studying doesn’t go away by taking deep breaths. What can be done to minimize stressful work?

Time tracker apps
Check out Forest, Moment, or other time-tracking apps that help you resist the urge to multi-task and help to put you in control of your time.

Change scenery
Change where you study for a shift in your attention.

Motivate yourself
Use a reward, such as a fun break, for finishing something you read doing.

Mono-task
For at least the first part of homework time, try putting the phone in the other room, not responding to messages/alerts, and turning off music. Every time you switch attention or feed your brain multiple thoughts, your productivity slows, as research has shown. Go for peak concentration to reduce your time.

Homework plan
Sandwich tough tasks with not-so-tough tasks. Make a plan before starting and estimate the time you will need.

Office hours
Try starting your homework in office hours; you might end up having a question. You might hear someone else ask a question that you didn’t know you needed.

Prioritize
Ask yourself, “What is essential right now?”

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

The one that I find most helpful for emotional stress is the “5 Senses Break.” It’s when you focus on specific sensory aspects of something you like, such as a favorite food or song. What does it smell like? How does it feel? If you focus hard on small details in the big moment, it can take you out of the stress of the big picture. I would recommend this method, as it is easy, takes little time, and is very relaxing.

“Peaceful imagery” is another method that may work in specific situations and is supposed to calm you down by taking you to a happy place. When you’re stressed about things that you can’t control, imagining a calm landscape or calling up a happy memory can calm you down enough to get unproductive stress out of the way. The goal is to simply step back from your stressor and go back to the basics of existing as a human.

So there you have it! Stress can sometimes seem like an unmanageable burden, but by using multiple, small destressing methods, it is possible to manage it.