National Stress Awareness Month: What is it and what can you do?

What is it?

April is National Stress Awareness Month. Let’s be honest, we’ve all been in stressful situations in our lives and we want to bring attention to the negative impacts of stress. Knowing how to manage stress is an essential aspect for a healthy lifestyle and can dramatically improve mental and physical well-being. Unfortunately, we don’t all know how to manage and cope with stress🙁

This year’s theme of National Stress Awareness Month is #choosehope. Hope is not just a feeling, but rather, it inspires us to take action towards a decision to perceive things differently and make changes to achieve a desired goal and decrease stress.

30 Day Challenge

You may have heard of this challenge before, but for those that haven’t, it only takes 30 days to turn an action into a habit. It only takes one action each for your mental, physical and emotional well-being to drastically decrease your stress levels. Why not turn these actions into habits? The 30 Day Challenge allows you to make positive and permanent changes in your behaviour and lifestyle💪

What can you do?

💬Talk about stress and it’s effects: let’s end the stigma!

💚Share your coping mechanisms: this could really help someone else out

😍Be kind to those who may feel stressed or anxious

🛀Look after yourself: self care can go a long way in decreasing stress, so make sure you do something you enjoy!

Top tips to decrease stress:

🏃‍♀️Get more physical activity (this can just be a walk)

🥒Follow a healthy and balanced diet

📵Minimise your screen time

☕Reduce your caffeine intake

💤Avoid procrastination

🌳Spend time in nature

👪Spend time with friends and family

Tips from us:

📚Dedicate time to learn a new skill

🐕Get/borrow/walk a dog: this will force you to get some fresh air and you’ll get some puppy love as an added bonus!

🙅‍♀️Organised time with your friends but don’t feel like it anymore? Learn to say no to things, it’s okay!

📵Have a gadget free night

🗞️Turn off the news (the news can get pretty dark so try to turn this off, especially before bed)