Stress literally means physical, mental, or emotional strain or tension. Stress, may sometimes result in a negative outcome. We hear so much about stress related to examinations and how it takes a toll on the students. So, stress can be harmful in certain situations it may even lead to unconventional behaviour, depression or loss of confidence in many. As a result, to start managing your stress you need to identify the factors responsible for creating stress in and around you. The definition for stress management provided by Richard Lazarus and Susan Folkman says that stress is a result of an “imbalance between demands and resources” or occurring when “pressure exceeds one's perceived ability to cope”.

Therefore, management of stress was developed on the idea that stress is not a direct response to a stressor but on one's resources and ability to respond to a situation. In other words the creation of stress has three parts: the aim, the expectation and the result.

Stress may affect a person physiologically too. People, who get anxious quickly, may display physical symptoms of stress. In a demanding situation the brain prepares the body for defensive action by releasing cortisone and adrenaline, which are stress hormones. These hormones raise the blood pressure and the body prepares to react to the situation.

When we fail to offset a stress situation the hormones and chemicals stay unreleased in the blood stream for a long period of time. This results in stress associated physical symptoms such as tense muscles, unfocused anxiety, dizziness and rapid heartbeats.

When we think of the people who suffer from stress, it is amazing to know that just about everybody men, women, children suffer from stress. Age is no bar; in fact we come across many cases where children get stressed out due to one reason or the other. The reasons are many; it could be demands of a relationship, unremitting health problems, demands at workplaces, traffic jams, meeting deadlines, growing-up tensions or finance related problems. People respond to it in their own ways. In some people, stress-induced adverse feelings and anxieties tend to persevere and cause mental and physical problems.
However, once we have understood the first part, which is the reason for the stress, it should be easy to find the solution. There are a number of ways to reduce stress.

In India, we thankfully have the panacea for all illnesses and that is yoga. Yoga is increasingly being used to relieve oneself of stress. The ancient practice of meditation is being taken up by people to relieve them of stress. It is very important to build a certain lifestyle for oneself, which integrates stress-busters. It is very essential to take off for at least 15-20 minutes everyday and pursue some activity, which takes you away from your work. It could be listening to music, meditation, and yoga or may be some vigourous physical activity like a game of lawn tennis.

This exercise will consciously reduce the stress and put you in a better frame of mind. Once the stress has been relieved, you can now think of the real reason for the stress and find a solution to remove it permanently. In the office it could be the result of a conflict. Once the stress is gone, you will realise how easy it is to talk over things with your boss or colleagues and resolve issues. In case you have problem of keeping deadline, start managing your time better. We hear of so many cases of road rage. It is all very momentary, if one were able to control oneself consciously for that moment, the terrible desire to lash out would pass.

As a child we were told to take deep breaths and count up to ten in a moment of anger, this was a great way to manage anger in a situation, which was threatening to go bad. This singular action taught us to recognise a bad situation, take preventive action and manage stress!