Sunday, April 8, 2007

You Could Be Stressed Out Because...

Believe it or not, but stress begins at your doorstep. A difference of opinion, high expectations, death of a loved one can all contribute in some little way to causing you stress. Domestic stress can be because of personal, economic, social/religious and situational/external factors or events.

Personal Factors: that can cause stress include personality characteristics and coping skills, expectations that one has from family and oneself, understanding with spouse, emotional attachment, feeling of guilt for not being able to spend time at home, eating and sleeping habits and rigidity. If your income cannot support your family, your job prospects are low or if you have sudden expenses, you could be under stress due to economic reasons.

Situational factors: over which you may have no control, such as deaths or births, divorce, altercation with neighbours, illness or retirement, financial loss, or unsuccessful completion of daily activities could all lead to domestic stress.

Changing value systems: a lack of effective leadership, corruption, and bureaucracy affect both your economic and social lives directly, thus directly or indirectly causing stress. Increasing ambitions, growing desires and a tendency to become more and more materialistic has become the order of the day. We all want to be rich and successful and for that we struggle very hard. Beware, for this can take a toll on your health and consequently increase stress.

Your personality: can also determine how stress prone you are. If you are constantly worried about what will happen and what could happen, there will be no end to your stress. Another factor that adds to your stress is your belief systems. These affect your personality directly.
Beliefs are what you have acquired from your family and society and these affect your characteristics, behaviour and thoughts. The way you perceive stress, your lifestyle, your working style, relationship with your family, perception of others, attitude towards others and priorities all depend on your personality. Whether the stressors are environmental or social will depend upon the personality they effect.