There is no shortage of advice on how to handle stress, but a well-meaning friend’s advice or a simple internet search often yields tips that aren’t as effective as they seem. At best, these techniques can be a waste of time, money, or energy, or a distraction from stress management techniques that work far better. At worst, they can cause damage, lead to unhealthy habits, interfere with medications, or create more stress instead of minimizing it. The following stress-management strategies are common but misleading. Some are overhyped or don’t have enough research behind them. The promise of venting and receiving emotional support is the idea of releasing the stress you are feeling inside. More often though, it feels magnified as the focus remains on the problems you face rather than potentially workable solutions. This will get you stuck in a negative, stressed state of mind, and continuous venting can become a habit—an unhealthy one at that.
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Finding the right kind of support. While venting to a friend may not be the best long-term strategy for stress relief, finding a friend that can help reframe your situation in a positive way is effective. Your body’s stress response is triggered when you perceive a threat to your safety or to the status quo. If you or someone else can show yourself that the danger isn’t as threatening as it seems (and it usually isn’t), and if you can remind yourself of the resources you have available, you will feel less stressed by what you face. You can also take advantage of resources you may not have realized you had. Either way, if you can get practical help from a friend—what’s called instrumental social support—this can relieve significant stress. While these rooms can be a fun night out with friends or even a cathartic novelty experience to try, they don’t function as well as other stress management techniques. Once in awhile, anger rooms may work, but to have it as a go-to stress management technique is not realistic and can backfire. Smashing things with a hammer can provide a healthy dose of cardio, but there are more cost-effective ways to get exercise.
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Planning. For some people, taking charge and coming up with a to-do list or schedule feels hands-on and helpful. This may mean drawing up a list of what needs to be done the next day or week so that you can relax in the knowledge that you’re not forgetting anything. Keep in mind that different coping mechanisms are needed for different emotions. If you think throwing things could help your stress in a particular situation, a better alternative might be a burst of cardio. Researcher Thomas Lenz from Creighton University in Nebraska conducted a review of several studies on herbal supplements and found the following:
Kava: This supplement has been found to significantly lower anxiety but has been linked to liver failure, so it may not be safe to take. St. John’s Wort: Several studies have found this supplement to be effective for treating mild anxiety and other negative emotional states, but some studies have found no effect. Valerian Root: This herb, taken in conjunction with St. John’s Wort, has been found to be effective for anxiety and sleep disorders, even rivaling diazepam in effectiveness after two weeks. However, studies are conflicting in these findings. Lower doses have been found to be safe, but higher doses may create changes in heart rhythm and vision.
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Aromatherapy. While many might expect to find aromatherapy on the list of things that don’t work for stress relief, research does find that aromatherapy can be helpful. For example, lemon balm has been found to be effective. The best part? Aromatherapy is cheap and easy to incorporate into your life. A study conducted in Spain examined different coping techniques and their connection with negative emotional states and heart disease. Researchers found that denial was a coping strategy that had more negative consequences than positive ones, contributing to negative feelings and higher heart disease risks. Without obsessing, it helps to face problems straight-on and change what you can in the situation. If you engage in denial long enough, it may become too late to stop things from getting worse.
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Distraction. While denial isn’t the most effective coping strategy, distraction has been found to be helpful. This means that you face a problem and then let it go by focusing on something else that’s less anxiety-provoking and more relaxing. Do your best in a situation and then move on from it until you’re able to do something else. In the moment, it may feel like a relief to leave a stressful situation or dump a person who seems to be creating stress in your life, and sometimes that is the best long-term solution. However, we may all too often give up and disengage—losing something that still may have value—when we can potentially salvage the situation and create something better and stronger than we had before. This means that sometimes it can feel stressful to work through a conflict with a friend, but dumping the friend before attempting to discuss and solve the problem can mean losing a potentially good friend and even creating an enemy, which can cause more stress in the future. The same holds true for jobs—leaving a stressful job before attempting to solve the problems that create stress can make for a more anxiety-provoking situation in the long run. Remember, this doesn’t mean that you should never part ways with a toxic friend and that you should stay at a stressful job for decades. It just means that leaving a situation without trying to salvage it—engaging in “avoidance coping” as your go-to strategy—can ultimately create more stress.
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Active coping. This has been found in many studies to be the best way to deal with stressful situations in your life. This means that you change what you can rather than just complaining or trying to avoid facing it. If you find yourself examining what went wrong and taking responsibility for what you can change and do differently next time, this is fine. If this slips into beating yourself up for not knowing better, gently remind yourself that now you know better and can do better, and congratulate yourself on a learning experience then move on.
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Humor. Finding a way to laugh in the face of stress is a quick way to feel more relaxed physically and emotionally. It helps you to look at things in a different way, distract yourself, and feel closer to others. It can even help you to more easily accept what you can’t change and ease away from blaming yourself.
