Spray Nutrients

There’s a reason that stress management strategies need to be an essential part of every woman’s menopausal self-care program. Let’s face it, menopause is a stressful time in our lives.

Stress is a menace that knows no boundaries. We all feel it and its effects on our lives. It must be acknowledged and handled. And while we can all point to different “stressful” aspects of life, whether they be family related, work related, health related or any other of the many possible options from the menu, we must also understand that stress can also be identified as a self-imposed mental state.

Yes, I know, it’s not easy to think of our stress as being self-imposed. It’s much easier to think it’s hoisted upon us. While life certainly does include stressful circumstances, the mental state with which we greet stress plays a LARGE role. So, in reducing stress and its effects we are striving for peace of mind. You cannot simultaneously experience tranquility and stress, in the same way that you cannot simultaneously experience joy and anger. How do you capture peace of mind?

Good question, and one that’s been asked throughout time. And it’s an important question to ask because it acknowledges that we have the power within us to be at peace, or at least more peaceful. We have the ability to make stress less menacing so that the symptoms of stress, whether they are related to menopausal symptoms or not, do not get the best of us.

Where to begin? First, recognize that peace of mind does not shift with changing circumstances. If you have peace of mind, you can handle both adversity and good fortune with calm confidence. With peace of mind, your thought process stays the course and does not swing back and forth depending on the events of your life. With peace of mind your moods don’t meander all over the place. It’s how you think about events that sets the tone for peace.

We will all have to handle fear, loneliness, rejection, illness, death, financial misfortunes, and loss of love during the course of our lives. Where we differ from one another is in how each of us handles these feelings and events as they come into our lives. This, to a large extent, will determine whether our lives will be stressful or tranquil.

Here are 3 tips for developing a powerful and less stressful mind-set.

Tip #1 Accept the inevitable.

There are some things you simply can’t do anything about. Discernment is KEY. What is difficult, but something you CAN DO something about, is very different from the inevitable. Accepting the inevitable is not being negative, it’s actually positive.

What’s negative is not being able to ignore the inevitable and move on with your life. We’ve all heard the saying, “Life is 10 percent what happens to you and 90 percent how you react to it.” Accepting the inevitable and focusing on the things you CAN do something about is virtually guaranteed to lower your stress level!

Tip #2 Understand that life isn’t perfect or necessarily fair.

You can reduce your stress by accepting the reality that there is no perfect child, parent, spouse, home, city, or job. Think about some of the things you perceive must be perfect in order for you to be at peace. See if you can change your mind-set and lower your stress level.

Tip #3 Let go of worrying and stewing about problems that don’t exist.

Do you live in a “what if” world?

Do you project that everything that can go wrong will go wrong? Do you fret about menopausal symptoms you don’t have, but could? Do you worry about other health conditions?

When the results of your routine physical, pap smear, or mammogram come back negative, you feel relieved. Until you get the results it’s easy for you to stress out. But that’s a good example of being stressed over a problem that doesn’t exist. The problem becomes real only if, and when, the results come back positive.

Reflect on a time when you “supposed” and got all stressed out, only to find it didn’t turn out like you anticipated it would. Stress starts in our minds with our imaginations. If you dwell on what might happen in your life, then you can’t focus on what actually IS happening!

Remember these three tips: accept the inevitable, recognize that life is not perfect or fair, and let go of stewing about problems. Use them as ways to trade your stress for some peace of mind. This will make the stress you feel during menopause much more manageable.