Allen Elkin, PhD, is a clinical psychologist, certified sex therapist, and the former director of the Stress Management & Counseling Center in New York City. He appears frequently on Today, Good Morning America, and Good Day New York, as well as on programs of PBS, CNN, FNN, Fox 5, and National Public Radio.

Introduction 1

About This Book 1

Conventions Used in This Book 2

Foolish Assumptions 3

Icons Used in This Book 3

Beyond the Book 4

Where to Go from Here 4

Part 1: Stress Management: Where to Start 5

Chapter 1: Stressed Out? Welcome to the Club! 7

Experiencing a Stress Epidemic? 7

Individual or personal stressors 8

Shared or collective stressors 9

Understanding Where All This Stress Is Coming From 10

The lingering pandemic 10

A nation under stress 11

The political divide 11

Struggling in a struggling economy 12

Getting frazzled at work 12

The gender divide 13

Feeling frazzled at home 14

Dealing with daily hassles 15

Looking at the Signs and Symptoms of Stress 17

Understanding How Stress Can Make You Sick 18

Understanding how stress can be a pain in the neck (and other places) 18

Taking stress to heart 19

Hitting below the belt 20

Compromising your immune system 20

The cold facts: Connecting stress and the sniffles 21

Stressing Out Your Friends and Family 22

Your relationships 22

Your libido 22

Your kids 22

Can Stress Be Good? 23

Chapter 2: Stress Explained (in Surprisingly Few Pages) 25

So What Is Stress Anyhow? 25

Defining stress 26

Stress causes stress? 27

How This Whole Stress Thing Got Started 27

Imagining you're a cave person 28

Surviving the modern jungle 28

Understanding the Signs of Stress 29

Your body reacts 29

Your feelings and behavior change 31

Understanding Stress Is as Simple as ABC 33

Managing Stress: A Three-Pronged Approach 34

Managing your stressors 34

Changing your thoughts 35

Managing your stress responses 36

Tuning Your Strings: Finding the Right Balance 36

Chapter 3: Identifying Your Stress Triggers and Responses 37

How Stressed Are You? Finding Ways to Measure Your Stress Level 38

Starting with a simple gut check 38

Using a stress gauge 38

Measuring your stress in other ways 39

Monitoring Your Stress with a Stress Journal 43

Knowing how to record your stress 44

Knowing when to record your stress 47

Facing Roadblocks 47

Taking it a step at a time 48

Giving it a try 48

Accepting your different strokes 48

Practicing for the Long Haul 49

Finding a quiet place 49

Linking up 49

Getting a stress buddy 49

Being patient with the process 50

Chapter 4: Reducing Your Technostress 51

Living in a Technological World 52

Benefiting from all of this technology 52

Stressing about all of this technology 53

Worrying about Cybersecurity 54

Outsmarting the scammers 55

Feeling romantic? 56

Stressing Out with Social Media 57

Tuning in so you can tune out 57

Reducing social media stress 59

Managing Your Tech Diet 60

Minimizing your digital overload 60

Creating a work-life balance 62

Part 2: Mastering the Basics 63

Chapter 5: Relaxing Your Body 65

Stress Can Be a Pain in the Neck (And That's Just for Starters) 66

Funny, I don't feel tense 67

Invasion of the body scan 67

Breathing Away Your Tension 68

Your breath is fine It's your breathing that's bad 69

"Why change now? I've been breathing for years." 69

Evaluating your breathing 70

Cutting yourself some slack 71

Changing the way you breathe, changing the way you feel 71

The yawn that refreshes 74

Tensing Your Way to Relaxation 75

Exploring how progressive muscle relaxation works 75

Scrunching up like a pretzel 78

Using the Power of Suggestion 79

Stretching Away Your Stress 81

Massage? Ah, There's the Rub! 82

Massaging yourself 83

Becoming the massage-er or massage-ee 85

Taking a Three-Minute Energy Burst 86

Experimenting with More Ways to Relax 86

Chapter 6: Quieting Your Mind 89

Where Do All These Thoughts Come From!? 90

Sorting out your thoughts 91

Thinking automatically 91

Turning Off Your Mind 92

Stopping your unwanted thoughts 92

Snapping out of it 94

Distracting Yourself 94

Using Your Imagination 95

What, Me Worry? 98

Scheduling your worries 98

Blowing up your worries 98

Striking up the band (or better yet, the string quartet) 99

Visiting the rainforest 100

Using some common scents 100

Doing Nothing: Meditation Is Good for You 102

East comes West 102

How meditation helps 103

It's harder than it looks 103

Preparing to meditate 103

Practicing meditative breathing 105

Meditating with a mantra 106

Finding time for mini-meditations 107

Hypnotizing Yourself 107

No, you won't turn into a clucking chicken 108

Surprise! You've already been hypnotized 108

Considering the power of a trance 108

Inducing a light trance 109

Going a little deeper 110

Returning to the world 110

Going Digital 111

Chapter 7: Cultivating Mindfulness 113

Understanding Mindfulness 113

Defining mindfulness 114

Dispelling myths about mindfulness 115

Figuring out whether mindfulness is right for you 116

Recognizing Mindlessness 116

Going on autopilot: The good, the bad, and the really bad 117

Mindless multitasking 118

Understanding How Mindfulness Can Help Reduce Your Stress 120

Developing the Skills of Mindfulness 123

Staying in the present 123

Meditating mindfully 123

Revisiting your daily routines 124

Learning how to detach 126

Controlling your attention 127

Reframing Stressful Thoughts and Emotions 129

Chapter 8: Developing Stress-Reducing Organizational Skills 131

Figuring Out Why Your Life Is So Disorganized 132

Are you organizationally challenged? 132

Identifying your personal disorganization 133

Clearing Away the Clutter 134

Eliminating those clutter excuses 134

Getting motivated 137

Drawing yourself a clutter roadmap 137

Getting your feet wet 138

Stop kidding yourself 138

Avoiding discouragement 139

Getting down to the nitty-gritty 140

Organizing Your Space 142

Organizing Information 144

Losing the paper trail 144

Organizing the papers you do need to keep 145

Organizing electronically 149

Managing your email 151

Keeping Your Life Organized 152

Being proactive 152

Buying less 152

Chapter 9: Finding More Time 155

Determining Whether You Struggle with Time Management 156

Becoming Mindful of Your Time 156

Knowing where your time goes 157

Figuring out what you want more time for 158

Knowing what you want to spend less time doing 159

Minding your time with cues and prompts 159

Questioning your choices and changing behaviors 160

Becoming a List Maker 161

Prioritizing and minimizing overload 162

Creating a do-today list 163

Having a do-later list 164

Keeping some tips in mind as you make your lists 165

Minimizing Your Distractions and Interruptions 167

Managing electronic interruptions 167

Losing the visitors 167

Lowering the volume 168

Limiting your breaks 168

Shifting your time 169

Managing interruptions 169

Using your screen time wisely 169

Winning the waiting game 170

Crashing Through Time Management Roadblocks 171

Getting over the desire to be perfect 171

Overcoming procrastination 172

Discovering the Benefits of Delegating 174

The fine art of delegating 174

Delegating begins at home 175

Buying Time 176

Chapter 10: Eating, Exercising, and Getting Your Zzzs 177

Stress-Reducing Eating 178

Understanding the food-mood connection 178

Choosing low-stress foods 178

Avoiding high-stress foods 181

Stopping the stress-eating cycle 182

Eating mindfully 186

Mastering the art of anti-stress snacking 187

Eating out healthily 187

Incorporating Stress-Reducing Exercise and Activity 189

Calming your brain naturally 189

Thinking activity, not exercise 190

Doing the gym thing 192

Sweating at home 192

Staying motivated 193

Getting a Good Night's Sleep 194

Checking for medical problems 195

Recognizing the signs and symptoms of insomnia 195

Keeping a sleep journal 196

Hitting the sheets earlier 197

Adopting other sleep hygiene practices 197

Staying asleep 202

Part 3: the Secrets of Resilience 207

Chapter 11: Understanding How Your Thinking Stresses You Out 209

Creating Your Own Stress 209

Stress at 30,000 feet: Flight and fright 210

The presentation from hell 210

Remembering Your ABCs 211

It's not exactly a new idea 212

It's the thought that counts 212

Separating Thoughts from Feelings 214

Understanding Your Stress-Producing Thinking 215

Figuring out whether your thinking is the problem 215

Understanding your automatic thoughts 216

Uncovering your hidden thoughts 216

Identifying Your Thinking Errors 217

Catastrophizing and awfulizing 217

Fortune telling 218

Can't-stand-it-itis 218

What-if-ing 219

Overgeneralizing 220

Mind reading and conclusion-jumping 221