How To Manage Stress, Anxiety & Depression - Identify What Causes Stress

To be able to successfully cope with stress, it is absolutely imperative that the root cause of stress is identified. Fact is, you cannot solve a problem unless you identify what the problem is in the first place! As soon as you identify what causes stress, anxiety and depression, you'll be able to gain an insight as to how they are affecting you. From this point, empowering stress and anxiety management methods that conquer stressful illnesses can then be applied.

Usually, various causes of stress are listed in two groupings: Causes that are within you - internal and causes that are outside you - external. These groups can make identifying the root cause of stress more demanding as they complicate things by causing confusion to arise. We'll now look at why most of the causes of stress, anxiety and depression that are often placed in these categories are not quite right.

The majority of people will likely believe that the causes listed in the external grouping will be at the root of stressful illnesses. They are situations that happen in life that most of us will have to deal with. These include relationship problems, death of loved ones, finances, issues with work, moving home and family matters.

The key point to be aware of here is that no external event is the root cause of stressful illnesses. It simply isn't possible for circumstances, whether minor or major, to be at the root cause of stressful illnesses. This is due to the fact that 2 individuals may be confronted with similar circumstances, for instance, losing a job. The first enters into an episode of stress whereas the second doesn't. As external events do not trigger stress in each person experiencing them, they cannot be at the root cause.

Among the internal causes of stressful illnesses are a pessimistic outlook, talking to yourself negatively, unable to handle uncertainty and low self-confidence. Once more, such things are not the root cause, in fact, they are symptoms of stressful illnesses. Negative self-talk can arise when you make a mistake or something doesn't turn out as you hoped. Being unable to handle uncertainty doesn't cause stress, this is a response to situations and is part of the stress, not a cause.

And we've all come across individuals who have a negative outlook on life yet are not enduring episodes of stressful illnesses. There are also people who are shy and reserved but who don't suffer from stress, anxiety or depression as a result. But when you are suffering from stressful illnesses, even the most confident of people can lose their self-confidence and I would give myself as one such example.

OK, if all of those internal and external issues don't lie at the root of stressful illnesses, what does? There is only one thing that is at the root cause of stressful illnesses: The way in which you ascribe explanations to make sense out of each situation you face. It could be something as minor as driving on a freeway to something major such as relationship breakdown. When you assign single, bad-outcome, unfavorable interpretations to the circumstances confronting you, you arouse strong emotions which trigger stress and its related illnesses.

This flawed mode of thinking is what causes stress and its related illness and also provides us with an explanation as to why stress is aroused in some people but not in others when confronted with similar trying circumstances. Individuals who remain stress-free do so because they are equipped with powerful techniques and if you learn these techniques then stress, anxiety and depression will never enter into your life no matter what demanding situations confront you.