Yale Health

Managing Stress

Stress is a physical, mental, or emotional strain or tension. Stress is not a disease and is a normal part of everyone's life. Stress occurs in all kinds of situations and different people perceive different situations as stressful. Stress management refers to the effort to control and reduce the tension that occurs with a situation that is considered difficult or unmanageable. To help reduce tension, consider the following suggestions:

  • Good social support plays an important role in keeping everyday tension down: make an effort to interact with people more personally, reach out to friends, nurture yourself and others.

  • Taking time for personal interests and hobbies is a great way to relax. Relaxation is a key in dealing with stress and there exist many techniques about which you can find out on the Relaxing page.

  • Managing your time efficiently will help you improve the quality of your life.  Visit our Managing Time page for more information.

  • Review the situation and your view of it. Control the stressors that you can. Your reaction to each situation determines whether it will be stressful or not.

  • Start or maintain an individualized exercise program: decide on a specific time, type, frequency, and level of physical activity and try to exercise regularly.

  • Improve your nutrition: eat foods that improve health at a reasonable schedule. Use the food guide pyramid to help select healthy food choices. You can find more information on healthy food on our Nutrition page.

Helpful Web Resources