Q: Ok! What are the first things that I have do to manage my stress?

A: There are two things that you have to do:

1. Be aware of what your body is telling you all the time (discussed before)
2. Be aware of what your mind is telling you all the time (self-talk).

Q: Am I crazy! I never talk to myself!

A: No! You are not crazy, but the mind subconsciously telling you somethings that put you down and the body reacts to these thinking.

Q: What are these self-talk?

A: It is an internal dialogue which is quite normal and very useful. In fact, inner conversations have a powerful impact on emotional well-being. Becoming aware of exactly what you are saying to yourself can help you understand why you react the way you do to events and people in your life.

Self-talk is so automatic and subtle that you often don’t notice it or the effect it has on your mood. You react without noticing what you told yourself right before you reacted. Thus, it’s important to step back and see the connection between what you say to yourself and how you react to situations. One way to become more aware of self-talk is to work backwards. When you notice yourself experiencing a strong emotion (e.g., anger, depression, guilt, joy), ask yourself what is occurring. What is the situation? And then ask yourself what you are saying to yourself about the situation. What thoughts are running through my head?

The Common Types Of Negative Self-Talk Are:

1. All-or-None Thinking
You see things in black-or-white categories. If your performance falls short of perfect, you see yourself as a total failure. Example: When a young woman on a diet ate a spoonful of ice cream, she told herself, “I’ve blown my diet completely.”

2. Overgeneralization
You see a single negative event as a never-ending pattern of defeat by using words such as “always” or “never” when you think about it. Example: You’re having a bad day with a lot of pain, and you tell yourself, “I’m always feeling crappy and it will never change.”

3. Mental Filer
You pick out a single negative detail and dwell on it exclusively so that your vision of all of reality becomes darkened, like the drop of ink that discolors a glass of water. Example: You receive many positive comments about your work, but one person reacted critically, and you obsess about his reaction for days.

4. Disqualifying the Positive
You reject positive experiences by insisting they “don’t count” for some reason or other. Example: When a friend compliments you, you tell yourself, “She’s just saying that to be nice.”

5. Jumping to Conclusions
You interpret things negatively when there are no definite facts to support your conclusion. A. Mind Reading: You arbitrarily conclude that someone is reacting negatively to you without checking it out. Example: A friend doesn’t return your call so you tell yourself, “She probably doesn’t like me anymore.”

6. Fortune-Telling Error:
You anticipate that things will turn out badly, so you constantly predict disasters. Example: Before going on vacation, you tell yourself over and over, “I’m going to have a terrible time because I’m in so much pain. You may work yourself into such an agitated state that these direct predictions become self-fulfilling prophecies. Then you conclude, “I was right all along.”

7. Magnification or Catastrophizing
You exaggerate the importance of your errors or problems. Example: You forget someone’s name when you’re introducing him or her, and you tell yourself, “This is terrible. I am an awful person.”

8. Emotional Reasoning
You assume that your negative emotions necessarily reflect the way things really are. “I feel terrified about flying on airplanes” means “It’s very dangerous to fly.” Or “I feel guilty” means “I did something bad.” Or “I feel angry” means “I’m being treated unfairly.”

9. Should Statements
You try to motivate yourself to do better with “shoulds” and “should nots.” Example: After playing a difficult piece on the piano, a gifted pianist says to herself, “I shouldn’t have made so many mistakes.” When you direct “should” statements at yourself, you will usually feel anger or frustration.

10. Labeling
This is an extreme form of overgeneralization. You attach a negative label to yourself or to others. “I’m a loser. He’s a jerk.” Labeling is destructive because you tend to feel the problem is with a person’s defective character.

11. Personalization

You blame yourself for an event you were not responsible for. Example: When it rained on your outdoor dinner party, you told yourself, “It’s all my fault that the party has been mined.”