Definition of stress?

Stress has become the important malady of our time. The constant pressure associated with living in a fast-paced world has created an environment where nearly everyone feels the effects of stress.
Stress is a term used to describe the wear and tear the body experiences in reaction to everyday tensions and pressures. Change, illness, injury or career and lifestyle changes, are common causes of stress, however, it's the effects of stress, like pressure and tension, that we feel in response to the little everyday hassles—like rush hour traffic, waiting in line, and too many emails—that do the most damage.

Stress is the body and mind's response to any pressure that disrupts its normal balance. It occurs when our perception of events doesn't meet our expectations and we are unable to manage our reaction. As a response, stress expresses itself as resistance, tension, strain or frustration that throws off our physiological and psychological equilibrium, keeping us out of sync. If our equilibrium is disturbed for long, the stress can become disabling and create numerous health problems.

Stress and the effects of stress are often misunderstood. We look at outside events as the source of stress, but in fact stress is really caused by our emotional reactions to events. The stress we experience in today's world often goes unnoticed and unmanaged. Many people have simply adapted to stress in an unhealthy way, resigned to thinking it's “just the way it is”. Unfortunately, lack of stress managament has created a pandemic of low-grade anxiety and numerous health issues.

Health Effects of Stress?

The effects of stress in people are seen physically, mentally and emotionally. According to the American Institute of Stress, up to 90% of all health problems may be related to stress. Too much stress can contribute to and agitate many health problems including heart disease, high blood pressure, stroke, depression, digestive problems and sleep disorders. Additional studies confirm the debilitating effects of stress on our health:

• Three 10-year studies concluded that emotional stress was more predictive of death from cancer and cardiovascular disease than smoking. People who were ineffectively managing stress had a 40% higher death rate than non-stressed individuals.
  
• A Harvard Medical School study of 1,623 heart attack survivors found that when subjects got angry during emotional conflicts, their risk of subsequent heart attacks was more than double that of those remained calm.
  
• A 20-year study of over 1,700 older men conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health found that worry about social conditions, health and personal finances all significantly increased the risk of coronary disease.
  
• Over one-half of heart disease cases are not explained by the standard risk facts, such as high cholesterol, smoking or sedentary lifestyle.
  
• According to a Mayo Clinic study of individuals with heart disease, psychological stress was the strongest predictor of future cardiac events, such as cardiac death, cardiac arrest and heart attacks.

To listen to Mark from Life pHorce briefly outlining the effect of stress on your health on BBC radio click here

How to relieve stress?

In order to effectively relieve stress it's important to understand it's not the external events or situations that do the harm; it's how you respond to those stressful events. More precisely, it's how you feel about them that determine whether you feel the negative effects of stress and ultimately relieve stress.
Emotions, or feelings, have a powerful impact on the human body. Emotions like frustration, insecurity and depressing feelings are stressful and inhibit optimal health and relief from stress. Positive emotions like appreciation, care, and love not only feel good, they promote health, performance and well-being.
The Institute of  HeartMath's research has shown when you learn how to intentionally shift to a positive emotion, heart rhythms immediately change. A shift in heart rhythms may not seem important but in fact it creates a favourable cascade of neural, hormonal and biochemical events that benefit the entire body. The stress relief effects are usually immediate and can be long lasting.

To listen to Mark from Life pHorce giving a demonstration live on BBC radio of the Institute of Heart Math's approach click here

Heart Rate Variability and Cardiac Coherence

A healthy heart has a natural beat-to-beat variation which is important to health and well-being. Research shows that when you shift into a different emotional state, the quality of the heart rhythms immediately change.

 Negative emotions such as anxiety and frustration show a disordered and chaotic variation like that shown in the diagram below,  while positive states like appreciation show an ordered and coherent rhythm such as that shown in the diagrams below.

Biofeedback technology, together with stress management techniques, enable to you to rapidly learn to create this state of coherence in your body. It's a highly efficient mode of functioning and just some of the known benefits are:

• faster reaction times
• improved hormone balance – e.g. levels of the "stress hormone" cortisol decrease, while levels of DHEA (the "youth hormone") increase
• improved cardiac health
• improved immune system activity
• improved thinking: cognitive performance can be faster and more accurate with improved memory. Research subjects report thinking more clearly.

Cardiac Coherence and Biofeedback Training

In biofeedback training, computer analysis of heart rate variability information generates a measure of the level and amount of coherence. This information is fed back to the client on an on-going basis, enabling the trainee to rapidly learn to develop coherence.
Regular practice of Heart Rate Coherence can bring about the health benefits mentioned, and to this end Life pHorce has biofeedback devices available for home use by clients. These instruments have been developed by the HeartMath Institute, a not-for-profit organization based in California which has conducted research into the benefits of coherence training.
Experience in the US has shown that Heart rate coherence training can be helpful in cases of therapy for anxiety, depression, and stress related symptoms including insomnia, fatigue, aches and pains, high blood pressure and pre-menstrual symptoms. In addition it can help with several other conditions including: asthma, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, diabetes and cardiac arrhythmias.

Click here to read a recent article from the independant on Sunday "Is this the cure for stress"

For a free telephone consultation

call 0191 491 3665

Email mark@lifephorce.com

Hunter Kane is the exclusive licensee in the UK for HeartMath LLC’s training programmes and products, and has trained over 6,000 people in Peak Performance over the last six years, with corporate clients including Shell, BP, Unilever, HSBC and Hewlett-Packard.  These programmes have been delivered throughout UK, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Latin America and the USA.
HeartMath programs are provided in Europe to organizations, public agencies, school systems and health care professionals. Hunter-Kane Ltd is a UK-based human performance consultancy providing a range of training and development services in a number of market sectors. Hunter-Kane is the exclusive licensee in Europe for HeartMath LLC's training programs.
Hunter-Kane has demonstrated benefits in:

• 65% reduction in self assessed stress in an aggregate group of 1,500 employees
• Reduction from 65% to 8% anxiety in one year from improvements in efficiency and productivity and reduction in attrition costs Reduction on staff turnover from 28% to 5.9%)
• Achieved a 52% increase in Maths and 77% increase in Reading Profiency in a Secondary School

Contact Hunter Kane
Tel: +44 (0) 118 989 0101
Fax: +44 (0) 118 989 2333
E-mail: office@hunterkane.com