Ways to Reduce Stress and Live Longer

Stress has a way of leaking into everything. Your health, your work, your studies, the people you live with: when stress runs high, all of it tends to suffer at once. Getting a handle on it matters, because leaving it unchecked rarely stays contained to one corner of your life. The familiar relaxation techniques do help, and they are worth using. But there are other, fairly ordinary habits that make a real difference, and most of them don't ask much of you.

Start with sleep, because it probably matters more than anything else on this list. How well you rest shapes how well you handle whatever the day throws at you, and people who cope well tend to be calmer and more content. Aim for something close to eight hours a night, and aim for it consistently rather than in occasional catch-up bursts. Rested, you have the energy to meet problems as they come instead of being flattened by them.

Spiritual practice, whatever form it takes for you, is another anchor. Tending to it tends to make you more aware of who you are, which means fewer moments of being blindsided. You become steadier, more in touch with your own feelings and with the tools you have for dealing with them. When something unpleasant happens, that grounding keeps you from being swept under.

Stay close to the people who love you. Being around those who support you is one of the simplest buffers against stress there is, so carve out regular time for them. Meet a friend for lunch. Sit down to dinner with family. Phone the person who moved away and never gets a call. A few hours a week is usually enough to keep those bonds alive and to remind yourself that people are in your corner.

Move your body on a regular basis. Exercise does as much for the mind as it does for the muscles, and in a spike of acute stress, even ten or fifteen minutes can burn off that jittery, nervous energy. Most days of the week is the target. Mix things up so you are building cardiovascular fitness, strength, and flexibility rather than only one of them. The payoff is partly chemical: physical activity floods your brain with the compounds that lift mood and take the edge off tension.

Set the screens down when you want to unwind. Look for ways to relax that don't involve a device, and go easy on the hours of television or gaming that pass for rest but aren't. Pick up a paperback. Walk through a park. Do something, anything, that forces you to unplug for a stretch. Even a couple of hours a week of this leaves most people lighter and in a better mood. Put it on the calendar, at least twice a week, if you want the full effect.

Pay attention to what you eat, because diet feeds directly into how you cope. Eat well and you have the nutrients and steady energy to absorb setbacks as they arrive. Try not to eat to the point of fullness, either, since that tends to leave you heavy and drowsy. Lean toward healthy food, keep portions sensible, and let treats be occasional rather than the default.

Fold these into your weekly rhythm one by one, and the stress starts to drop off almost on its own, without you having to grind at it. Over time you'll notice your mood sitting higher by default, and that when bad days come, they knock you down less hard. None of this is a one-time fix, though. Keeping stress low is work you keep doing, so that the health problems that trail chronic stress never get their foothold.

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