INTRODUCTION

LIFE STRESS: - The current level of life stress is

not a novel
phenomenon. The word Stress" was first used in the 15 th century.
but it was actually in the 20 century that social
consciousness about
life stress has risen dramatically. Stress is
primarily a process of
motivation, since it requires some sort of adaptation or coping to the
demand or sets of demands. Stress is not a single thought; but stress is
many different things like happy things, sad things, allergic things,
physical things, Stress is the sensation that we feel as a result of a
series of complex internal chemical reactions. That occurs in response
tocertain events and situations in our life.
According to, the founder of modern stress research, Hans Selye,
Stress is the physiological response of the body to physical and
psychological demands". These demands are known as »stressors.
Stress has been implicated as a factor in illness but some degree of
stress is normal, necessary unavoidable. Selye had noted Complete
freedom from stress is death Stress acts as a motivator to make us
adjust our behavior to meet changing demands, as when we study for
an exam, wear a sweater when feeling cold. Stress can also be
pleasurable, as when we attend a party or play a game of scrabble.
 Selye had called unpleasant stress "distress" and pleasant stress
eustress Greek word meaning, good stress.
Hans Selye (1956, 1976) termed the body's response to stressors
the general adaptation syndrome (GAS). During the first stage of the
general adaptation syndrome, is the alarm reaction, in which the body
prepares to cope with the stressor by increasing activity in the
sympathetic nervous system and the adrenal glands that causes the fight
or flight response. If there is continuous exposure to stressor the body
enters the stage of resistance, in which the body becomes more resistant
to stressor. And finally the body enters the stage of exhaustion. In this
stage, the body's capacity to respond to both continuous and new
stressors compromises and the person's resistances to disease collapses.
Anything that causes a change in our life causes stress. Both good
as well as bad change causes stress. Even imagined change is stress.
Stress is emerging as a big problem today. Stress is often a factor in
heart disease and cancer; these two are the leading causes of death.
Stress can thus, be defined as the difference between the way we want
our life to be and the way it actually is. This means that specific events,
ideas, beliefs or even our own thoughts can be generated from ithin,
 fear of loss, fear of failure, of not getting something we think of as
important or desire can trigger stress within us.

Optimum Stress Level (0SL) -There is a model based on Yerkes

Dodson's law of stress, which helps us in differentiating between
positive and negative aspects of stress. According to this aw certain
degree of stress termed as OSL or optimum stress level is necessary to
make us live an active and productive life. But stress which is lower than
OSL forms the Zone of Boredom. It makes us disinterested in activities,
thereby leading to the decay of our psychobiological system. Similarly
stress that is greater than the OSL makes the psycho-biological system to
come under too much pressure and forms the Zone of Distress. That
leads to the accumulation of fatigue in the system, which sooner or later
manifests in the form of one or multiple psychobiological diseases.
Stress is thus like fire in winter: we can afford neither to be too close to
it, nor too far away from it.

Causes of Stress- Stress experienced byan individual is the product of

two factors: environmental stimuli and basic anxiety. Environmental
Stimuliof ajob related stress experienced by an individual could be the
new job, bully type of boss, etc. But the phenomenon of basic anxiety is
rather complex. It is a legacy of man's early developmental period and is
related to his birth trauma and dependency syndrome.

There are four kinds of basic fear of human nature, namely: -

(a) Fear of darkness.

(b) Fear of failure.

(c) Fear of getting suffocated.

(c) Fear of unknown.

INDICES OF STRESS BEHAVIOR There are certain behavioral

indices which can give the observer an idea, whether the person he is
interacting with is under stress or not and if he is to what degree. There
are some behavior patterns which serve as pointers of stress:

(a) Flustered Behavior

(b) Repetitiveness in talk or performance.

(c) Incoherence in speech.
(d) Tendency to correct himself often.
(e) Rapidor high pitched voice.
() Eye blinking.
(g) Head scratching.
(h) Ring twiddling.
() Revealing bodily rigidity.
(i) Furrowed brow.
(k) Forced smile.
() Excessive smoking, drinking or cating.

High order stress plays a negative role in the decision making ability of a
person. It blurs his judgment and as a result of that his decisions are
likely to suffer from some effects like:

(a) Concentration on a single aspect of the problem.

(b) Hasty action.
(c) Perception of false similarities between present and certain past
events.

(d) Undermining the importance of certain sophisticated patterns of

thought and skills.
(e) Confining consultation to supporters.
() Declining sense of responsibility.
COPING STRATEGIES The body has its own way of coping with
stress when we talk about stress coping strategies; we encompass large
varieties of discipline such as health psychology, environmental
psychology, and neuro psychology. "Life is another name for a long
sequence of stresses" saida great Urdu poet. For a living man there is no
escape from difficulties, problems and stresses. However, they must
remain within controllable limits to make life positive and productive.
There are a number of steps,which can be taken to exercise this control.

Stress management implies the conditioning of an individual's

environment and responses to those influences, which disturbs natural
equilibrium of the human being and thercby limitthe negative effects of
the same. The management of stress through a human value approach is
an inward looking process, which focuses on the individual's value
based strengths to combat the fallout of stressful influences it effectively
aims at stress management through problem prevention rather than
through problem solving.
The present century has been called the Age of Stress" because from
birth till the last breath every individual is being exposed to various
stressful situations.

Stress is emerging as a big problem today. Stress is the difference

between the ways we want our life to be and the way it actually is. This
means that specific events, ideas, beliefs even our own thoughts can
trigger stress.
Work from home culture and technological advances should be
propagated amongst families thereby empowering them in leading an
independent lifestyle. Knowledge of varied vocations and hobbies
should be made available to them.