Stress Stress is the body's reaction to any change that requires an adjustment or response. The body reacts to these changes with physical, mental, and emotional responses. Stress is a normal part of life. Many events that happen to you and around you—and many things that you do yourself—put stress on your body. You can experience stress from your environment, your body, and your thoughts. How does stress affect health? The human body is designed to experience stress and react to it. Stress can be positive, keeping us alert and ready to avoid danger. Stress becomes negative when a person faces continuous challenges without relief or relaxation between challenges. As a result, the person becomes overworked, and stress-related tension builds. Stress that continues without relief can lead to a condition called distress a negative stress reaction. Distress can disturb the body's internal balance or equilibrium--leading to physical symptoms including headaches, upset stomach, elevated blood pressure, chest pain, and sleeping problems. Research suggests that stress also can bring on or worsen certain symptoms or diseases. Stress also becomes harmful when people use alcohol, tobacco, or drugs to try to relieve their stress. Unfortunately, instead of relieving the stress and returning the body to a relaxed state, these substances tend to keep the body in a stressed state and cause more problems. Consider the following facts: Forty-three percent of all adults suffer adverse health effects from stress. Seventy-five to 90% of all doctor's office visits are for stress-related ailments (烦恼) and complaints. Stress is linked to six of the leading causes of death, heart disease, cancer, lung ailments, accidents, cirrhosis (硬化) of the liver, and suicide. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) declared stress a hazard of the workplace. In terms of lost hours due to absenteeism, reduced productivity and workers' compensation benefits, stress costs American industry more than ＄300 billion annually. The lifetime prevalence of an emotional disorder is more than 50%, often due to chronic (长期的), untreated stress reactions. What's normal anxiety? The cold sweet of anxiety is that 'fight or flight' response that kept our early relatives safe from grizzly (灰色的) bears and other scary characters That adrenaline rush still serves us well under certain circumstances. Anxiety is a natural reaction to those very real stresses. In today's world, that reaction helps motivate us, prepares us for things we have to face, and sometimes give us energy to take action when we need to. Big job interview is coming up, and it's got you in knots. So. you spend a little more time getting dressed or rehearsing what you're going to say, You've got an appointment with the divorce lawyer, so you do more homework. That kind of anxiety can motivate you to do better. It helps you protect yourself. But as we know too well, sometimes it doesn't take a specific threat-only the possibility of crisis-to send humans into anxiety mode. The difficulty comes in learning to tone down that automatic response-to think, 'How serious is the danger? How likely is the threat?' The thing about anxiety is, it can take on a life of its own. Everything becomes a potential crisis. The unthinkable has happened. So around every corner, there's the next possible disaster. What are symptoms of harmful anxiety? When anxiety is taking a toll, your body knows it. You have trouble sleeping, eating, and concentrating. You get headaches your stomach is upset. You might even hay6 a panic attack- the pounding heart, a feeling of lightheadedness. Anxiety may also feel like depression.