Personal stress management - When B is better than an A, and the power of optimism

Personal stress management acknowledges that each of us is unique in the way that we view the world and that there are individual differences to our stress resistance.

Is viewing a cup half full better for your personal stress management?

Are you an optimist of a pessimist?

Research suggests that if you are an optimist you are less likely to report an illness in stressful periods and are more likely to recover more quickly after surgery (Scheier & Carver, 1985, 1993).

One reason given for optimists dealing with stress better than pessimists is that optimists tend to use more problem-orientated coping strategies. On the other hand, pessimists are more likely to be in denial or avoid dealing with the stressor altogether.

So identify whether you are an optimist or not, and how to increase your optimism can be important for your personal stress management

When is a B better than an A for personal stress management?

Type A behavior pattern is described as an action-emotion complex, in which a person is continually trying to achieve more and more in less and less time. In terms of other measures of personality, Type A could possibly align itself with the neuroticism factor in the Big Five, or the left-side STJ in the Jungian Type Inventory. On the other hand, Type B’s are not preoccupied with achievements, are more interested with relaxing and having fun. They may be more aligned with the right-side of the STJ Jungian Type Inventory.

Click on this link for more information on how knowledge of your Myers Briggs personality type can help you manage your stress.

Type A’s often feel pressured for time and are highly competitive. In the course of struggling against people and time, the fight or flight response is triggered repeatedly. As a result, higher levels of the stress-hormones occur in the bloodstream.

From this perspective, knowledge of whether you are a Type A can be important for your personal stress management

The strongest evidence for a link between Type A behavior and coronary heart disease is work that was conducted by Meyer and Friedman in the 1950’s. They remarked that the risk factors associated with coronary heart disease, namely hypertension, smoking and high serum cholesterol did not explain increased incidence of heart disease, and identified a Type A behavior pattern that increased the risk of heart disease.

Type A behavior patterns can also moderate the effect of job stressors. For example, it was found that in a machine-paced letter sorting job compared to self-paced worker, that machine-paced work led to higher levels of anxiety, depression and anger; but only for Type A’s (Hurrell, J., 1985).

Are you a Type A or A Type B.

There are a number of ways to test if you have a Type A or a Type B behavior pattern. For example you could use the Bortner Rating Scale Type, the Framingham Type A Scale, the Jenkins Activity Survey and the Structured Interview.

However, by taking a good look at yourself, or by asking yourself what category your friends, partner or children would put you in, can inform whether you are a Type A or a Type B, and the best way to deal with your personal stress management.

You are possibly have a Type A behavior pattern if you often:

• Move, walk and eat rapidly all the time.
• Emphasize your words in a sentence like a machine gun.
• Become impatient and frustrated with the pace that things happen.
• Interrupt others or have difficulty waiting for others to finish their sentence.
• Hurry in all the activities that you do.
• Try to do a number of things at once.
• Feel guilty about relaxing and doing nothing – even when on vacation.
• Often find yourself so busy that you do not appreciate things around you.
• Find yourself more interested in getting things done than in enjoying the things you are doing.

Personal stress management for Type A’s – become a Type B without losing the things you want

Type A’s tend to have desires that can be quantified, such as a better paying job, how to become more productive, or how many things they can get done. However, these accumulated outward successes can hide an inner emptiness!

Are you living your life the way that you want to, with balance and respect towards yourself and others?

One way to question yourself is to imagine your retirement dinner in 5, 10 or 20 years time, in which your colleagues, friends and family all have a couple of minutes to talk about you to the others. Set aside time, and visualize what you would like each group to say about you. Visualize your own desires and goals, and where you would like to be in 5, 10 or 20 year’s time. Examine your goals. Are your goals balanced? Are they within your reach? Are you devoting enough time to achieve your goals. How are you spending your time now?

Rather than running your life as a series of 100m dashes, plan and pace yourself as a marathon runner. Use these goal setting strategies to help you do this.

Manage your time urgency.

Type A’s consistently feel time pressured in their activities. One of the best ways to reduce this time urgency is to manage your time. See these time management strategies to help you work more efficiently.

Slow down by planning and scheduling

A characteristic is that Type A’s like to do several things at once, and rush from on thing to another. While you may think this is an efficient way to do things, evidence suggests that increased errors and poorer quality of work is often the result.

An important part of your personal stress management plan may be to construct a To Do List and then concentrate on the task that you have to do. Ensure that you leave enough time between tasks, and then add some more. By leaving yourself extra time, you will be able to relax and enjoy your work more. Also it helps you to manage the many unexpected events that are likely to crop up during the day.

Ensure that in your To Do List that you schedule time for relaxation, such as progressive muscle relaxation. When you have mastered the progressive muscle relaxation, the cue words that you use in the exercise can be your trigger to relax you can be used whenever you start to feel impatient with a person or a task.

Deal with the uncontrollables

Many stressful situations arise with events that are uncontrollable, such as the car breaking down or an unexpected deadline. Many researches have determined that these can result in Type A behavior patterns.

Explore your goals and your options. Ask yourself: Is the task essential to my goals? Can the task be delegated? What happens if the task is not completed on time? Is the task absolutely essential? Try to set boundaries on your work, remember that time will not make the choice for you; you are the one that decides when your work is done.

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