Nearly half of women report a rise in stress levels over the past five years. And while women and men tend to cope with stress differently, we know that chronic stress contributes to a range of health problems in both sexes, including mental health disorders, heart disease and obesity, depression, anxiety, low sex drive, memory and concentration problems, headaches, upset stomach, lack of focus, lack of energy and mood swings.

Stress can be a motivator, and it can even be essential to survival. The body’s fight-or-flight mechanism tells a person when and how to respond to danger. However, when the body becomes triggered too easily, or there are too many stressors at one time, it can undermine a person’s mental and physical health and become harmful.

Stress is the body’s natural defense against predators and danger. It causes the body to flood with hormones that prepare its systems to evade or confront danger. People commonly refer to this as the fight-or-flight mechanism.

Managing stress calls for addressing the mind as well as the body, since both the brain and body contribute to symptoms. In my practice, I employ a variety of stress busting techniques derived from energy psychology including acupoint tapping, EMDR, Regenerating Images in Memory (RIM), guided meditation and exercises such as tai chi and qi gong movements meant to disapate stuck energy from the body.