There are so many ways to deal with stress, and all of them can be helpful to certain individuals at one point in your life. When dealing with stress, remember to first recognize what your common stressors are. After you have been able to identify the common stressors, you will then start to recognize what these stressors bring into your life and how you tend to react to them. Remember, only you can manage stress in your own life. You are the one who causes it, and you are also the one who deals with it. Here are certain stress management tips:

1.Avoid unnecessary stress
Most of the time, when you start to become stressed; you tend to bring other situations in your life into stress as well. A lot of times, stress comes from individuals who are too nice to say no and would do anything for other people. This also happens with athletes who take on too much during their own seasons. To control this stress, simply say no to avoid unnecessary stress.

2.Alter the situation
When something goes wrong and starts to stress you out, the first thing you can do is alter the situation itself. The best way to gain control over it is to calmly tell yourself that everything will be okay in the end, and to not procrastinate your way around it. Take charge of the situation, and change your perspective of it so you are less stressed. A lot of athletes try to do way too many things at once, and instead of letting out their emotions, they try to be strong and bottle them away. By expressing your feelings and staying positive and assertive, you will avoid these breakdowns in the future.

3.Adapt to the stressor
Unfortunately, stressors are never going to go away for some people and they may reoccur throughout your life. The only way to manage these stressors is to adapt to the situation and change accordingly. When stressors come into your life, change how you look at the stress and how you are going to cope to it. By focusing on the positives, you do not feel the pressure of the situation itself, therefore making you less stressed in the end.

4.Accept the things you can't change
Like I said before, a lot of the stressors you face or the challenges you come around to are unavoidable and you can't control. When things like this happen, it is okay for you to feel vulnerable and to share your emotions and feelings with friends and family. Do not try to control the uncontrollable, and learn to forgive quicker so you can learn to cope with this kind of stress. If you never let go of something like this, it can eventually take over your entire life and will be a stressor for a long time.

5.Make time for relaxing and some fun!
Even though athletes are quite the busy bees, we should always make time for having some fun and being able to sit down and relax. When this is going on, do not think about stressors, and be able to relax without the stressors in the back of your head. If working out is a stress reliever, by all means, exercising is one of the best ways to relieve stress. At least once a day do something you like to do so you are able to let go a little steam from the inside!

6.Adopt and live a healthy lifestyle
This to me is one of the biggest stress reducers I have in my life right now. Especially for an athlete, living a healthy lifestyle is one of the most important ways to manage and reduce stress in your life. By eating healthy, you feel better about your figure and your body is able to respond positively to the healthy food you ingest. Getting enough sleep every night is also a must-have. In reality, everyone should be getting 8 hours of sleep a night, and if that can't be done, sometimes this can cause unnecessary stress on an athlete's life. Athletes who don't sleep enough also don't perform well when the time comes. Reducing caffeine and sugar is a good idea too because not only is it unhealthy, but it prohibits students from getting a good night sleep as well.

I hope all of these stress reducers can be added to each and every individual's life in hopes that it can better help to prohibit stress.

Katie