Taking time to contemplate what you're grateful for isn't merely the "right" thing to do. It also improves your mood because it reduces the stress hormone cortisol by 23 percent.

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Travis Bradberry

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Stress reduction and mindfulness

What puts us so much under pressure? How can we respond when we are having a hard time? What can we change in order to avoid crisis in the future? Here is a collection of almost 100 thoughts and inspirations where you can choose from for relaxation or contemplation.

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It's not the events of our lives that shape us, but our beliefs as to what those events mean.

Tony Robbins

When I look back on all these worries, I remember the story of the old man who said on his deathbed that he had had a lot of trouble in his life, most of which had never happened.

Winston Churchill

The time to relax is when you don't have time for it.

Sydney J. Harris

You can't always control what goes on outside, but you can always control what goes on inside.

Wayne Dyer

Once you accept, truly accept, that stuff will happen to you and there is nothing you can do about it, stress miraculously leaves your life.

Srikumar Rao

The best way to pay for a lovely moment is to enjoy it.

Richard Bach

We all have those things that even in the midst of stress and disarray, they energize us and give us renewed strength and purpose. These are our passions.

Adam Braun

Remember that stress doesn't come from what's going on in your life. It comes from your thoughts about what's going on in your life.

Andrew J. Bernstein

Getting stress out of your life takes more than prayer alone. You must take action to make changes and stop doing whatever is causing the stress. You can learn to calm down in the way you handle things.

Joyce Meyer

Much of the stress that people feel doesn't come from having too much to do. It comes from not finishing what they've started.

David Allen

Take chances, make mistakes--that is how we grow. Pain nourishes your courage. You have to fail in order to practice being brave.

Mary Tyler Moore

In times of great stress or adversity, it's always best to keep busy, to plow your anger and your energy into something positive.

Lee Iacocca

You are braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.

Christopher Robin

It is not a daily increase, but a daily decrease. Hack away at the inessentials.

Bruce Lee

Stand up to your obstacles and do something about them. You will find they haven't half the strength you thought they have.

Norman Vincent Peale

The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another.

William James

We can easily manage if we will only take, each day, the burden appointed to it. But the load will be too heavy for us if we carry yesterday's burden over again today, and then add the burden of the morrow before we are required to bear it.

John Newton

You will never change your life until you change something you do daily.

Unknown

It's a good idea always to do something relaxing prior to making an important decision in your life.

Paulo Coelho

Your mind will answer most questions if you learn to relax and wait for the answers.

William S. Burroughs

Doing something that is productive is a great way to alleviate emotional stress. Get your mind doing something that is productive.

Ziggy Marley

Stress is caused by being "here" but wanting to be "there."

Eckhart Tolle

When we long for life without difficulties, remind us that oaks grow strong in contrary winds and diamonds are made under pressure.

Peter Marshall

Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are.

Chinese proverb

Stress is an ignorant state. It believes that everything is an emergency.

Natalie Goldberg

If the problem can be solved why worry? If the problem cannot be solved, worrying will do you no good.

Śāntideva

In times of stress, the best thing we can do for each other is to listen with our ears and our hearts and to be assured that our questions are just as important as our answers.

Fred Rogers

Adopting the right attitude can convert a negative stress into a positive one.

Hans Selye

Sometimes the most important thing in a whole day is the rest we take between two deep breaths.

Etty Hillesum

The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.

Elbert Hubbard

It's not stress that kills us, it is our reaction to it.

Hans Selye

Slow down and everything you are chasing will come around and catch you.

John De Paola

There are thousands of causes for stress, and one antidote to stress is self-expression. That's what happens to me every day. My thoughts get off my chest, down my sleeves and onto my pad.

Garson Kanin

Somehow our devils are never quite what we expect when we meet them face to face.

Nelson DeMil

If people concentrated on the really important things in life, there'd be a shortage of fishing poles.

Doug Larson

Maturity is achieved when a person accepts life as full of tension.

Joshua L. Liebman

If you treat every situation as a life and death matter, you'll die a lot of times.

Dean Smith

If you ask what is the single most important key to longevity, I would have to say it is avoiding worry, stress and tension. And if you didn't ask me, I'd still have to say it.

George Burns

Do not anticipate trouble or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.

Benjamin Franklin

How beautiful it is to do nothing, and then to rest afterward.

Spanish proverb

One of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one's work is terribly important.

Bertrand Russell

Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under the trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time.

John Lubbock

There is more to life than increasing its speed.

Mahatma Gandhi

Rule number one is, don't sweat the small stuff. Rule number two is, it's all small stuff.

Robert Eliot

Don't underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can't hear, and not bothering.

Winnie the Pooh

Your mindset matters. It affects everything - from the business and investment decisions you make, to the way you raise your children, to your stress levels and overall well-being.

Peter Diamandis

For fast-acting relief, try slowing down.

Lily Tomlin

I'd like to see a world free of strife, stress, pain, hunger, war - a cool place where everyone could live.

Dionne Warwick