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Teacher's Guide To Coping With Stress Is The Reading We All Need

Which five things can you start doing today?
Alina Ramirez/Twitter

All students literally everyone could use a list like this.

Alina Ramirez, a high school senior in Oxnard, California, tweeted a photo showing a list of “101 ways to cope with stress” on Sept 2., writing that her psychology teacher handed out the guide to his class.

It includes specific tips like getting up 15 minutes earlier, saying something nice to someone and petting “a friendly dog/cat,” as well as broader advice like “know your limitations and let others know them, too.”

Alina Ramirez/Twitter
Alina Ramirez/Twitter

The teacher, Brett Phillips, told BuzzFeed he’s been handing out the list for the past 10 years.

“I give students the list and then I have them pick five things that they need to start doing to lower their stress levels,” he said.

Since Ramirez posted the list online, its advice is reaching people far beyond Phillips’ classroom. As of Saturday afternoon it had more than 22,000 retweets and an extensive collection of replies thanking her for sharing it.

While not every tip on the list is going to help everyone (some of us are definitely not going to be getting up any earlier) there’s likely at least one or two things on the list that any person could find helpful. And a lot of them have some real basis in science. Interacting with pets, having plants around and even just smiling are all acts that have demonstrated stress-lowering powers.

Now get out there and pet a cat!

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