63.    People have different ways of escaping the stress and difficulties of modern life. Some read; some exercise; others work in their gardens. What do you think are the best ways of reducing stress? Use specific details and examples in your answer.

Nowadays, the people in Hong Kong are always under stress. Hong Kong is now suffering the economic downturn. Many companies, e.g. hotels, have laid off a number of staff, so as to save cost. The unemployment rate is rising and the competition for jobs is keener. All staff are afraid of being fired. They work much harder and are always under stress. For students, they have to face many examinations. Sometimes, they even study round the clock in order to have a result with flying colours in both internal and external examinations. This results in a huge pressure. Having too much stress is definitely not good to health. We should find various ways to alleviate pressure. In this essay, I am going to state three ways to release stress.

Watching films can surely release stress. We may choose some relaxed films to watch, e.g. a comedy. The plot of the film is funny and the conversation between the characters can always make us laugh. When we concentrate on watching the film, we can escape from hard work temporarily and in an extremely relaxed state. However, some people think that watching film is a waste of time and they prefer to grasp time to do some meaningful things. Actually, it is not good to our health! After we have worked for a long time, much of our energy is consumed and we will be very exhausted. Take a student as an example. If students continue to revise for many hours without relaxation, they will find that it is very difficult to concentrate. On the contrary, they can concentrate more easily and can spend less time to analyze the contents after relaxation. Thus, it is good to watch films.

Apart from watching films, we can also do exercise to release stress. When we are under stress, our hearts throb faster and the blood glucose level rises . This will  affect our health and we will be suffered from various kinds of diseases easily. Doing regular exercise can let us release stress. Many people say that they don’t have spare time. We can just spend about 15 minutes to do exercise every day and it will not occupy us much time. We can have some simple exercise such as jogging along a  park nearby, climbing up and down the stairs and the like. We will find more relaxed after doing exercise and we will be healthier than before. Doing exercise can also help us to keep fit as some of our energy is consumed. Don’t hesitate to do exercise!

On top of doing exercises, we can visit other countries. As all we know, the tempo in Hong Kong is fast. The people on the streets are always walking very fast and all other things run quickly. It will make us easy to suffer from stress. We may visit other countries that the tempo is slow. We can try to walk slowly at the streets and breathe in some fresh air. We will be more relaxed than staying in Hong Kong. Our spirits can be rejuvenated. We may visit other countries when we are having the summer vacation. It is a good time to relax after busying for the whole year.

All in all, it is very important to release stress. However, some people find the wrong ways to release stress such as smoking, going to rave parties etc. All these are not good ways to release stress. We should have a proper way to alleviate pressure. Being more relaxed, everything can be done better!