When feeling stressed, many people often turn to behaviors that have an element of pleasure or satisfaction to them in order to get a quick hit and improve their mood. These things can include things like drinking alcohol, eating sweets or carbohydrates or potentially shopping, gambling, anything that gives us a bit of a high when we're feeling stressed or feeling down. And in and of themselves it's easy to make a case for any of these behaviors in isolation or in limited amounts as being okay. And in fact that's probably the truth as long as you're looking closely and carefully at how much and how often you're engaging in these behaviors. So one of the things you can do is step back and ask yourself has there been a change in how much I am doing blank, like drinking alcohol after work or snacking after dinner or going online shopping. And then you can ask yourself why am I doing this. Am I actually doing it based on preference or for positive reasons like celebrating something? Or am I doing it because my emotions are driving me to do it? I don't like the way I'm feeling and therefore I'm doing this in order to feel something different. If it's the latter, it's a good idea to step back and try to look at the cues and the triggers that have led you to act in that way and potentially come up with some alternatives. Not to eliminate them and say you can never use those tools, but just to have some other choices available that may have an equally powerful impact on your mood without the potential problematic consequences down the road. Things like exercise or connecting with other people in your life that have meaning and value to you or watching an enjoyable show, listening to some pleasurable music, having a scented bubble bath or doing some relaxation. All of these tools taken together give you choices so that you don't feel pushed into doing something that may help in the short term, but be a problem in the long-term.