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I'm going to depart from the advice given so far on this thread. It's all good advice for how to cope with stress. I'm going to propose something radical, though, that, when I practice it, leaves me completely without stress to cope with.
The first thing to really get--I don't mean understand or comprehend, but actually internalize and operate from--is that there IS no world separate from your perception of the world. How could there be, given that you can only see the world by way of your inherently limited perceptions and interpretations? At the very least, you'd have to agree that if there IS a "real world" out there, you don't have any access to it, given your only interface with the world is by way of your perception of it, and every human being's perception is ALWAYS filtered and skewed. I mean, sure we operate like our point of view is The Truth, but a little thinking will show how inaccurate that is.
So REALLY, there's nothing out there. As far as you can or ever have or will ever be able to tell, all there is of the world is your interpretation of the world. And if that's the case, there's no such thing as stress REALLY--it's just your physical and emotional reaction to things that might or might not be happening out there in that thing you call the world.
You only need ways to "deal" with stress when the existence of stress is The Truth. But maybe it's not. Maybe stress only exists in how you interpret what you see as the world. Maybe there ARE no stressful circumstances. Maybe "shit piling up" is nothing more than an interpretation--and I'm sure it's a valid interpretation, but maybe it's not the only possible interpretation. And maybe the interpretation you choose about your circumstances has more to do with your emotional state than the circumstances themselves.
When I can stand there (which isn't all the time AT ALL--there's nothing natural or easy about creating this space), stress is impossible.
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