Is there a set way to relieve stress?

There is no single right answer. The same situation feels different to different people, and effective coping varies by person and context. Rather than searching for a method that works for everyone, it is more realistic to try several approaches in small ways and discover what fits you.

Do exercise and rest not help with stress?

They do help, but they are not universal. For problems you can change (like an overloaded workload), you need coping that adjusts the situation itself. For things you cannot change (like something that has already happened), rest and exercise that soothe the emotion fit better. The advice may not have failed; it may just not have matched the situation.

What is the difference between problem-focused and emotion-focused coping?

Problem-focused coping directly changes the situation causing the stress (planning, asking for help, adjusting priorities). Emotion-focused coping leaves the situation as-is and manages the resulting feelings (rest, expressing emotion, reframing). For things you can control, problem-focused tends to fit; for things you cannot, emotion-focused does.

How do I know if I'm handling stress well?

Not by whether it vanished completely, but by how well you return to your usual state. The closer recovery gets to a repeatable daily routine rather than a special event, the more of a buffer you build before stress piles up.

When You Don't Know How to Deal With Stress

How to handle stress in a way that fits the situation, rather than trying to make it disappear.

Minsoo · Founder & CEO

Mind GuideSeptember 20, 2026Read 8 min

Few pieces of advice are as useless as “don’t get stressed.” What we actually need is how to handle the stress we already have, and almost no one teaches that.

This post is not about making stress disappear. It is about handling and recovering from it in a way that fits your situation.

01. Not knowing how is not strange

In a 2024 survey by Korea’s National Center for Mental Health, 46.3% of respondents said they felt severe stress, up sharply from 36.0% in 2022. Those who reported depressed mood lasting several days rose from 30.0% to 40.2%.¹

Nearly half of people feel severe stress, yet neither school nor work ever taught us how to deal with it. So “I don’t know how to relieve it” is not laziness or a personal flaw. It is simply the natural state most people are in.

02. Why “just exercise, just rest” often fails

Most advice is well-meant. Exercise. Rest. Take a trip. Get a hobby. And yet it often fails, for a reason.

Advice is usually just what worked for the person giving it, not something drawn from your situation. Telling someone buried under a deadline to “take a trip” only adds one more stressor. There is no one-size-fits-all answer to relief. So when generic advice doesn’t work, there’s no need to blame yourself. The method wasn’t wrong; it just didn’t fit the situation.

03. Two kinds of coping: what you can change and what you can’t

Psychology broadly divides stress coping into two kinds, as framed by Richard Lazarus and Susan Folkman: problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping.²

Problem-focused coping changes the situation causing the stress directly. You plan, reprioritize, ask for help, and say no when needed.
Emotion-focused coping leaves the situation as-is and manages the feelings it creates: rest, expressing emotion, reframing, exercise, conversation.

The point is not which is better, but which fits. If it’s something you can change, problem-focused coping tends to work; if it’s already happened or beyond your control, emotion-focused coping fits better. If “just exercise” didn’t help, the situation may have actually called for problem-focused coping.

04. The method that fits you is found by experiment

So relieving stress isn’t really about knowing the right answer. It’s more like an experiment to find what fits you.

It doesn’t need to be elaborate. Recall one or two moments this week when you felt stressed, and sort each into whether it was something you could change or not. If you could, what small action might you try next time? If you couldn’t, how might you let the feeling pass? Then actually try it, and lightly note how it felt for you.

Repeat this a few times and you end up with your own list of coping strategies, not someone else’s.

05. Recovery over relief, before it piles up

Stress rarely explodes from a single event; it accumulates little by little within the rhythm of daily life. So recovering often, in small doses, lasts longer than one big release.

Occasional grand events can’t keep up with fatigue that builds every day. When recovery becomes “one more thing to do,” even that becomes a burden. Recovery lasts when it’s a light routine you can slip naturally into the gaps of daily life. This is why we built Duck’s Dream as a “recovery routine” rather than a “treatment program.”

You can’t eliminate stress entirely. But caring for yourself often, before you break down and while there’s still room, is the most realistic response available to us.

References

The next post asks why “What are your hobbies?” feels uncomfortable to some people, and what it’s like to not know what you enjoy.

Updates: Instagram (@symple.kr).

National Center for Mental Health, “2024 National Survey on Mental Health Knowledge and Attitudes,” Ministry of Health and Welfare press release, 2024. ↩
Lazarus, R. S., & Folkman, S. (1984). Stress, Appraisal, and Coping. Springer. ↩

Frequently asked questions

Is there a set way to relieve stress?: There is no single right answer. The same situation feels different to different people, and effective coping varies by person and context. Rather than searching for a method that works for everyone, it is more realistic to try several approaches in small ways and discover what fits you.
Do exercise and rest not help with stress?: They do help, but they are not universal. For problems you can change (like an overloaded workload), you need coping that adjusts the situation itself. For things you cannot change (like something that has already happened), rest and exercise that soothe the emotion fit better. The advice may not have failed; it may just not have matched the situation.
What is the difference between problem-focused and emotion-focused coping?: Problem-focused coping directly changes the situation causing the stress (planning, asking for help, adjusting priorities). Emotion-focused coping leaves the situation as-is and manages the resulting feelings (rest, expressing emotion, reframing). For things you can control, problem-focused tends to fit; for things you cannot, emotion-focused does.
How do I know if I'm handling stress well?: Not by whether it vanished completely, but by how well you return to your usual state. The closer recovery gets to a repeatable daily routine rather than a special event, the more of a buffer you build before stress piles up.