English Conversation on Stress for IELTS and TOEFL

English Conversation on Stress

English Conversation on Stress

Session NO.: #4
 Session Name: (A Stress-free Session)
 Topic: “How do you try to handle stress in your life?”
o Suggested Key Words: stress, anxiety, anger, worry, etc.
o Topic by “Mohammad Hossein Hariri Asl”

Questions:

1. Is there anything positive about stress?
2. What is the role of stress (if any)?
3. What happens if you overlook stress in your life?
4. Is stress contagious, i.e. transmitted from one person to another?
5. What are the techniques you put to use in order to control or harness the level of stress in your life?
6. Do you think controlling stress is a skill that could be learnt / acquired?
7. Do you think you can be stressed for no particular reason?
8. Discuss some of the physiological dire consequences of leading an excruciatingly stressful life?

 Activities:
1. Season of Reason: Among the questions listed below, concentrate on Question “7”. Then attempt to come up with as many cogent reasons as possible to support your viewpoint in 3 minutes (Brainstorming). Finally, prepare to get into a heated argument with your classmates.

Conversation Handout
 Quotations and/or Ideas:
1. “Stress is an internal defense mechanism to make you ready for a challenging situation. In this case, stress is likened to pain in the sense that as pain indicates that there is something wrong in your body, stress shows that there is something wrong in your mind and your life. As you should not use a pain-killer to suffocate pain; instead, you should find out the reason of pain in your body to eradicate the causes of pain, you must also find out the reasons and causes of stress in your mind and life to try to eradicate the causes.” (Mohammad Hossein Hariri Asl)
2. “Stress is often self-inflicted.” (Anonymous)
3. “Taking actions and attacking fear are two important keys to reducing stress and worry in your life.” (Dr. David Schwartz)

 Related Idioms:
1. To blow a fuse: to become angry
2. To hit the ceiling: to become angry
3. To be hot under the collar: to be so angry
4. To go bananas: to become stressed and angry
5. To hit the roof: to hit the ceiling
6. To get one’s back up: to go angry
7. To get up on the wrong side of the bed: to feel slightly angry and annoyed for no particular reason