While we talk a lot about business, we don’t ever really sit down and talk about stress. We haven’t been talking about what it is that we need to do for stress management other than pursue traditional medicine. Dr. Kathy Gruver has been following the breadcrumbs looking for alternative medicine. Losing her mom at 18 to cancer inspired her to look for options. One of the first things to recognize with stress is that stress isn’t really the problem. We can’t control or stop the stress. There’s always going to be something pulling on us that is stressful. However, we can control our response to that. Changing how we think about stress and how we respond to it is the key. Kathy shares some amazing techniques to managing stress.

My guest is Kathy Gruver, PhD. She's graced stages on three different continents, two cruise ships, and a handful of islands, which is cool. She's even done TEDx. She hosts a TV show that's based on her first book, The Alternative Medicine Cabinet. She earned her PhD in natural health. Dr. Gruver is a twelve-time award-winning author of seven books, including Conquer Your Stress, Workplace Wellness, Conquer Your Stress at Work, and Journey of Healing. She has studied Mind Body Medicine at the famed Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine at Harvard. She's been featured as an expert in numerous publications and she appeared on over 250 radio and TV shows. For fun and stress relief, she does hip-hop and flying trapeze.

Listen to the podcast here:

Stress Management Techniques with Kathy Gruver

Welcome, Kathy. It’s great to have you.

Thanks so much for having me. I appreciate it.

I'm excited to have you particularly because while we talk so much about business, we don't ever really sit down and talk about stress. We haven't been talking about what it is that we need to do other than pursue traditional medicines. First of all, how did you get into this field? What led you here?

I just follow the breadcrumbs. All things started when I was an anchor, but I always had this parallel path of acting and healing for those alternatives. I started doing massage when I was a little kid and then apprenticed with another massage therapist when I was in college as a theater major. I lost my mom at eighteen to cancer. That wasn't the direct link. I have a lot of people say, "Of course you're already healing," that didn't quite go that way but definitely it inspired me to look for options. Pittsburgh in the ‘80s, chemo, radiation, surgery, that was pretty much her choice. I like to let people know that they have more choices. They have different choices, if nothing else how we think, how we act, how we respond. That led me here; from massage to hypnosis, Reiki, herbs, homeopathics, writing, speaking, and Harvard. I just said yes to things and here I am.

I really hope that the listeners take that in because I always advocate that you look at whatever's in front of you and instead of saying, "No,” what if you do? What if you can? Instead saying yes, that's awesome. Maybe you can give us a couple of stress management tips.