Section 1 for this iCourse, How To De-Stress & Prosper, is now drawing to a close. Take a moment now to reflect on the issues that have been covered to date. You may even like to click the links of the highlighted points below to review the previous posts and refresh your memory.

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• Dr Hans Selye defined stress in the 1930s as: “An inappropriate physical response to any demand.”

• Everyone has a unique personal relationship with stress.

• Stress is a noun, a verb and an adjective. Stress can be acute or chronic, “good” or “bad”.

• Stress is also a condition and a cause.

• Evolutionists explain the origins of stress on the instinct to survive, the “fight or flight” response.

• Figure 1: The Human Function Curve illustrates human performance against the trend of rising stress.

• To be 100% stress-free is to be dysfunctional!

• CHRONIC STRESS AGES US.

• Stress is a mess! It needs defining –

• Stress is the physical and/or psychological condition of sadness, insecurity, unworthiness, unease and limitation.

• A Stressor is that physical or psychological cause of sadness, insecurity, unworthiness, unease and limitation.

END OF SECTION 1

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NEXT SESSION: How To De-Stress & Prosper – 2:1 The Demand-Control Model

Don’t want to wait for the next session? The Empowered Living iCourse How To De-Stress & Prosper is available as a Companion Guide and ebook.

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In this session – 1.5 Stress Defined (Part 3) – we will continue the definition of stress that was started in 1:5 Stress Defined (Part 1).

We began the definition of Stress as that state or cause of physical and/or psychological Sadness, Insecurity, Unworthiness, Unease and Limitation.

In Part 3, we will now discuss Limitation in regards to the nature of stress.

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LIMITATION

Physical Limitation:

Physical detainment, such as imprisonment, captivity, and even kidnapping, are obvious examples of physical limitation. Solitary confinement is an extreme example, which is a well known cause of stress and is often used as a punishment or torture.

Other examples may not be so obvious but are physical limitations and stressful conditions nonetheless: cramped work spaces, pregnancy and young parenthood (especially motherhood), long-haul flights and journeys, and disablement.

Disability was briefly mentioned in the sub-section on Physical Unworthiness in regards to discrimination, but it is disability as a stress of limitation that is being referred to here.

Here’s an example of what is meant by disability as a physical limitation:

If a writer, surgeon, pilot, or musician, were to lose the function of their hand, or both hands, either through injury or illness, that person would feel severely limited or disabled, in the sense that they could no longer perform to the level at which they were previously able to.

Loss of hand function, in this scenario, is a physical stress to that person suffering the disability. Just as is sudden paralysis of the legs or arms caused by stoke, head or spinal injury. It is the limitation or disablement that has been caused, not the disability in itself per se, that is the stress.

Just as pain can be acute or chronic, so too can disability. The limitation or disablement can either be short or long lasting. The stress can be temporary or permanent.

This last point is very important. Although we might suffer a disfiguring or permanent injury (e.g. loss of hand function), the resulting stress is within our sphere of influence and somewhat controllable.

This is because our reaction to the disablement has a major impact on the stress we experience. Once the initial devastation of losing hand function has passed, we have the power to determine whether or not to use the disablement as a positive or negative force.

We will shortly discuss this inner power in greater detail in the next section. Suffice to say, this power involves choice. We can choose how to react. We can choose whether or not to let limitation disable us and cause continuing stress.

Limitation doesn’t have to mean a limited life.

Psychological Limitation:

The feeling of helplessness and vulnerability can be disabling and corrosive. They are the emotional equivalents of detainment and disablement.

Situations in which feelings of helplessness arise are many and varied. They are magnified when we have an emotional investment in the outcome. Here are some examples:

• Suffering: Watching a child suffer and being unable to do anything about it
• Disaster: Watching your house burn to the ground, get washed away in a flood, get flattened in a storm or landslide, crumble to the ground in an earthquake
• Bankruptcy: Watching your business suffer and eventually go under due to economic hardship
• Stagnation: Work colleagues succeeding at your expense and getting promoted over your head
• Poverty and hunger: Lack of self-determination due to your economic circumstances
• Accidents: Witnessing a fatal accident

Helplessness, or the lack of control over the outcome of a situation, is a state of stress because it can evoke all manner of negative, self-limiting emotions, such as guilt, unworthiness, failure, impotence, dishonor, shame, and so forth.

Unfortunately, these emotions can also act to negatively reinforce the initial helplessness long after the event has occurred and thereby prolong the stress we experience. Guilt (e.g. survivor guilt) replays the scene over and over again in our mind. Our failure continually reminds us of our faults and uselessness. Shame, unworthiness and dishonor reopen the old wounds and prevent them from healing.

Like helplessness, the sense of vulnerability is also a stress emotion. When we feel vulnerable, we feel limited in our ability to cope with the situation or meet the challenge facing us.

Our safety might be in jeopardy. Our state of mind, our sanity, might be questioned. Our job or marriage might be under threat.

Vulnerability, though, is a two-edged sword. It can lead us to defeat or it can spur us to victory.

The sense of vulnerability can deflate us, causing us to give in or yield to the forces acting against us. Alternatively, it can also inspire us to solve the issues facing our safety, sanity, career or relationship issues.

We have the inner power, however, to let any limitation – physical or psychological – be a negative or positive force in our life. We can choose to let the stress continue and risk dysfunction, or we can choose to acknowledge the vulnerability and take the necessary steps toward a positive resolution.

END OF PART 3 – STRESS DEFINED

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NEXT SESSION: How To De-Stress & Prosper – Session 1 Review

Don’t want to wait for the next session? The Empowered Living iCourse How To De-Stress & Prosper is available as a Companion Guide and ebook.

Click here to view more.

In this session – 1.5 Stress Defined (Part 2) – we will continue the definition of stress that was started in 1:5 Stress Defined (Part 1).

We began the definition of Stress as that state or cause of physical and/or psychological Sadness, Insecurity, Unworthiness, Unease and Limitation.

In Part 2, we will now discuss Unworthiness and Unease in regards to the nature of stress.

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UNWORTHINESS

Physical Unworthiness:

Our physical attributes help define who we are. Am I tall, short, overweight, fit, young, middle-aged? Am I male or female? Do I have red, blonde or dark hair, or am I balding? Am I physically attractive or unattractive? Am I African, Asian, or European?

In themselves, these qualities are just markers or physical definitions of who we are. They are neither good nor bad. They simply help define which historical group we have in common with others of similar physical appearance.

Problems arise, however, when these qualities are used against us, when someone else, or some institution, exerts power over us for their own benefit simply because of the way we look.

When we are made to feel as though we don’t belong because of our physical attributes, when we are rejected or bullied simply for being who we are, when we are considered unacceptable because of our sex, age, race, and even physical abilities (or disabilities), we are made to suffer a state of unworthiness, which is a stress.

This is discrimination – sexism, ageism, racism – and it can lead to the sense of psychological or emotional unworthiness – shame and humiliation.

Psychological Unworthiness:

Shame and humiliation are what we commonly feel when we are discriminated against. Shame and humiliation can come from others or it can come from within. When we don’t live up to others’ expectations, or even our own expectations of ourselves, we feel small, weak and impotent. We feel belittled and undeserved. We have become unacceptable to others or ourselves.

Being outcast from a group of friends, a work or sports team, or even family, is an affront to our sense of self, to the sense of who we think we are. The rejection is a direct threat to our ego, which, like any perceived threat, reacts with the usual stress-response of “fight or flight”.

An elderly person may react to age discrimination in the workplace by taking the fight to the courts. They may seek compensation for being made redundant on the basis of their age.

Another person of similar circumstances may react differently, seeking to shelter themselves from future shame and humiliation by taking early retirement.

Neither response is right or wrong. The issue is stress, and both situations involve large quantities of it – unworthiness.

We must be careful, however, that our “fight” response doesn’t become too aggressive and dysfunctional, or that our cause doesn’t consume our sense of who we are, our identity, and we fall into the trap of righteous martyrdom. The trap, of course, is becoming the very thing that we are fighting against.

So too we must be careful of the other extreme, reclusiveness. As humans, we need to belong. We need to feel part of a group. We need to feel accepted. Wallowing in shame and humiliation, consumed by self-pity, secluding ourselves and avoiding all contact with the outside world, only adds to the stress we experience because it maintains and consolidates the state of unworthiness we feel.

However, simply being alert to the early signs of shame and humiliation, and instigating appropriate rational measures against discrimination, can go a long way to help reduce our present and future levels of unworthiness-stress and achieve a more harmonious balance in our life.

UNEASE

Physical Unease:

Tension and restlessness are examples of physical unease. When tension rises through our body, when restlessness is coursing through our veins and we feel “on edge”, we are in fact feeling the effects of physical stress.

Tension classically results from the “fight or flight” response. When we ready ourselves to fight or flee a threatening situation, adrenaline floods our body. The muscles tense, the mind becomes fixated, our senses become alert, and our reflexes are sharpened, all in preparation to react as quickly as possible to the needs of the situation.

When reacting to an immediate threat, tension is a normal and healthy stress-response. Unfortunately, tension tends to linger and hang around much longer than the initial situation required.

As discussed earlier, chronic tension, or tension that is constantly present for long periods of time, even decades, is not healthy. It causes chronic disease and premature aging.

Tension becomes chronic due to two main reasons:

• The initial stressor of the “fight or flight” reaction is replayed over and over again in the mind
• The initial stressor is still perceived to be present

Chronic tension is therefore highly connected to the mind: the physical unease is fed and sustained by psychological unease.

This is because the body doesn’t discern between an actual or a perceived threat; that is, a threat created by the mind. The body reacts with a stress-response in the same manner to a physical threat as it does to a mind-created threat, such as those evoked by memory, imagination, delusion, association, and suggestion.

Let’s now discuss this further.

Psychological Unease:

The stressor, threat or trauma that caused our initial stress-response more often than not has a fairly limited lifespan.

Although some stresors are extremely violent and may cause physical injury and debilitation – assault, rape, natural disasters, accidents, acts of terrorism, war, torture – the actual timeframe of the violence is on average measured in minutes, hours and days. Only very rarely is it measured in months or years.

Yet victims of violence can relive the terrifying moments over and over again in their minds, even years after the event has taken place.

Returning veterans of war are the classical victims of what was once known as “shell shock”. The modern term for it is Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and not only soldiers suffer from it. Any victim of a traumatic event, especially if it is overwhelming, unexpected and uncontrollable, can exhibit symptoms of PTSD, which tend to fall into 3 categories:

1. Re-experience

• Intrusive memories
• Flashbacks
• Nightmares

2. Avoidance

• Deliberate avoidance of places, people, or dates that trigger memories/thoughts of the event
• Lack of interest in activities, others and events
• Detached feelings or numbness
• Hopelessness

3. Anxiety

• Insomnia
• Outbursts of anger/rage
• Poor concentration
• Guilt, blame, mistrust
• Edginess, heightened alertness

Other common symptoms of PTSD include substance abuse, depression, self-harm and suicidal ideation, and unexplained physical aches and pains.

(Note: If you think you or somebody you know is suffering from PTSD, please seek medical advice. PTSD is a condition that rarely resolves by itself and usually gets worse. For more information, contact your local doctor or health clinic.)

PTSD is an extreme example of psychological unease brought on by reliving the traumatic event over and over again. Thankfully, most people won’t experience PTSD in their lifetime. More commonly, however, we will experience much milder versions of the affliction.

Here is an example of reliving a stressful moment:

The Near-Miss Scenario:

Driving down the road to work, somebody cuts us off, causing us to slam the brakes. Our heart beats faster, our palms become sweaty, our muscles tense, and we may even become annoyed at the other driver. Aggrieved, it takes several minutes to calm down and push aside the near-miss, even though the other vehicle is now well out of sight.

Upon arrival at our destination, we relate the incident to our colleagues. We feel our heart beating faster again, our palms getting sweaty, our muscles tensing, and our anger flaring. Again it takes some minutes to forget about it until we get about our daily routine.

Later, over lunch, we start chatting to a friend and the incident is brought up again. Our heart beats faster, our palms sweat, our muscles tense, and our anger flares at the memory. Not until we finished eating do we feel calm again.

Driving home after work, we encounter a similar vehicle to the one that cut us off this morning. Even though that car is adhering to the road rules and driving with care, our heart beats faster, our palms sweat, our muscles tense, and we feel our anger swell. Only when we pull into the driveway does the memory fade and the tension leave our body.

But then our partner returns home and asks us how our day went. We waste no time in blurting out the whole story again. Our heart beats faster, our palms sweat, our muscles tense, and we feel we need an immediate antidote to calm our anger, like a bottle of wine.

Is this a familiar story? It highlights the manner in which a minor incident is turned into a major one through memory, association, suggestion, and righteous thinking. Our normal and proper “good” stress-response in avoiding the accident earlier in the day has been transformed into “bad” dysfunctional stress that has lasted throughout the day.

But what’s the point? Why do we do this to ourselves?

Reliving past grievances, whether we have been victims of bad driving, or wronged by a work colleague, or harmed by somebody we love, only serves to aggravate the stress and tension that was caused initially.

The initial stressful event has long passed. Why, for the sake of feeling justified and in the right, do we hang on to the memory and thereby cause the release of unnecessary, age-inducing, stress hormones into our body?

This is a topic that requires far greater discussion. In the next chapter, we will delve more deeply into the human propensity to hang on to stress far longer than is necessary.

More importantly, in Section 3, we will also discuss what we can do about it, namely how we can begin to let go of the stress that we seem unable to release – The Process of Letting Go.

END OF PART 2 – STRESS DEFINED

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NEXT SESSION: How To De-Stress & Prosper – 1:6 Stress Defined (Part 3)

Don’t want to wait for the next session? The Empowered Living iCourse How To De-Stress & Prosper is available as a Companion Guide and ebook.

Click here to view more.

Now that we have worked through the basics of stress and what it is, where it comes from, and how it can manifest in our lives, we can now go about giving stress a workable definition.

Here then is the Unlocking Your Life seminars definition of stress

Although by no means complete, Figure 2: Physical & Psychological Stress lists some examples of physical and psychological stress universal to the human condition.

Figure 2: Physical & Psychological Stress

Let’s now work through the individual parts of the definition, beginning with sadness.

SADNESS

Physical Sadness:

Illness, injury and pain can be considered types of physical sadness. When the body is suffering from cancer or an infection, it is sad-stressed. When the body has a fever or it shakes with rigors, it is sad-stressed.

When a child is nutritionally and emotionally malnourished, it doesn’t grow to its full genetic potential; growth retardation is a stress reaction – physical sadness – to long-term physical and emotional neglect.

When the body aches and is discomforted, when it is in pain, it is also communicating its sad-stress. Yet some pain could be considered “good” stress or sadness, as with the previously mentioned example of bodybuilding – stressing the body through exercise to build and tone muscles.

The “pain reflex” is also an example of good stress or sadness. When our hand is accidentally placed on a hot stove, the hand sends pain signals up the nervous system to the spine, which then diverts the signal back to the appropriate muscles to immediately withdraw the hand and prevent greater injury. Some of the pain signal continues up the spine to the brain’s “pain centre”, the area where we actually feel pain. “Ouch!”

Chronic pain, though, is bad stress. Pain that is continually present and resistant to analgesia causes dysfunction, disablement, and misery to the sufferer.

Exhaustion is another type of physical sadness. Whether it’s caused by excessive exercise, sleep deprivation, overwork, or even mental fatigue, the exhaustion is a stress reaction (see Figure 1: The Human Function Curve).

The body is saying it needs rest and recuperation. Failure to heed its cries can result in collapse, loss of consciousness, and even total body shutdown.

Psychological Sadness:

Depression is an example of severe psychological sadness. Depression is a stressful time for those suffering from it and for those caring for them. People suffering depression may exhibit symptoms such as:

• Crying easily (they are emotionally labile)
• Erratic sleep cycles (e.g. insomnia, early morning wakening)
• Appetite loss or gain (they lose or gain excessive amounts of weight)
• Lack of interest in things that previously gave them joy or pleasure (anhedonia)
• Behavioral seclusion (societal withdrawal)
• Thoughts of self-harm (suicidal ideation)

Thankfully, not everybody suffers depression. Yet many still suffer milder forms of psychological sadness, such as unhappiness, grief, sorrow, despondency, and gloom. We may acknowledge our sad-stress by saying we’re “feeling down”, “feeling blue”, “not feeling myself”, and so forth.

This is not to say these feelings are abnormal or somehow immature. Quite the contrary. Psychological sadness is a normal emotion and a necessary part of the grieving process to loss.

What’s important to recognize, though, is the nature of sadness as a psychological stress. Accordingly, there is “good” sadness (e.g. that which helps us overcome significant loss), but there is also “bad” sadness, such as depression, which is chronic and causes dysfunction and disharmony in our life.

Part of emotional balance is to recognize when our sad-stress has exceeded its usefulness and turned dysfunctional.

INSECURITY

Physical Insecurity:

Thirst and hunger are examples of physical insecurity. If the body doesn’t receive sufficient water and food, its very survival is threatened, which is a stress.

As water and food intake dwindles, a kind of subconscious triage takes place inside the body, where the organs are prioritized as to which should be saved first. The stomach, gonads, skin, and other ‘minor’ organs are deliberately rationed of glucose, water and oxygen in an attempt to save the ‘major’ organs, such as the brain and the heart.

This diversion or triage of essential nutrients is a recognized physiological stress-response to the absence of food and water. In this sense, the rationing is a “good” stress-response. It buys the body valuable time and minimizes the harm caused by water or nutrient deprivation, giving the organism the best possible chance of recovery and recuperation.

However, chronic and persistent thirst and hunger represents a deterioration into severe stress, where the body tips into a state of total body shutdown. This state is exemplified by the distressing condition of Anorexia Nervosa, the extreme and deliberate starvation of the individual by the individual. At this point, even if food and water were to be ingested, the body is beyond recovery and death is the result.

A similar stress-response occurs with severe oxygen depletion (e.g. suffocation, drowning, high altitude). When air security is threatened, the body immediately shuts down non-essential organs, diverting the limited supply of oxygen to the organs vital in survival – the heart, lungs and brain. This is a normal and good stress-response to lack of oxygen.

However, persistent oxygen depletion can cause the body to rapidly deteriorate, leading to the bad stress of total organ shutdown, an example of which is end-stage high-altitude sickness. Even if Cardio Pulmonary Resuscitation is applied at this stage, death is often the result.

Psychological Insecurity:

Worry, anxiety, and fear are examples of psychological insecurity.

When we worry about what has happened in the past or what might happen in the future, we become anxious and even fearful. (See the section on Fear in Part One.)

Anything that is intimidating and threatening to our sense of security – war, crime, disease, natural disasters, job loss, financial hardship, rush hour traffic, and so forth – evokes worry, anxiety and fear, which are states of insecure-stress.

Our mind often reacts in the “fight or flight” mode, either defending the threatening situation or fleeing to a safer and more secure haven.

In regards to survival, this is an example of a good stress-response. The individual has secured their survival. Life can continue.

However, a good “fight or flight” stress-response can escalate into a bad stress-response. Our defensive actions can turn aggressive, such as road rage, assault, bullying, and other offensive behaviors. We may even find ourselves repeatedly reacting with greater and greater violence.

We may also find that we start to run away and flee even minor situations, situations that most people would find normal and unthreatening. For example, a fear of pain could result in hospital and doctor avoidance, to the detriment of our own health.

Worse, our minor fears could become irrational and grow into phobias. We may find ourselves melting in fear or overtly panicking at the sight of a needle on the television. Even the thought of receiving an injection may overwhelm us to the point of hysteria.

Recognizing the difference between healthy stress-reactions and dysfunctional stress-reactions, along with seeking professional help, are important steps to shifting our mind and body back to a comfort zone level of functionality.

END OF PART 1 – STRESS DEFINED

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NEXT SESSION: How To De-Stress & Prosper – 1:5 Stress Defined (Part 2)

Don’t want to wait for the next session? The Empowered Living iCourse How To De-Stress & Prosper is available as a Companion Guide and ebook.

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You will have noticed by now that stress is both a physical and psychological entity. But it doesn’t end there. Stress is also a condition and a cause: it is a state of being, a condition, such as anxiety, as well as an externally applied pressure, a cause, such as a looming deadline.

The awareness of the dual nature of stress led Dr Hans Selye to split the definition of stress into two parts:

• “Stress” – the condition we experience
• “Stressor” – that which causes or is a stimulus to the experience of stress.

Here is a list of common causes of stress, or “stressors”:

• Noise pollution
• Poor communication
• Cramped conditions
• Deadlines
• Mess
• Redundancy/Retirement
• Workload
• Financial loss
• Unsafe work conditions
• Bullying
• Shift work and sleep deprivation
• Exams/Tests of performance or competency

Accordingly, both stress and stressor also have physical and psychological components. Of the stressors above, below is a list of those that are physical causes of stress:

• Noise pollution
• Cramped conditions
• Mess
• Redundancy/Retirement
• Workload
• Financial loss
• Unsafe work conditions
• Shift work
• Sleep deprivation

The remaining causes of stress can be categorized as psychological stressors:

• Poor communication
• Deadlines
• Bullying
• Exams/Tests of performance or competency

But what stress is being caused by these stressors? Here are some examples of physical stress being caused by physical stressors:

• Hearing loss from continual noise pollution
• Neck strain from awkward and cramped conditions
• Twisted ankle from tripping over mess
• Financial hardship from a redundancy or retirement
• Back ache from excessive and heavy workload
• Homelessness caused by catastrophic financial loss
• Broken limb from unsafe work conditions
• Weight gain from poor eating habits during shift work
• Traffic accident caused by sleep deprivation

However, a physical stressor is not limited to causing physical stress. Here is a list of psychological stress-reactions caused by physical stressors:

• Irritability due to continual noise pollution
• Claustrophobia from cramped conditions
• Frustration at untidy and messy work or living area
• Insecurity from recent or threatened redundancy or retirement
• Sense of being overwhelmed by excessive workload
• The shock of sudden financial loss
• Worry of physical injury from unsafe work conditions
• Relationship difficulties brought about by irregular contact that comes from shift work
• Cragginess from sleep deprivation

Likewise, psychological stressors also cause psychological stress. Examples include:

• Shame/embarrassment resulting from poor communication (e.g. gossip)
• Worry from a looming deadline
• Anxiety and dread from emotional bullying (e.g. cyber bullying)
• Nightmares resulting from the fear of upcoming tests of performance or competency

What’s more, psychological stressors too are not limited to causing psychological stress. They can cause physical stress. Examples might include:

• Relationship breakdown/loss brought about by poor communication
• Physical tiredness/exhaustion resulting from the attempt to meet a deadline
• Nausea and vomiting brought on by the impact of constant emotional bullying
• Weight loss and hair loss caused by the excessive worry of an exam or test of competency

Given the understanding of stress we have now worked through – its individualized, complex and unique nature, its “good” and “bad” qualities, its “fight and flight” nature, its physical and psychological makeup, its cause and effect – a workable definition of stress can now be made, one that will be used and referred to throughout this iCourse.

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NEXT SESSION: How To De-Stress & Prosper – 1:5 Stress Defined

Don’t want to wait for the next session? The Empowered Living iCourse How To De-Stress & Prosper is available as a Companion Guide and ebook.

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Believe it or not, there is such a thing as “good” stress. It is a positive force, acting to improve our state of being and life-situation.

As stated before, Dr. Hans Selye called this kind of stress “eustress” in order to distinguish it from “bad” stress, or what he referred to as “distress”.

An example of good stress is bodybuilding. When we stress the right muscle groups appropriately through a workout at the gym, the muscles respond by increasing their tone and bulk. “No pain, no gain,” say the body-builders.

However, a bodybuilder needs to monitor the amount of stress he or she is placing on their body during a workout because it can quickly turn to bad stress and cause injury or harm.

Likewise, with any stress, part of successful stress- management, therefore, is the ability to monitor our stress and to sift the “good” stress from the “bad”. It also requires some kind of recognition that being totally “stress free” is not necessarily a desirable state of being.

Figure 1: The Human Function Curve below graphs the relationship between stress (good and bad) and performance (physically and mentally). (*Adapted from Nixon, P: Practitioner 1979.)

One of the most interesting facets of this graph is that it is entirely personal. Although it represents the limits of the human organism in general, everybody has their own individual limits for stress.

Furthermore: Zero stress = zero performance

In other words, to be 100% stress-free is to be dysfunctional!

The reason why a little bit of stress is actually “good” is because each of us has a degree of “healthy tension” in which our body and mind function throughout the day.

Figure 1: The Human Function Curve (*Nixon, P: Practitioner 1979)

At just the right amount of tension we also have a “comfort zone” in which performance is optimal, neither underworked nor overworked.

[Note: Everything in this iCourse is designed to help you achieve a “Comfort Zone” of stress and maintain it within that zone of optimum functionality.]

Yet even if “good” stress increases, functionality begins to falter. Although an initial improved output or performance may occur, the body and mind reach a “hump” where fatigue sets in.

With yet more stress, the body starts to lose coordination and the mind loses concentration. We forget simple things. We become easily irked and irritated.

And if stress still continues to be applied, exhaustion sets in and illness and disease begin to manifest.

Physical symptoms of stress may include:

• Angina
• Heartburn
• Gastritis
• Anemia
• Recurrent infections
• General malaise or weakness

Mental symptoms of stress may include:

• Excessive anxiety
• Insomnia
• Unexplained feelings of doom and despair

Finally, if stress becomes unrelenting, the body and mind break down completely. Angina may lead to a full cardiac arrest (heart attack). Gastritis may lead to ulceration and even perforation, with catastrophic hemorrhage (internal bleeding).

The mind too may break down to the point of complete dysfunction, with paranoia, overwhelming fear, psychological regression, and even, in its extreme, schizophrenic catatonia.

Chronic Stress

Thankfully, however, stress usually isn’t excessive and overwhelming. More often than not, it’s something we learn to live with over an extended period of time.

Yet living in a constant state of stress, day in, day out, month after month, year after year, also takes its toll on our physical and mental health.

Although adrenaline and cortisone have positive effects on the body in an immediately threatening situation, the body cannot cope in the long-term with elevated hormone levels.

It starts to break down, albeit gradually:

• Arteries become clogged and friable.
• Muscles melt away and atrophy.
• Nerves become slow and hyporeflexic.
• Bones become brittle and weak.
• Vision blurs and hearing deafens.

In short CHRONIC STRESS AGES US.

The mind, too, is greatly affected by chronic stress. Cocooned in a state of anxiety, either fighting the threat of danger or fleeing it, it also begins to break down.

Although breakdown may not be total and completely dysfunctional, as just discussed, the commonest states of a chronically stressed mind are:

• Dread
• Despair
• Depression

But do we have a choice? Or are we all destined to become helpless victims of stress?

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NEXT SESSION: How To De-Stress & Prosper – 1:4 Stress: Condition & Cause

Don’t want to wait for the next session? The Empowered Living iCourse How To De-Stress & Prosper is available as a Companion Guide and ebook. Click here to view more.

Interestingly, the term “stress” wasn’t used in the common vocabulary until the 1930s. Until then, stress mainly described physiological, mechanical, physical, and biological forces, but it took an endocrinologist to popularise the word as we know it today.

After studying the behaviour of laboratory rats, Dr Hans Selye came to define stress as:

 “AN INAPPROPRIATE PHYSICAL RESPONSE TO ANY DEMAND”

Words such as pressure, duress, strain, and catch phrases such as “under the pump”, “high maintenance”, “up the creek”, and “in the doghouse”, all refer to various levels of stress, but instead of helping to clarify the term “stress” they only seem to add to its vagueness.

Eighty years on, however, stress has come to mean anything from a minor concern about what to wear to a party, to relationship difficulties, workplace deadlines, and global financial crises, so much so that the word has become a complex and ill-defined entity.

There are many other words available to choose from, but the words you use are important because they not only reflect your understanding of what stress is, they are also a reflection of how you personally experience stress.

SUBJECTIVE STRESS

Like love, everyone has a unique personal relationship with stress. What is stressful to some is a walk in the park for others. Some seem to thrive in high-pressure environments, whereas others tend to wilt and fall apart.

Stress also depends on perspective. To an engineer, stress is some quantifiable mechanical force acting within a structure being built. To a parent, stress is a baby that won’t stop screaming, even though all its needs have been attended to.

A look through the dictionary also reveals many various definitions of stress that encompass:

• Linguistics
• Mechanics
• Physiology
• Socio-economics
• Emotions
• Situational events

Stress is a noun, a verb and an adjective. Furthermore, stress can be acute or chronic.

There is also “good” stress, called eustress, which enhances function, such as strength training in the gymnasium. In contrast, there is also “bad” stress, called distress, which leads to a deterioration in function or “burnout” (which we will refer to in the next section 1:3 The Human Function Curve).

In short, the definition of STRESS IS A MESS!

The term “stress” therefore needs to be simplified into a common, agreeable definition, a definition that will facilitate the implementation of psychological tools and techniques that are designed to reduce the impact of stress on our state of being.

But before we do that we need to broaden our understanding of the origins of stress.

THE ORIGINS OF STRESS

Evolutionists explain the origins of stress on the instinct to survive. The “fight or flight” response, as it is called, can literally save us, either by instigating a fight against the current threat to our lives or fleeing to a place of safety.

You may take a minute to reflect on recent experience(s) you have had of the “fight or flight” response.

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During the fight or flight response, hormones called adrenaline and cortisone flood our body, heightening our senses and reflexes in order to deal with the imminent threat.

Blood and oxygen are diverted away from non-essential organs – such as our stomach, gonads, liver, and pancreas – and re-routed to supply the parts of our body that will require extra sustenance – our heart, sensory organs, muscles, and brain.

Once the threat has been dealt with, however, adrenaline and cortisone return to normal levels and our body returns to its original, more passive state.

In the past where lions, tigers and other predators roamed more freely than today, the fight or flight response meant the difference between eating dinner around the campfire with one’s family or being the dinner itself.

In today’s world, though, we are not likely to come face-to-face with a savage predator, yet we still experience threats to our personal safety.

You might like to take a minute now to make a list of events you consider threatening.

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At such moments as you have just listed you are experiencing precisely what your ancestors did hundreds of thousands of years ago, even though our world today is a much safer place to live.

Yet why do we still have stress? Is there anything we can do about it? Is the complete absence of stress a realistic ambition, or does it have at least some benefit?

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NEXT SESSION: How To De-Stress & Prosper – 1:3 The Human Function Curve

Don’t want to wait for the next session? The Empowered Living iCourse How To De-Stress & Prosper is available as a Companion Guide and ebook. Click here to view more.

By Scott Zarcinas MD, Founder Unlocking Your Life seminars

Researchers put the cost of personal and workplace stress to the Western economy at almost 2% of GDP, which equates to over 100 billion dollars per year. Stress has not only the potential to cripple our own personal livelihood but also the potential to cripple business and national finances.

We are not immune to stress. It’s an integral part of being human. But are we, as a whole, suffering too much stress? Take this quick survey.

This is the most important step of the whole process of de-stressing. So take your time, re-evaluate it if you need to, because your current level of stress will be the measuring stick with which you will monitor your improvement throughout this Empowered Living iCourse. Without knowing where you are now, you cannot plan where you want to be.

For most of us, there is a big discrepancy between what our stress levels are and what we would like them to be. Yet although being totally stress-free might sound desirable, we will discover that it isn’t a realistic or entirely practical goal. In fact, some stress is appropriate!

But if this Empowered Living iCourse could help you achieve an 80-90% REDUCTION in your current stress levels and KEEP them at that “comfort zone” level, would you be interested?

Then let’s begin…

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NEXT SESSION: How To De-Stress & Prosper – 1:2 Stress Is A Mess!

Don’t want to wait for the next session? The Empowered Living iCourse How To De-Stress & Prosper is available as a Companion Guide and ebook. Click here to view more.

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE EMPOWERED LIVING iCOURSE