Living in a stressful world
As most of us are painfully aware, stress seems to be an unavoidable feature of the fast-paced, time-urgent lives we lead. From the instant we open our eyes in the morning to the moment we drift off to sleep at night, we're bombarded with a stream of images and messages that make pressing demands on our time and resources, pose challenges to our livelihood or emotional security, or provoke anxiety about our future. Especially in these uncertain times, with economic turbulence and terrorist threats, we may feel that our very survival is at stake.
As a result, we're constantly online - and on edge - checking our computers, monitoring our email, talking on our cell phones, relying on caffeine to keep us going - and often on drugs to calm us down. No wonder we have difficulty unwinding at the end of the day, enjoying our leisure time, and getting a restful and relaxing sleep at night - all of which just further fuels our stress.
Stress epidemic
Indeed, stress has now reached epidemic proportions. Three quarters of Americans experience physical or psychological symptoms related to stress in a given month. One-third of Americans feel they are living with extreme stress, and half report lying awake at night because of stress. The impact of stress reaches every area of life. For example, one half of Americans say that stress has a negative impact on both their personal and professional lives. More than 30 percent of workers say they are "always" or "often" under stress at work, and about one-third of employed adults have difficulty managing work and family responsibilities. In the end, workplace stress costs more than $300 billion a year in health care, missed work, and stress-management programs.
What is stress?
But what exactly is this stress we're suffering from and why can't we get a handle on it? Stress is actually the body's natural response to exceptional demands or pressures of some kind. When you're faced with an unusually difficult or challenging situation, your body mobilizes to meet the challenge by releasing a flood of stress hormones, including adrenaline and cortisol, that enable you to take emergency action. Your heart pounds faster, muscles tighten, blood pressure rises, breath quickens, and your senses become sharper. These physical changes, known collectively as the fight-or-flight response, increase your strength and stamina, speed your reaction time, and enhance your focus, all for the purpose of helping you to avoid an oncoming car, fight with an attacker, or, in more everyday terms, meet your deadline or deal with an emergency at work.
The problem is, most of the time we don't have a clear-cut opportunity to fight or flee; instead, we're faced with a series of complex, irresolvable problems. As a result, the energy mobilized by the stress response is frozen in the body rather than released, and the stress becomes chronic rather than acute. Our minds perpetuate this chronic stress by amplifying the challenges we face with worry, self-doubt, catastrophic expectations, and an underlying feeling of being overwhelmed and unable to cope.
Gradually this chronic stress takes its toll on the body and causes or contributes to a host of ailments, from high blood pressure and digestive disturbances to heart attacks and strokes. Forty-three percent of adults suffer adverse health effects from stress, and two-thirds of all office visits to family physicians are due to stress-related symptoms. Physical symptoms of stress include fatigue, headache, upset stomach, muscle tension, dizziness, overeating, frequent colds and flu, and decreased libido. Psychological effects include low energy, irritability, anxiety, depression, difficulty concentrating, and a diminished enjoyment of life. Clearly, excessive stress has devastating consequences.
But stress can be difficult to identify and manage because it takes so many forms, has so many causes, and tends to creep up on us gradually. Not until we notice the painful knots in our shoulders or the anxious grip in our solar plexus or find ourselves snapping at our loved ones or exploding at another driver on the road do we realize we've become stressed out. Before we can free ourselves from stress, we first need to assess the unique ways that stress manifests in our lives.
Understanding the stress cycle
In general, the stress cycle can be broken down into three principal components:
- The stressful situation or event
- The negative thoughts and beliefs associated with the situation or event
- The physiological and emotional responses to holding these beliefs
Though some situations are inherently stressful - loud noises, extreme temperatures, crowded places, busy highways - the vast majority of the stress we experience is caused not by the situation itself, but by the way our mind interprets the situation. In other words, we create most of our own stress with the thoughts and beliefs we hold. This insight is pivotal in the process of freeing yourself from stress because it turns you from a victim into a potential agent of change. You may have limited control over the situations you encounter at home and work, but you definitely have the capacity to change your own mind -and this program provides exercises and meditations to help you do just that.
Let me give you an example of how your beliefs cause you stress. Say your boss (or a valued customer) calls to tell you she needs to have a particular project completed by next week. It's a reasonable deadline, and you know you can do the work, but you immediately start to feel some of the familiar signs of stress -tension in your gut, tightness in your shoulders or diaphram, headache, rapid heartbeat. What's going on?
Well, perhaps your last project wasn't as successful as you had hoped, and you're telling yourself the story that you might lose your job if your boss or customer is displeased. This story may in turn be amplified by negative beliefs, like "I'm stupid" or "I'm just not good enough." Now that you've begun doubting your ability to cope with the situation, your mind may run rampant with visions of losing your family and friends and living on the street - all because your boss or customer gave you a deadline. These thoughts and beliefs may be so subliminal that you're not aware of them, but they're the real cause of your stress, not the situation itself. When you do the exercises provided in this program for working with your mind, you can identify the stressful thoughts and beliefs and release their hold over you.
