Stress

Claus Georg Tornai

Did you know that you sacrifice about 27,000 minutes of your life looking at your watch? ... and maybe only to ascertain that you have no time? The word “stress” is on everybody’s lips. Adults as well as children and young people throw this term about liberally. Often as an excuse when we do not want to fulfil a request or a wish, we say: “I am sorry, but I am stressed out!”

The manager in an office is under pressure, one deadline comes close on the heels of another. With modern communication tools everyone is within reach round the clock. Employees feel that in spite of the use of computers due to disproportionate downsizing, the workload is increas- ing if anything. They have to withstand an ever-mounting pressure of deadlines and of growth in sales and earnings. Coming back from (a hopefully relaxing) holiday, there is already a big pile of outstanding work waiting at home or in the office.

The number of people that go off sick because of “burnout” has been on the rise in recent years. The World Health Organisation (WHO) considers this as one of the biggest health risks of the 21st century.

While in the past the thinking was more long-term, today the sowing and harvesting should ideally be happening at the same time. Especially endangered are people in caring occupations and commuters. The housewife often feels overbur- dened with or without the double strain of a job; the reasons for this can lie in the children’s education, the worry about finances or also the putting aside of one’s own interests and needs in favour of the family. The pupil likewise runs on adrenalin – homework, meeting friends, hobbies, surfing the internet and so on, hectic in the shopping centre, at the station, on the streets ...

For many people it is a sign of the importance of their person to claim to be under stress.

“Only in a calm lake will the light of the stars be reflected!”

Why do we feel such a great pressure? And how can we find niches or “emergency lay-byes”?

The stress tolerance of man and material

The term “stress” (Latin stringere = strain) was originally used in connec- tion with materials testing in indus- try. In trying to find out how resilient a material could be before becoming fatigued it is put through a stress test.

In 1936, physician Hans Selye borrowed this concept from physics. Transferred to humans, the question now is: How far are we resilient? When do body and soul cry for help, when do illnesses and burnout ensue, which force us into resting from the ever more hectic daily grind?

Stress factors can be serious events like the death of a loved one, divorce, accidents, illnesses, unemployment, external factors such as noise, cold, heat, smells or also – and above all – the “normal” everyday life.

The borderline cannot be identified objectively: the one gets terrible stage fright when he has to address an audience, the next gets excited in the traffic jam, a third gets panic attacks because he is not finished with his work, and a fourth feels stressed by lack of work, lack of recognition, loneliness or lack of perspective (“boreout”). What makes the one keep calm, causes over-excitement in the other, he just cannot bear it. It is a matter of individual dose for each one.

A very complicated life with diverse wishes

The time is indeed fast-paced, in which complexity is increasing, and a lot happens in ever shorter time intervals, as we can ascertain in many areas of life – in climate change, in the economy, technology or in commu- nication. Perhaps one feels that he is not left with much time? But time for what? When somebody says that he has no time, he actually does not have any time for life, so no time for the really important things in life.

While our grandparents were mostly finished with their education and training by the age of 20 and could think about starting a family, training today takes considerably longer; after that we would still like to work for a few years before we think of parenthood. But at some time the pressure of the existing wishes – successful career, happy family, building a home, travel, hobbies and so on – gets too big. The balancing act on all fronts, perhaps even paired with an urge for perfec- tion, becomes a trap.

Stress – a survival strategy of the body

Stress is a survival strategy of the body. When once a Neanderthal encountered a sabre-toothed tiger, he had to decide quick as a flash: fight or flight. But no matter which way he decided, it meant physical exertion, above all the arms and legs were called into action; secretion of hormones – adrenalin, noradrenalin and cortisol – accompanied by increased heart rate enhanced the blood flow through the extremities; the physical exertion then restored the metabolism to normal.

Today we are not faced with a sabre-toothed tiger but perhaps the sword of Damocles, in the threat of unemployment, hangs over us – and we respond with stress, risking long- term stress, which leads from tension to irritability and anxiety.

The described bodily processes show that with physical exertion we can “run away” from stress. Movement, best of all combined with time in the open air, is a proven method of overcoming stress.

Incidentally, our stress system does not only apply in emergency situa- tions: without this strategy of the body we could not even get up in the morning, because first we have to get the organs moving.

Stress symptoms and healthy stress

People afflicted with stress complain of rapid pulse and raised blood

pressure, but they also offen suffer from stomach ache, circulation disor- ders, headache and migraine, backache, greater susceptibility to infection, excess acid as well as psychic problems ranging from insomnia, an inability to switch off and irritable mood, right through to depression and anxiety. These are all serious warning signals. In the worst case, stress can end in death. The Japanese use the term “karoshi” for the death of people who literally carry on working until they keel over.

This stress by overload, the so- called “distress”, has to be differenti- ated from sensible stress, so-called “eustress”. The latter increases our attention during challenges we are able to deal with and urges us on to higher performance levels, whereby we feel vigour and satisfaction leading to a healthy tiredness and subsequent recuperation and regeneration.

The quiet fear of failure

The stress of any overload with all the time pressure and unpleasant burden- ing it entails, is mainly accompanied by the anxiety not to be able to please oneself or others. One could define stress as a fear of not being able to cope with the tasks set by oneself or others, either in time or content, or of momentarily not having a solution to a problem – together with the thought: “I just cannot cope!”

Typical habitual ways of thinking: • “I absolutely must do this today!” • “I must make no mistake, everything must be hundred percent!” • “I have to please everybody, no way can I say ‘no’!” Whoever is under stress, for him the future is more important at this moment than the present, because his thoughts circle around a future result that has to be achieved, accompanied by the anxiety of not being able to do it well and finish in good time. One then does not really concentrate entirely on one’s present activity.

When we are in nature and perhaps also when we carry out relatively simple manual activities, it will as a rule be easier to live in the present. Because one needs little in the way of thought constructs, one simply looks and acts. It is often said of monks, not without reason, that with compara- tively simple activities they can best live in the “here and now”. Such activ- ities can also be found in the home – at any rate, to counteract false stress it is important to stay with the job.

This living-in-the-present naturally becomes more difficult in the presence of other people, especially if they themselves do not exude calm when carrying out activities of predominantly intellectual nature and working under deadline pressure, but it is nevertheless possible.

Use your time more effectively!

“Use your time well, it slips away so fast, yet discipline will teach you how to win it”, says Mephisto in Goethe’s “Faust”

How can one use one’s time more effectively – and prevent with it unnecessary stress?

One rather intellect-orientated, but as a first step very practical solution, is to question just which of the desig- nated activities are really important and urgent, and then to do those jobs in the appropriate sequence, so as not to get bogged down. This approach is especially helpful for people who have a tendency to shelve things. Also tidying up and giving away certain things can foster emotionally the necessary letting go. Time pressure can also be reduced by observing regular breaks or rituals, working slowly deliberately, conscious breath- ing and other relaxation techniques. Also talking about a stress situation can be helpful.

But we want to go a little deeper: Time pressure is not felt when one allows oneself a somewhat more relaxed attitude, takes a step back in the direction of simplicity, eases back any overstretched expectations and listens more to one’s own needs.

We are in the full flow of life when our thoughts are focused entirely on one thing or activity; then the hours can pass as if on wings, everything is running as if by itself. Because the present is timeless, since in the present it is always “now”. Even when some matter does not seem at first so excit- ing, it is quite possible to concentrate the full attention to that which lies ahead. With a little practice it eventu- ally becomes child’s play and it is then easier to be in the present and to accept things – whatever they may be – for the time being.

Non-acceptance automatically leads out of the present – and into discon- tent. The recommended attitude to be adopted in unpleasant situations is: “Love it, change it or leave it!” A simple rule, which supports an active, conscious decision-making, which in turn naturally counters any passive suffering of stress.

The consumption of stimulants or increased television viewing to cope with stress is not advisable, since this only pushes the problem aside. However, a targeted change in diet (and eating slower!) or natural remedies (Bach flowers, homoeopathy, acupuncture, herbal teas, relaxing baths, to name just a few) are very useful as support. But the decisive step for a stress-plagued person is and always will be the change of his inner attitude. Part of this is finding a new answer to questions concerning the inner core of the human being, the spirit: “What really is important in my life? What tasks did the Creator entrust me with?”

There are often decisive tasks, which life presents us with and which we might try to avoid. We should recognise these tasks and handle them. For the only seemingly important tasks, however, with which our own restless intellect likes to “present” us, perhaps in the form of an exaggerated perfectionism, there are other bits of wisdom like “Tomorrow is another day!” and “Just hold your horses!”

A wise Chinese proverb says: “Only in a calm lake will the light of the stars be reflected!”

We find calmness and an inner balance by more thoroughly cultivat- ing the intuitive perceptive planes of life, by again finding the connection to our spiritual homestead. Therein lies the best protection – not only from damaging stress but also from all spiri- tual distress.