STRESS
Stress has been on my mind lately. A young friend reported headaches and light-headedness. When asked, she revealed working 16-hour days and concern about a project. She admitted her only food during a long day was a banana. Another friend is concerned about family issues and works incessantly to solve them. Yet another, having lost heavily in the recent stock market declines, is consumed with rebuilding quickly. My Sunday supplement reports that 60-90% of doctors' visits are related to stress. The common theme seems to be lack of time to accomplish all desired tasks.
This generalized lack of time is a recent but growing phenomenon. My grandparents and parents didn't feel they lacked time to do what they wanted to do. Even today, I meet older people who have a hard time filling their time. I see many causes for the stress arising from lack of time: grueling commutes, growing unkindness and discourtesy, economic issues- all contribute to stress. But the root cause is clear to me: We create artificial expectations for ourselves, impossible expectations, and then punish ourselves for failing to meet them. That is, we bring the lack of time and related stress on ourselves.
I did a little reading on the subject and experts agree that the solution to stress is within us. One change most of us can make immediately is increase exercise. Exercise in an enjoyable way is something we can all do. And by the way, don't judge your exercise program by comparison to others. Do what you can do and don't try to do too much. This is one reason I love golf so much. Golf brings pleasant mild exercise in a setting where you're only competing with yourself.
A more basic change is to be optimistic. If we all avoid falling into the trap of pessimism, if, again, we look forward to doing the best we can do every day to enjoy ourselves and be better people, we'll have plenty of time. If we can have faith in ourselves and in those around us, if we can recognize that we have everything we need within us, we can confidently face each day. Then what we need to do and what we want to do will match and both will be completed.
But I only recently figured out something else that will help us all: Laughter. I've discovered that laughing automatically relieves stress and makes us feel better, better about ourselves, better about those around us and better about the future. Sometimes we think there's nothing to laugh about. I've found that there's always something to laugh about. Reading the comic strips, observing the passing scene, even things that used to annoy me, can make me laugh if I'm willing to laugh. I've learned to laugh at myself if I can't find anything else to laugh at. If all else fails, think back to the last time you laughed and see if that makes you laugh again. You'll feel better, you'll feel more optimistic and stress will melt away.
1-27-03
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