INTRODUCTION willingness to be a beginner

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1 INTRODUCTION Stress is now an everyday word that is used by people in all walks of life. It is mostly used to describe a sense of the difficulties we all face in coping with the unpredictable and sometimes overwhelming circumstances of the modern world around us. What hasn t fully found its way into common conversation yet are the volumes of recent research that have uncovered fascinating information about how to relieve stress and develop greater vitality and well being. Few people have the time to decipher the scholarly findings of ivory tower enthusiasts and extract the data relevant to our own personal situations. So we have organized this workbook to provide you with the most relevant, condensed details on the concept of managing stress in your daily life, both on and off the job. Our focus will be on sharing scientific research in a practical, user friendly way. We will offer information on a variety of subjects and behaviors that can be integrated into an overall lifestyle approach to improve personal health and well being. We focus on a lifestyle approach to managing stress because research in the area of job stress reduction has shown that a combination of lifestyle skills not only improves personal health and longevity, but contributes to greater productivity and satisfaction in the work environment as well. The areas of personal and professional life are best addressed together since they overlap and influence each other both positively and negatively. Research has also shown that the main factor in learning new behaviors is the repetition of new skills until they become part of your daily routine. Unfortunately this means that we need to take time from already busy schedules to practice slightly different ways of doing things until they become automatic. With this in mind we encourage you to be patient and focus on learning one or two new behaviors at a time. Yet try to keep building new skills into your lifestyle as you go along by referring to this and other books or related courses on the subject. Developing new coping skills is a long-term process that can be enjoyable if we approach it with an open mind. We recommend an attitude of curiosity and willingness to be a beginner in exploring these new ideas and experiences. This may hopefully encourage an appetite for life long learning that will keep your mind and body flexible and fit for years to come.

2 OVERVIEW OF STRESS Stress is the tension created in the body by the instinctual reflex we all have, called the fight or flight response. This reflex was developed in our prehistoric ancestors to generate a quick mobilization of energy, in order to respond to the life or death threats coming from the environment. During this stress response dozens of physical changes occur to support exertion and survival, including an increase in blood pressure, heart rate and muscular tension. At the same time, other systems divert energy to these survival functions which results in a decrease in the workings of the digestive, reproductive and immune systems. Unfortunately these days the same ancient reflex is stimulated too often, leading to an accumulation of tension which may strain certain bodily systems and lead to possible illness. In other words the stress response was really good for an occasional run away from a tiger that was sizing you up as its next meal. But may be very counterproductive when dozens of daily hassles leave us wound up like a spring ready to bite the head off the next imaginary tiger that crosses our path. Luckily the stress response is not all bad news. Stress can be helpful during brief periods of pressure to improve concentration and endurance. It allows us to speed up for a little while and increase productivity. However just like when driving a car you would use fifth gear only as an occasional passing gear. So too, we need to be able to pace ourselves and balance our tensions. This is the basic premise of managing stress. By learning to downshift our efforts when possible we can prevent unnecessary wear and tear on the systems of our body. The concept of the human performance curve may be helpful in portraying this concept (figure 1 on following page )

3 HUMAN PERFORMANCE CURVE Fig 1 OPTIMAL RANGE FOR PERFORMANCE AND HEALTH HEALTH RISK RUSTOUT BURNOUT FLOW PERFORMANCE A. LOW B. OPTIMUM C. HIGH Amount of Pressure Boredom Efficiency Mistakes Apathy Creativity Frustration lethargy Flexibility Anxiety Dissatisfaction Self Confidence Depression Distraction Energy Illness This concept suggests that the B optimum amount of pressure can challenge us to grow and stretch a little beyond our reach to grasp a new understanding of our potential strength and flexibility. This is called positive stress when we beneficially adapt to situations and learn new coping skills as a result of a temporary challenge. Negative stress is what happens when C high pressure or length of a challenge overwhelms our physical or mental resources somehow and leads to strain or exhaustion. The other option is that A too little pressure can lead to boredom and apathy.

4 Therefore one of the main goals of stress management is to smooth out the highs and lows of stress (figure 2). By replacing the patterns of accumulating tension with a more balanced rhythm of exertion and coping (figure 3). Stress management is more like developing specific training practices to pace yourself for running a marathon rather than exhausting yourself in too many 100 yard dashes. Figure 2 Stress Reactions Reaction Collapse TIME Burnout Unhealthy Bodily Stress Reaction

5 Figure 3 Stress Reactions Reaction TIME Healthy Bodily Stress Reaction