Recognizing and Responding to Stress and Stress-Related Issues (part 3)

Stress is a necessary part of life that helps mobilize us into action when we need it most. However, left unchecked, prolonged exposure and traumatic events can lead to a host of debilitating symptoms--including burnout, compassion fatigue, PTSD, chronic pain and medically unexplained symptoms, as well as anxiety and depression

While society is generally aware of the dangers that can come about when we are unable to properly manage our stress-levels, many people have struggles in not only recognizing the symptoms, but in adequately responding to them. It seems only fitting that we try to understand why this is the case, and what we can do about it.

Last article sought to unpack this quandary by covering the first of three (3) values (#1 ‘Why We Struggle With Self Care’) that North Americans subscribe to which ostensibly contribute to our growing stress-epidemic. This entry adds to the discussion by focusing on our culture’s preferred outlook on life and way of dealing with adversity, along with its subsequent behavioral adaptations.

2) Good Health Comes From a Positive Attitude -> Challenges with Authenticity

The Science Behind Positive Thinking

Something that has caught on wildfire in the past few decades is the notion of the power of our mind in shaping our experience. “Change your thoughts, change your life” is the general gist of a lot of self-help literature, with the notion that many of our mental and physical health concerns are related to poor habits of thinking.

In a lot of ways, this makes sense. If I have a thought after being berated by my boss that “I am a failure”, and I believe that thought to be true about myself as part of my identity, then I will have a subsequent feeling of sadness. I also might have a corresponding physiological response of collapse in my body.

If I then go off afterwards and start ruminating over that interaction, so that it keeps me occupied for the rest of the day, I will effectively be training my mind to emit the same chemicals that stem from the activated neural network around the event. This process could be described as “what fires together, wires together”, which is attributed to Hebb’s rule of associated learning by strengthening the synaptic strength between the cells--also known as neuroplasticity.

Therefore, on paper, it would seem quite practical then to want to encourage the ‘right’ neurons to come together by intentionally promoting positive thinking in one’s life, so that we can feel ‘up’. It also would be understandable to want to try to prune away all the ‘negative thoughts’ and associated down-feelings...because why stand in the rain when the sun is just around the corner?!

The Rise of Putting On Appearances

This last point concerning the notion of choice, or decision-making when it comes to our mental state is a big one with regards to how we respond to our emotions and stress. No matter how hard a day we might have had, or if we simply just woke up in a bad mood, the standardized response we are conditioned to give to those who ask us how our day is tends to be: “Good!”, “Great”, “Well”, etc. If we are having an exceptionally challenging day, we might even say “Fine” or “Ok”.

These cordial lines we offer can all be geared towards a hard reset, or manual override of our internal processing systems in order to display an agreeable appearance to others. The rationale behind this is that, even though I may not be feeling at this moment like a “Happy 10”, if I can ‘Fake it till I make it’, I can eventually get there.

The Threat of Non-Compliance

The motivations for doing this aren’t just personal. The underlying fear with conveying anything outside the realm of hunky-dory, or life-as-usual, is that you will be marked as a threat and cast out of the herd of normalcy. By taking off your mask and exposing your true feelings, you are effectively betraying the unspoken civic agreement implicitly held by people which is maintained by a “Keep calm, Carry on” attitude.

Given that we are a society that is based on productivity and performance, where everyone plays their role in maintaining the status-quo, hearing that someone is displeased with their job or considering taking some time off for their mental health can be construed as a disruptive force to the system; a cog in the wheel.

On top of this, people who have learned to dampen their own difficult feelings will be highly uncomfortable around those who express theirs, as the act of vulnerable disclosure can evoke that which they have denied in themselves. A good example of this would be on the occasions when you’ve been on a bus, train, or plane with a crying baby. The way you respond to their wails can be representative of how you were relating to your internal distress around that period.

The Loss of Connection to Self

* Affecting Relationships

The result of our internalized value of ensuring that we ‘keep it together’ and put on a ‘happy front’ is that we forfeit our internal experience with our emotions and bodies. In essence, we reject ourselves in order to be accepted by the masses, as well as to keep the peace among our closer relations. The consequences of this primal disconnection are vast, with many that go under the radar due to the challenges of pin-pointing causation.

To offer some of the more clear examples, if I am not in connection with my emotions, then I will have a hard time evaluating when someone is either treating me appropriately or not. The core emotions of anger, sadness, disgust, or fear may rise, but they will quickly be thwarted—because at some time I learned that expressing these basic feelings was not acceptable. The subconscious inhibition then leads to anxiety and built-up stress in the body. The positive intention behind this emotional subterfuge is to try and defuse potential conflict. But the end result is that the affected person thereby embodies the conflict via internal tension—maintained through the impulse to express and address the emotional injury in juxtaposition with the desire to maintain the relational attachment at all costs.