Let’s calm down, take a deep breath, turn our attention inwards and let go of our worries, burdens and commitments for a moment. Think of something beautiful… draw a smile on your lips… and enjoy the moment.
Congratulations, you have just found yourself in – stress.
Or, to be more precise, instead of experiencing two types of stress, you are now likely to experience only one. You have eliminated the “usual” one; the one you used to feel as pressure, discomfort or excitement.
In fact, the easiest way to fix it is …
The first type of stress: cognitive stress
Let’s call this type of stress cognitive stress. It has the property of being noticeable and therefore distinguishable from our normal state. Or, to put it more simply, we know when something is upsetting us.
Three types of stress fall into this group:
- physical stress – as a result of injury, exhaustion, extreme weather conditions, lack of food or water, etc,
- chemical stress, caused by inhaling harmful substances, allergens in the atmosphere, toxic substances…,
- psychological or emotional stress.
Let’s just focus on the last one, which is created in two ways:
- through the experience of a specific situation , or more precisely, through the perception and interpretation of a situation. (The bodily intelligence, which manages all the processes that take place unconsciously, does not react to the actual environment, but to our perception of the environment. Take the example of having a low self-image and being praised by a colleague. Because we don’t value ourselves enough, we feel that we don’t deserve the praise, so it makes us feel uncomfortable – we can only accept praise to the extent that we value ourselves (and the same applies to criticism). We may even perceive the colleague’s praise as a covert mockery of us, and stress follows. Not because of the actual situation, but because of our specific perception or interpretation of the event.)
- creating an image or imaginary situation through memory, through worrying about the future, by playing out worst-case scenarios in your head, and so on.
This means that a lot of stress is not caused by circumstances, but by our interpretation of them. We look at life through our own filters of reality, made up of specific beliefs, attitudes, experiences… And when we see a situation as a hidden threat or potential danger, we may experience it as stressful.
We experience this stress as distress, pressure, a load on our minds and so on. In each case, it also manifests itself through the perceived functioning of bodily functions. For example, our heart beats faster, our stomach tightens, we can become tired in an instant, we breathe more breathlessly and rapidly, and so on.
Internal stress
The second kind of stress is much more dangerous, because we do not perceive it clearly or even know when, how or why it occurs. It can also be experienced in situations where we are not (consciously) stressed or feeling uncomfortable. Since we do not experience it through a perceptible and momentary change in bodily functions – as we experience the former – let us call it internal stress.
This type of stress comes from unresolved conflicts, traumatic memories and other unpleasant experiences. Every perception, view of a situation, memory and even association that can throw us off track contributes to internal tension.
Dr Alex Loyd and Dr Ben Johnson write in their bestselling book “The Healing Code”, “Suppressing destructive memories takes a tremendous amount of energy, all the time”, and add: “Dr John Sarno, a professor at New York University School of Medicine, has confirmed in his research that chronic pain and chronic health problems are the result of the suppression of destructive cellular memories.” (Note: cellular memory is so called because it has been discovered that memory is not hidden in the brain, as used to be thought, but in every cell. Although a more accurate statement would be: every cell has access to memory …)
These destructive memories are usually swept under the carpet or kept from being expressed. We may not even acknowledge them … we may become numb to them (and not even realise what is happening) … we may console ourselves that we have resolved them because we are “positive” and should not look at life negatively, and so on.
It also includes (slight) feelings of guilt, shame, helplessness… This energy is not so aggressive that it makes you feel bad.
What’s more, sometimes we even perceive these personality quirks as character traits that lead to equanimity – which means that they are not just taken for granted, but can make us feel as if we have progressed as a person.
Many of us “settle down over the years” …
Since this usually happens slowly, starting – according to researchers – sometime after the age of 35, we consider ourselves to have reached maturity. We realise that we are no longer so flighty and direct, but that we act wisely and “think things through”.
(Note: there is a great test for this claim. Take ten minutes and let off the brakes – for that short time, become “less wise” and less calm, or more flighty and spontaneously direct; the way you used to be. Many of you will find that “it’s not you anymore” or you won’t even be able to be “the old you” anymore.)
We can also say to ourselves that “we have calmed down over the years”.
For all these reasons, we do not associate our “calmness” with a change of perspective on ourselves, on life and on others in the sense of creating internal tensions, but with taking on a bigger, more serious role at home, at work and in society.
If you were to ask people who have known us for a very long time how they see us in a new light, they would probably have a different answer. (Of course, if they said exactly what they thought.) We might be perceived as calmer, but for a different reason – because we have become more bitter, we have lost our passion for life, our youthful spontaneity and playfulness, and our belief in the realisation of our dreams. Or as the American songwriter John Carlton says: “Most people live in quiet desperation.”
On reflection, we might even agree with them. We have somehow resigned ourselves to our fate and are sailing with our sails down – because it is safer that way and because we are in no hurry … in fact, we should be happy to have what we have … shouldn’t we?
The fact is that “calm” is often just a socially acceptable label for a lack of life sparkle, while we want others to see us as more prudent and wise.
We feel best in our own skin
And in this state of knowing that we are no longer as alive as we used to be, on the one hand, and on the other comforting ourselves that “years of experience will bring that”, we experience ourselves.
And that is the key question. How do we experience ourselves … or what is our neutral image?
The answer is to put ourselves in a situation where we don’t experience (perceived) stress and other unpleasant feelings, but we also don’t experience any great joy.
It is a state of affairs that is very close to us, because we are used to it. It makes us feel at home. In fact – what we are experiencing in that moment is us. The frame through which we express ourselves … and from which we cannot escape.
How do we know this? Imagine driving to a new city where no one knows you. You can pretend to be anyone you admire or want to be like: a successful businessman … a curmudgeonly enjoyer … an open, friendly and compassionate fellow citizen … an understanding sage … a direct and insightful observer, and so on.
Let’s say that for a few minutes you actually accept this role and play it.
What would you be experiencing deep inside? Instead of feeling relieved – because you would not have to carry the burden of responsibility and identity that you carry in a normal environment – you would at best feel like an actor on a stage; at worst, you might even get a bad conscience because you have betrayed yourself and “lied to people” by denying your true nature.
In fact, if you had not really made a firm decision to play this role with commitment (read: if the game was more important to you than everything else; not only how you feel, but also the impression you make on people), you would have slowly slipped back into your normal behaviour, including your perception of your surroundings, your thinking and your emotions.
The culprit comes from within
This is how we come to know our normal, general state. Sometimes it is also called the dominant vibration. We think of it as a neutral position, because, as we said, we don’t experience stresses and pressures, and we don’t experience much joy or optimism.
This is where the story gets complicated.
Researchers are finding that for many people, this “neutral state” is not neutral at all, but a state of stress.
In their book “The Healing Code”, Loyd and Johnson describe an interesting study. They asked people if they thought they were stressed. Half said yes, and the other half said they were not. When they used a special device, also used in hospitals to measure physiological stress (a procedure called HRV, or “Heart Rate Variability Test”), to measure their state of mind, they found that ninety percent of the latter were also stressed.
This means that around ninety-five percent of people are living under stress, but less than half of them are even aware of it. That’s why they don’t do anything about it.
It is not the perceived stress – which we know when and usually where it comes from – but the “invisible” stress that is slowly wearing us down from the inside.
And then many people are surprised when they suddenly get a more serious diagnosis. “I take good care of myself, I do sports, I eat healthy… I haven’t been ill for years, not even with a cold. Now, out of nowhere, this diagnosis,” they often wonder. Of course, because they have only been paying attention to the first form of stress, which works on the principle of “stress – relax”.
Humans are very well adapted to this short-term form of stress, which even strengthens the body. As long as the stress comes in waves, the body has time to recover, rebalance and prepare for the situation.
The problem arises when the body has virtually no time to regenerate. Recently, more and more researchers are finding that this is the root cause of many health problems.
Official medical science also confirms that most illnesses are stress-related. In his book “Evolve Your Brain”, Dr Dispenza summarises a report by the American Institus of Stress, which states that 90% of Americans see a doctor for a stress-related problem. (It does not mention which form of stress.) Dr Bruce Lipton, a renowned cell biologist and former lecturer at Stanford University, says that stress is the culprit in ninety-five percent of illnesses, and genetics in the other five percent.Dr Lipton, a renowned cell biologist and former lecturer at Stanford University, says that stress is the culprit in the other five percent of illnesses.
This is why Dr Loyd and Dr Johnson write in their book “The Healing Code” that it is this kind of (internal) stress that causes illness and disease: “If you have a health problem, it comes from this kind of stress – all problems, all the time.”
The solution can be simple
But how do we know that we are at least well on the way to improving or maintaining our health; if we start from the fact that we need to relieve ourselves internally?
Trust in life.
Joyful anticipation.
New targets.
A child’s curiosity and belief in dreams.
Carefree and unencumbered by your surroundings.
Authenticity of expression and coherence of thought, word and action.
Do we dare to admit what we really think and feel … to ourselves and to others?
Can we stop our manic thinking in the middle of a Monday morning, smell the flowers and tune out the sun for a moment… even if we are rushing to a meeting?
Can we set even a small goal and look forward to it with sincerity and openness? Or are we “too serious for such nonsense” … because we are worried about how others will see us?
We can live according to others’ scripts or our own. In the first case we will be invisible, in the second we will be happy.
P.S. If you think that others will like you if you live according to their wishes, you have just placed an enormous burden on yourself. Firstly, because that is not remotely true. And secondly, because you will be conforming to something all the time.
But when will you live?
This article is based on the book “The Big Ugly Crisis”, by Boris Vene and Nikola Grubiša.