Entries Tagged 'Stress Hardiness' ↓

a4gpa. Creative Commons license.

The most wasted of all days is one without laughter.
—e.e. cummings

What soap is to the body, laughter is to the soul.
—Yiddish Proverb

I’ve used this picture and these quotes before, but I can always stand to be reminded. I’ve even been putting “Laugh out loud at least 5 times a day” on my Possibility List. I mean, how hard is it to say “ha, ha, ha, ha, ha” or “hee, hee, hee, hee, hee”? In fact, “hee, hee, hee, hee, hee” works best for me, because it forces my mouth into a smile, and I do notice the change in my body and spirits.

But, you might say, that’s not really laughing. We only really laugh when something strikes us as funny. Not so. It works the other way, too. If you laugh a lot you start seeing more humor in life, just like smiling can often change our mood.

In Cut Stress By Anticipating Laughter? Kelley Colihan says, “OK, take a deep breath. Now put your hand on your belly. Imagine your stomach jiggling, as if you are starting to laugh. You may have just taken a step toward reducing stress hormone levels.” One study has shown that merely anticipating a laugh can lower our level of stress.

My husband and I tend to laugh a lot, but it never hurts to keep ourselves tuned up. And that really paid off the other night. I was getting ready for bed when my husband came rushing in, saying, “Jean, there’s water all over the kitchen floor! I turned the faucet off and drained the sink, but we have to mop it up before it drips on our downstairs neighbor!” He was right, of course. I did mutter a short, “Good Lord, Jean!” to myself, because I was the culprit, but then I thought of my Garmin and said, “Recalculating. Recalculating.” I got out some sponges and buckets and we started to mop up. That didn’t quite work…it was like trying to bail out a boat using a tablespoon, so I got out two plastic dustpans and we used the sponges to sweep the water into the pans, which we emptied into the buckets. That was a lot faster.

Once we had a system that would clearly work, we started joking and having a good time. I’ll obviously try not to let the water run over again, but realistically there’s no way to promise. So we bought a water alarm that will go off if I do forget. Our motto is “Do the best you can with what you’ve got.” And if that’s not good enough, get some help. It’s a lot more fun to lighten up and enjoy life than to worry about our imperfections. As I said in last week’s post: we don’t have to be perfect to be awesome.

What about you? How do you lighten up when little things go wrong? Please share your experience in the comments section.

Thanks to bikehikebabe, Robert and The Constant Skeptic for commenting on last week’s post.

Thanks also to Square-Peg Karen for her posts, especially the recent one entitled You Smell. It definitely made me laugh out loud.

The relaxation response is a physical state of deep rest that changes the physical and emotional responses to stress…. [it is] the opposite of the fight or flight response.
—Herbert Benson, M. D.

In my last post I mentioned I was experimenting with a biofeedback device called the StressEraser. It’s been helpful if I wake up tense in the middle of the night. Even better, it helps me sleep more restfully if I use it just before bedtime. It has also made me more aware of my breathing during the day, especially when I catch my breath … literally forgetting to breathe. I’ve been doing that surprisingly often. The big difference is I notice it now. That’s a big payoff for the small amount of time I’ve been spending with the device…averaging about 15 to 20 minutes a day.

What It Measures
What exactly does the StressEraser do? It uses an infrared detector to measure the the tiny changes in your pulse rate, which it displays as a wave. These changes are related to the state of your nervous system, so you can tell when you are becoming more or less relaxed. Figure 1 shows a screen shot of a person in a stressful state (notice the ragged graph and all the single squares), and Figure 2 shows one of a person in an ideally relaxed state. My waves aren’t that regular even when I’m getting good marks (3 squares) for being relaxed, but I can definitely see the difference.

Why It Works For Me
I’m a visual person, so I appreciate being able to see…right away… what’s going on. I also love to experiment, so I haven’t only been following the recommended procedure: focusing on my breath and counting how long it takes. I’ve been trying other things, like chanting, slowly saying affirmations while exhaling, etc. With the device I can see how my organism responds, and it turns the process into a game. It also lets me see which techniques work best for me.

And, as I said, I’m much more conscious of my breathing during the day. The StressEraser has taught me to notice how I’m exhaling. I used to think I had to take slow deep breaths to calm myself, but the device has taught me that all I have to do is exhale slowly and completely. If I expel all the air in my lungs, inhaling will take care of itself.

Would I Recommend It For You?
If you’re interested in a portable biofeedback device I would suggest reading about both the StressEraser and another device called the emWave at amazon.com. Read the descriptions and also the reviews from people who have used them. The devices are expensive and do require some commitment. Also different things work for different people, so I personally would buy one only if I could return it within a reasonable time period, usually 30 days.

Even if you decide against buying one of the devices, I would recommend experimenting with your breathing. If you focus your mind away from stressful thoughts and gradually start breathing at a rate of less than 6 1/2 breaths per minute, there’s a good chance you will easily slip into the relaxation response. At least that’s the way it works for me!

What about you? How do you calm yourself when your life starts to become hectic? Please share your thoughts in the comments section.

Images by StressEraser.

Thanks to bikehikebabe and Ellen for commenting on last week’s post.

There are short-cuts to happiness, and dancing is one of them. —Vicki Baum

 
TangoPango. Creative Commons.

And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.
—Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Socrates learned to dance when he was seventy because he felt that an essential part of himself had been neglected.
—Anonymous

Anyone who says sunshine brings happiness has never danced in the rain.
—Anonymous

 
a4gpa. Creative Commons license.

The most wasted of all days is one without laughter.
—e.e. cummings

What soap is to the body, laughter is to the soul.
—Yiddish Proverb

OK, take a deep breath. Now put your hand on your belly. Imagine your stomach jiggling, as if you are starting to laugh. You may have just taken a step toward reducing stress hormone levels.
—Kelley Colihan, WebMD Medical News

A lot is going on in my life right now…nothing earth-shaking, and most of it fun. But I’ve been easily startled by noise and have been feeling “nervous”. So I looked in my bag of stress management tricks and have been experimenting with some of my favorites:

• Singing and dancing,
• Laughing out loud, and
• Using a biofeedback device

The device I use is called the StressEraser (I don’t get paid for this plug, but it does work for me.) I use it at bedtime to sleep relaxed at night, and to check how I’m doing during the day. As I said, I’m experimenting to see what works best for me. I’ll let you know what I find out in next week’s post.

In the meantime, what about you? What techniques do you use? What are your stress secrets? Please share your experience in the comments section.

Thanks to bikehikebabe, Robert, Mark, and Jackie for commenting on last week’s post.

Activities like knitting and crochet can cause a relaxation response similar to meditation.
—Knitting for Stress Relief

Find what you love to do and find a way to share it with others.
—The Cheerful Monk

I used to love to knit, but I haven’t done it for years because it hasn’t integrated very well with my present lifestyle:

Still, I’m about to go on a trip which will involve a lot of sitting. So that eliminates the first reason. And…I’ve discovered Knitting for Charity. I was especially taken by the Mother Bear Project, which provides homemade stuffed bears for African children with AIDS/HIV. What better reason to knit than to show a child he/she is loved?

With permission, Mother Bear Project.

To simplify things I’ve ordered a complete kit for one of the bears. So I not only have a chance to knit again, I have a chance to make this poor old world a slightly more loving place. I can’t pretend I’m being altruistic…projects like these soothe my nerves and warm my heart. But hopefully I’m not only giving myself a double dose of happiness, I’m giving some to someone else too.

What about you? How do you give yourself doses of happiness? Do you find it increases when you share it? Please share your thoughts and experience in the comments section.

Thanks to bikehikebabe for commenting on last week’s post.

casey marcum. Creative Commons license.

silent (e). Creative Commons license.

methyl lives. CC license.

Lee Gomes at the Wall Street Journal wrote an interesting article the other day: Why We’re Powerless To Resist Grazing On Endless Web Data. Like many headlines, this one exaggerates for the sake of effect, but Gomez does present some food for thought. He suggests that the human mind is as hard-wired to notice new information as a cat is hard-wired to chase a laser spot. He says that explains why some people get “addicted” to the Web.

He talks in terms of websites, but the allure of new information also extends to e-mail, watching TV, listening/watching/reading the news, and even to chatting on the cell phone. We’re all different and have our favorite forms of stimulation. Mine happens to be solving puzzles/problems. Last week I mentioned I had started doing some Word Jumbles to warm me up for doing my income tax, but I really got hooked on doing them. I didn’t worry about it too much, I just indulged until I finished the book so it would no longer sit around tempting me. But that excitement was powerful.

And power like that isn’t bad. It’s simply motivation we can learn to use wisely. I turned my fascination with problem solving into a career. My favorite nightmare used to be that I had to go on a business trip and couldn’t pull myself away from work to go home, pack, and rush to the airport. By now I’ve learned to be careful setting goals and making To Do lists…I recognize my tendency to be compulsive and simply plan around it. The trick is to have more than one thing that can grab my attention. For instance, it’s easy to pull myself away from projects to exercise every day because I have interesting DVDs to watch while I use my NordicTrack treadmill. It’s simply a matter of balancing one pleasure against another to be highly effective.

I learned this trick years ago when I stopped a preoccupation with food by finding something I enjoyed even better than eating. It took quite a while to find it…as the saying goes, “Sometimes you have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your prince.” But it turned out learning to play the piano stimulated the pleasure centers in my brain enough to do the trick.

Item #2 of the Traits of Stress-Hardy, Resilient People is

 
The first step is awareness, not only uncovering what we really want in life so we have a direction to go in, but also noticing what grabs our attention so we have the power to get there.

What about you? What grabs your attention? How can you harness this power wisely? Please share your thoughts in the comments section.

Thanks to bikehikebabe for commenting on last week’s post.

lady-bug. Creative Commons license.
 
 

dominocat. Creative Commons license.
 

Becoming mature means learning to accept what you cannot change, facing unresolved sorrows and learning to love life as it really happens, not as you would have it happen.
—Barbara Sher

I realize that humor isn’t for everyone. It’s only for people who want to have fun, enjoy life, and feel alive.
—Anne Wilson Schaef

There’s an old Sufi story about accepting imperfection:

Mulla Nasrudin decided to start a flower garden. He prepared the soil and planted the seeds of many beautiful flowers. But when they came up, his garden was filled not just with his chosen flowers but also overrun by dandelions.

He sought out advice from gardeners all over and tried every method known to get rid of them but to no avail. Finally he walked all the way to the capital to speak to the royal gardener at the sheik’s palace.

The wise old man had counseled many gardeners before and suggested a variety of remedies to expel the dandelions but Mulla had tried them all. They sat together in silence for some time and finally the gardener looked at Nasrudin and said, “Well, then I suggest you learn to love them.”

An Experiment in Loving the Weeds

Learning to love the weeds in our lives…that’s an idea worth playing with. The big challenge for me this week was working on income tax. So to get in the proper frame of mind I thought of my new role model and asked, “What would a dolphin do? How would he handle it?” Another way of asking this question is “How can I get this done and enjoy the process?” Once I looked at it this way, the answer was easy. I love puzzles such as such as Word Jumble and Sudoku, and parts of doing income tax isn’t that much different. It’s just figuring out what part of the tax code applies to us and where to put the information we’ve accumulated during the year.
That’s mostly a word-logic puzzle, so I did some warm-ups with Word Jumble…it seemed to activate the same part of the brain that I would be using. And it got me into the ideal problem-solving state: a curious mind in a relaxed body. I also cleared off the dining room table so I could spread out my papers and not have to fumble through them to find what I needed. And I allowed myself plenty of time so I could take a break as often as I wanted.

Results
On the whole the experiment worked well. I enjoyed it, and I didn’t get frustrated when I had to think for a while to figure something out. That meant the process probably went a lot faster than if I had been pushing to get it done.

The only downside was I got hooked by Word Jumble and spent more time playing with that than I had intended. But that’s a topic for next week’s blog! I think it went so well not just because I approached it with the right attitude, but also because I’ve been practicing that mindfulness…a curious but patient mind in a relaxed body… a lot this past year. All those hours working on my two blogs (this one and the one at Cheerful Monk) have really paid off.

So, can we enjoy the weeds in our lives? As we can see from the pictures above, dandelions can be beautiful if you stop to look at them rather than being upset because they’re “ruining” your garden. And I dare say, there are probably a lot more things in my life that I can enjoy if I just stop fighting them. So I suppose the stress-hardy thing to do is take Nasrudin’s attitude—by all means try to get what you want. But if that doesn’t work, do your best to love life just the way it is.

This site is presented as food for thought. Please share your views in the comments section.

Thanks to bikehikebabe for commenting on last week’s post.

Leo Reynolds. Creative Commons license.

 
I came across a delightful story about a dolphin this past week. Two pygmy whales, a mother and calf, were disoriented and stranded off a beach down in New Zealand. Rescuers had been trying to help, but the whales were getting more distraught, and the situation looked hopeless. Then Moko, a local dolphin, came in. She pushed herself between the humans and the whales and led the whales out to sea. In just a few minutes she accomplished what the humans had failed to do in about an hour and a half.

The story reminded me of a Calvin and Hobbes cartoon, where Hobbes the tiger says, “It makes you wonder why humans think they’re such big, screaming deals.” It also reminds me of an article, written by a dolphin trainer, I read years ago. He said he was just starting to train a new dolphin and brought over some fish to feed it. The dolphin was a quarter way around the pool and indicated the trainer should come over there to do the feeding. The trainer insisted…no, the dolphin had to come to him. So the dolphin good-naturedly did, and the trainer felt pleased and in control. Except that about a week later he suddenly noticed he was feeding the dolphin exactly where the dolphin had been that first day. There was no contest of wills. The dolphin had just patiently and subtly gotten his way. Even though the trainer didn’t use Hobbes’ exact words, you could tell from the article that he agreed with the sentiment. We humans do have an exalted opinion of ourselves. It would be more appropriate to lighten up and have a bit of humility.

My New Role Model
In What I Learned From Being Downsized I said I had learned:

• Be optimistic and have a sense of humor
• Always keep learning and growing
• Be patient and bide your time when it’s appropriate
• Generate new ideas and opportunities for yourself
• Enjoy the adventure of life and have friends to share it with

It seems to me that dolphins come by that naturally. So in the future if I start to get thrown by difficult people and situations, I’ll just ask myself, “How would a dolphin handle this?” Hopefully that will quickly get me back on track. Let’s face it, life is a lot easier and more fun if we have a bit of humility and a good sense of humor.

Please share your experience in the comments section.

Thanks to Robert and Jackie for commenting on last week’s post.

heyjules445. Creative Commons license.

If men were angels, no government would be necessary.
—James Madison

The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse.
—James Madison

All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree.
—James Madison

This month the topic for Robert Hruzek’s group writing project is What I Learned From…the Law.

A gazillion or so years ago, when I was young and naive, I was driving on the Stanford campus one sleepy Sunday morning. I came to an intersection with a visibility of several blocks in all directions, and there wasn’t another car in sight. So I slowed to a crawl in the spirit of the stop sign, and proceeded on my way. Unfortunately, even though there was no other car in sight, there was a police car parked in a driveway behind some bushes. The policeman saw me even though I hadn’t seen him, so he stopped me and gave me a fatherly lecture about the danger of making “rolling stops”. He assured me that I was risking the life and limb of not only myself but of other human beings if I didn’t come to a complete and utter stop at every stop sign I encountered, no matter how many cars there were or weren’t on the road, and no matter how good the visibility. Being a sensible young thing I listened respectfully and thanked him for the warning.

Now I didn’t insult his intelligence by assuming he actually believed every word he uttered. I mean, it must have been boring for him just sitting there with nothing to do. I imagine my coming by must have been a welcome relief. On the other hand, I decided obeying stop signs would be less of a nuisance than getting a lecture or a ticket, so I would mend my errant ways.

I had a chance to test my resolve a couple of weeks later. I was driving on the edge of campus, on a meandering road that had one stop sign after another. There was no side traffic, but I dutifully stopped at each sign. I was comforted by the fact that the only other vehicle on the road was the police car behind me. I didn’t think of him as an enforcer, I would have been stopping anyway, but it was nice to know he was sharing my misery. Yeah, sure. After the second stop he turned on his flashing lights, went around me and sailed through the rest of the stop signs without even slowing down. He clearly had better things to do with his time. I had to laugh at my outrage. Of all the injustices in the world, this is the one that made my blood boil.

It didn’t change my opinion about rolling stops, though. Sensible or not, I obeyed the rule because I didn’t want to draw my attention to myself. Keeping a low profile around policemen struck me as a good strategy. Except for one time a few years later. I worked about ten miles from where I lived, and I couldn’t sleep one night. So about 3 o’clock in the morning I decided I might as well drive in and get something done. But once I was on the freeway, I wondered if that had been such a good idea. One car seemed to be following me…every time I changed lanes, so did the driver. I was a nervous when I took the off ramp, so I purposely ignored the stop sign at the bottom. I checked for traffic but scarcely slowed down.

There was some justice in the universe after all…a policeman was there to see me. When he pulled me over I told him what was going on, and he followed me to work and made sure I got inside safely. That incident more than made up for the previous two…the rule had come to my rescue when I needed it. I now had a much better appreciation for the law, although not quite in the way the police had hoped.

Lessons Learned
So what did I learn from those experiences with the law? Basically The Traits of Stress-Hardy, Resilient People, especially Item 4: Life and people are imperfect, so don’t let it throw you. Have a long-term perspective and keep your priorities straight. Don’t waste your energy on things you have no control over. Focus on what’s really important to you and don’t be distracted by the foibles of other people.

What about you? What experiences have you had with the law? What have you learned from them? Please share your thoughts and experience in the comments section.

Thanks to Ellen and bikehikebabe for commenting on last week’s post.

Thanks again, Robert, for doing this series once a month. I’m a loyal fan.

Photo of Bentley courtesy of The Daily Puppy.

We hear a lot these days about how happy people not only have more fun in life, they also live longer. Does that mean we should worry about our health when we’re unhappy? A recent WebMD article indicates it’s best to lighten up. It’s not being happy every single minute that counts, it’s knowing how to be proactive rather than being a passive victim in life.

Basically it’s the first three items in The Traits of Stress-Hardy, Resilient People

Don’t forget, too little stress is as harmful as too much stress. Don’t try to live in a little cocoon of completely positive thoughts. Notice what’s going on in the world and in your life. Sure, that will cause you some stress at times, but the goal isn’t to eliminate stress it’s to optimize it. Notice what things you have control over and what you don’t. Focus on those areas where you have some influence. Know what you truly value in life and use the energy of stress to help you express those values in the world. That’s the attitude that leads to both health and happiness.

So, what about you? How do you focus your energy and your attention? Please share your thought sin the comments section.

Thanks to Sue, Ellen, bikehikebabe and Joseph for commenting on last week’s post.

 
If you don’t like something change it. If you can’t change it change your attitude; don’t complain.
—Maya Angelou

In the comments to last week’s post, Life Isn’t the Way It’s Supposed to Be, we discussed the joys of complaining. When my favorite job went down the tubes with a change in management, I had a great time complaining to my husband for almost a year. He was a great listener, and quite frankly, it was a fun and easy way of getting attention. Finally one evening he gently said, “You’re really letting this get to you, aren’t you?” Oh, oh. It was fun while it lasted, but it was time for me to move on.

That incident points out one good reason to stop complaining–it’s boring to the people around you. It was still fun to talk about what was going on at work, and my husband agreed. Things were as crazy in his division as they were in mine. So we started sharing funny stories riding home together. I would say, “You’ll never guess what happened today….” He would top my story with something even crazier, and we would laugh. We started looking forward to finding and sharing stories. That was years ago, and we’ve continued the tradition by trying to focus on the absurdities in situations we have no control over. The great truth is, laughing is even more fun than ranting.

But don’t take my word for it, experiment with a no-complaining rule and see how it works for you. Find a buddy to share it with if you can. If not you might try reading this article and these testimonials. Then try joining a complaint-free world for a while and share your experience in the comments section.