Chapter 6 – Stress
Astrid Lindgren, the Swedish, worldfamous author of children’s literature, is supposed to have said that during their old age, she and her sister began telephone conversations by repeating the word death three times. Death, death, death, they said, so that the issue was out of the way and they could engage in topics of a more light-hearted nature.
I would like to suggest the same thing here. For us to say in one voice – stress, stress, stress; and put it on the shelf. What I want to say is that we do not really need to know much about stress in order to create peace, joy and pleasure. It is important that we are clear about what we want to create and focus on that. We do not want the negative stress and therefore we do not need to spend our energy there. This is more than a play on words. Imagine that you listened to a two hour lecture on stress and its harmful consequences.
How would you feel in your body afterwards? Now, imagine instead listening to a two-hour description of calm, peace, harmony and joy. What vibrations would that trigger within?
First and foremost, we need to distinguish between stress and stress-reactions. It is our reactions to stress which cause the problems. Not stress per se. What is stressful for me, is perhaps stimulation for you; and we can be just as stressed by having too little to do as by having too much.
It is also important to distinguish between external and internal stress factors. Even if we have good balance in the outer world, we can “stress ourselves sick” through destructive thoughts, various ”musts”, low self confidence and so on. Here I will focus on the internal stress factors.