Just consider this! Have you ever caught yourself with clenched toes or calf muscles held taut and tight? Or do you suddenly take a deep breath and let it out, only then realizing you have been breathing very shallowly? Or do you find your hands clammy, when everybody else seems to be doing fine? If you have answered 'Yes' to a couple of those, the chances are you are under a fair amount of stress. The worst thing you can hear when under stress is: "Don't be stressed," and I'm not going to say that.
Forbes.com has a ppt presentation on the 10 most stressful jobs of 2016. Starting from #10: taxi drivers, newspaper reporters, broadcasters, senior corporate executives, public relations executives, event coordinators, police officers, airline pilots, firefighters and finally #1 was military personnel.
Each of these people experience many situations they cannot control, and this is key to understanding the tremendous stress they find themselves under. It's not easy for military personnel to disembark from an aircraft into different terrain without fully knowing what they can expect. This lack of control contributes to stress. When we don't have control over situations we face, it always increases our angst.
Marilu Henner says, "Being in control of your life and having realistic expectations about your day-to-day challenges are the keys to stress management." When you don't have control, when there are too many variables in your life, then the chances are that the stress levels can begin to increase. The truth is that "stress is not what happens to us. Stress is our response TO what happens. And RESPONSE is something we can choose," as Maureen Killoran would say. We don't need to respond mindlessly to events; we can choose our responses.
Dr. Hans Selye, a pioneering Austrian endocrinologist, defined stress as a "non-specific response of the body to any demand made upon it." There is a response of the body, and often, when we allow stress to settle on us, it is not specific. As you know, stress works itself out in different ways in our body. It can come up as asthmatic problems, skin problems, heart issues and so on. It's very non-specific in its response in the body. But the key always is that we have to be able to control our response.
Catherine Pulsifer said, "How we perceive a situation and how we react to it is the basis of our stress. If you focus on the negative in any situation, you can expect high stress levels. However, if you try and see the good in the situation, your stress levels will greatly diminish."
How do we handle that? All of us are under some kind of stress. Studies out of Cuesta College say that stress is good too. We have what is called 'eustress' which increases the adrenaline flow, makes us sharper and helps us through situations. The key to making sure that stress stays good, i.e. as eustress and not distress, are really three C's. I'd like to throw this out to you in short for if you are aware of them, you can begin to handle them.
● You have to have Control
● And make sure that the things happening to you are neither Continuous
● Nor Cumulative
Continuous, meaning there is no let up - the stress levels, the variables coming to you showing you have no control are constantly present. Also, they happen repeatedly, building on each other, which makes them cumulative. If you have a continuous and cumulative lack of control, the chances are that you will be dealing with exceptionally high stress levels that are really not good for you.
So how would you handle something like this? Selye goes on to say, "Adopting the right attitude can convert a negative stress into a positive one." Dennis Helmsley writes about somebody he knew, probably an older gentleman in his late seventies, who found out one day that he had terminal cancer and about a week left to live. The next day his family found him pouring over snapshots and pictures, reminiscing. They realized they had to do something. He was a vivacious, vigorous person very involved with family affairs. So his daughter went to him and said, "Dad, I want you to plan your 80th birthday," which was about a year away. "We don't have the time to do so, but we want to get everybody here. So you handle the logistics of it." Suddenly his negative energy was changed into positive – to look forward to his 80th birthday and make all the arrangements. And he actually lived that one year. They had to carry him down with his oxygen cylinder, but he lived. You have to be able to take what is negative and make it into something positive.
That is the key for us as we go through life. I started by asking you whether these things had happened to you. Possibly they have. But maybe the thing to do is to make sure you have a certain amount of control over it. Make sure it's not continuous, and not cumulative. Make sure you are able to leverage it in some way and turn it from a negative into a positive.
Elizabeth Cheney wrote this beautiful inspirational poem:
Said the robin to the sparrow,
"I should really like to know,
Why these anxious human beings
Rush about and worry so."
Said the sparrow to the robin,
"Friend I think that it must be,
That they have no Heavenly Father,
Such as cares for you and me."
That's one of the most beautiful thoughts we can take into this day, that above everything else going on in our life, that we have a Heavenly Father, and Almighty God, who cares about us. Our Scriptures tell us that He cares more about us than the lilies in the field and the birds in the air. Maybe today, all we need to do is whisper a prayer to Him and say, "Would You help me handle the things that are out of control in my life? Give me wisdom to ward off stress and to help me live a good healthy life." That's my prayer for you and me, my friends.
Allow me to offer this prayer on your behalf. Almighty God, bless each person who listens to this or reads it. May we all get to understand that You care for us and that You will help us through stressful situations. We yield to You this morning. In the name of Jesus we pray. Amen.
- Dr. Cecil Clements
Resources.
- Dr. Cecil Clements
Resources.
• Selye, H. The Stress of Life, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1956.
• Selye, Hans (interviewed by Laurence Cherry). "On the Real Benefits of Eustress." Psychology Today, March 1978.
• Marilu Henner quote, http://beyondthequote.com/stress-relief-quotes.html; http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/m/mariluhenn255189.html
• Biblical reference, Matthew 6:25-34
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