Is It Overwhelming To Do?
Continuing with 007’s comments.
Is it overwhelming to do all this for every issue?
Yes. But you don’t need to do it most of the time. What I am laying out is the process for overcoming an issue. Maybe for a while you have to do this consciously for big issues, but as you do the process you lay down a neural pathway that makes it easier for each subsequent time. So after a while it becomes an automatic response that you do without even realising it. But of course like anything, there is a learning curve.
Will you be overwhelmed by doing it in little chunks? Maybe. If you can deal with it one big chunk, then do it in one big chunk.
But the idea behind the small chunks is that it makes a big decision more manageable. In most cases people are stuck on making a decision because there are many other things they know are involved in the decision, but they can’t think of them all at the same time. So making small decisions is easier.
It all depends on what’s right for you. Stephen Hawking can calculate all his workings out in his head because that’s the way his brain has become structured. But his Peers need boards and papers to map out their thoughts. It just depends on what works best for you.
I’m not big on following processes and recipes. I don’t think life is about consciously following templates. I think you have to understand the basic process and then develop and refine it with your own individual stamp. So what I have done is analyse how issues are successfully dealt with and then broken the process down to detailed steps for you to digest and then develop your own way of working with them. It’s just a starting point so you have something to work with.
Which issues to tackle?
All of them. If they are on your mind, process them so they move from your mind to resolved and forgotten.
You’re right that most of them will come to nothing. Over time all stress passes. It passes because the issue no longer becomes a big deal or because you change your perspective, beliefs and definitions that make it no longer relevant to you. Or it will become so urgent that it becomes a priority to deal with it. Emergencies are almost always only little things that blew up to crisis level.
This process is about manipulating what naturally happens, so that you can make it happen faster.
Most of the time in life you’ll be off-balance. This is all about getting back to a calmer, clearer state quicker. Prolonged stress is costly, any way you measure it. If you were only to look at it in terms of physical health, stress only starts to damage you, once it starts depleting your body. The release of adrenalin that activates the ‘fight or flight’ response is a normal state. But it’s when that state is maintained for a prolonged period that Cortisol is released and the body begins to destroy itself to fuel the readiness to act, that stress starts taking a toll on your health.
Again it depends on how much tolerance you have for drama and internal conflict and confusion in your life. I have very little. I like calmness, peace and stability. I have great enthusiasm and passion for what I do. I already have more plans than I will ever have time to complete. Many people need great dramas to motivate them into action and give them a focus for action.
The key is not to sit there with your pen and paper ready permanently processing, but to get to zero stress and then catch issues as they crop up. As you get better and better at doing this, you can do it quicker and more easily. What holds people up is wanting perfection on every issue. You can’t get that, you just have to either make a decision or put it aside to make a decision at a specific time.
voice keeps telling me that we are missing something..
I think we are, but this is only a first draft. It’s the best I could come up with to explain this now. The key question for all of us, is what’s missing in this model? What would make it smoother and easier for us all to implement in our lives?
I believe what you have stated is a spiritual truth. In fact at this very moment the fight or flight response is in command. My committee of voices (lol) are telling me that I have gotten into something that is hurting me and I better figure out how to stop the pain as it is causing damage to ones spiritual and phyiscal essence.
Blame others? Running away? Freezing? Which one am I into at the moment? Hum Freezing because a frozen heart cannot feel the pain. Okay now what? Oh how I would love to shout to the roof tops with anger. Victim or love? Can I embrace my humanity and that of others? Maybe with God’s help. Maybe I’ll find love. Yes I am in pain at the moment but then…this too shall pass.
“The well of love refills itself, The more one gives of love, the more one has to give.” Lois
I am trying to understand the subtelities of how stress builds up..i am thinking as i am writing and so pls excuse me for the lack of structure in this post..
generaly, when we are in deep dreamless sleep, there is perfect peace and we are at at zero stress base.
let us leave the dreaming state aside for the moment..
the moment we wake up,we are conscious of somthig or other.. our attention and awareness is focussed on something or difussed..
thoughts and feelings keep arising in us which swings our atention..
so what is real relaxation? when are we stressed and when are we relaxed?
for g, there are several things going on in my head at the moment. it is 4.00 Am and i jst woke up..i want to get clarity and vision of how and what it would feel like to live with zero base stress, my daughter could wake up anytime and cry for milk and I have to attend to her, i have a few open issues at office, but those are not troublige me at the moment.
what i have noticed in me is that i have started to feel a slight discomfort when i have nothing to do..on both saturday and sunday i was pretty happy to wake up early, read, exercise, play with my kids, coach a couple of clients.. when i got sometime without anythin particular to do, i felt uncomfortable to simply watch tv..instead i wanted to meditate and i did..
it sounds good right? i also feel good about it, but this led me to the question that work or play s inherently stressful or not?i had the false notion that the more time you spend working the more stress builds up..that dos not seem to be true..when i am ngaged in activities that are more of me, hen there is no stress. only when i am engaged in activities that are not in line with my vision and is n contradicton to mysense of self, it creates stress..
this leads me to another question that i have in my mind.. i see that my elder daughter is only 7 years old and she is involved in many activities..she has school for about 6 hours a day (8-2 pm), she is learning swimming, abacus, dance, chess and squash.. on top of this she spends 1.5 hours in the play ground (unstructured play time)
i see her quite busy.. i ma asking myself “is she stressed?”. is it too much for a 7 year old? she looks cheerful and normal..
i have also seen the same pattern in her as i noiced in myself.. she would not know what to do when she has nothing to do.. she would simply watch tv..
since i have no way of measuring or knowing her stress levels, is there a way to know
1. what causes stress in children?
2. what are the symptoms?
3. all the activities that i mentioned above (school, squash , chess, dance, swim, abacus) helps her to structure her time and attention.. she has expressed interest in these and has willingly taken these up..
i am just concerned whether it is too much..
if i imagine myself to have so many activities where i have to learn many new skills, concentrate and focus, where there would be some demands on performance.. you need to do sme practice..there would e others doing better and this would result in some kind of comparison..
just wondering ho kids cope, or how silently stress builds up..
Ms Brown,
I’ve always liked the phrase ‘this too shall pass.’ I just like to work out what has to happen before it will pass, so it will pass quicker.
Siva,
I have a saying that I used talking to my children, that kids are adults in training. Unfortunately, so are most of us too!
What I mean is that they look around the world and try out things to come to work out what it’s all about and where they fit in to it all.
So often children will have many diverse interests. There are no rules. We can have no hard and fast set guides or dictates. Those that we try to set always end up being wrong sooner or later.
We all react and interpret differently and cannot understand how another person really feels. You and your Daughter are in very different places in your journeys.
She is exploring lots of topics to find herself, whereas you have an idea of what you want and are looking for a refined level of focus.
I think the only thing that can tell us if something is right or wrong is the Individual concerned. If your Daughter enjoys these things and is eager to do them then I’m sure it’s not causing her any stress.
You are getting to understand the nature of stress now. It is not being busy that causes stress, but the distance between your vision or your ideal sense of self and the reality you live.
You will always be happier being engaged in something that means something to you that stretches you than you will being idle.
We are only idle either because we need a rest to recharge or because we have nothing better to do.