There must be thousands of ways to manage stress. Indeed, if we take a hundred different people and ask each to tell us how they manage their daily stresses, we will get a hundred different formulas for dealing with the same stressors. Some will tell us that they ignore stressors and hope that they will go away on their own. Others use booze or drugs; still others deny that they are stressed at all. All methods of allaying stress have the potential to do the job for us, but there seems to be one element missing in the stress management system. The problem is that we concentrate on the stress more than we concentrate on the management. It is the same thing as putting a bandage on a cut. When do you put on a bandage, before or after the cut appears? Obviously, the bandage is a reactive measure, no cut, then there is no need for the bandage. So, if we are not cut, then we don’t attend to the bandage. We just put it away for the future and forget about it. It may become lost or dirty or inoperable in some way so that, when we need it, we are not prepared to deal with the cut.

How many people adopt a proactive stress management system? Not many, I am sure. This is because most of us treat stress like it is non-existent; when we are stressed, we will apply some strategy. This is not a sound preventive method to keep us peaceful. As in the example of the bandage, our stress management methods can get rusty, or ineffective. Even worse, we relegate our strategies to the closet because we hope that we will never need them; after a while we will forget about them altogether. The concept is ineffective; it is negative preparation

A Positive Approach

A better way to prepare for the stressors that will come to us on a daily basis is to construct our lives as best we can to circumvent as many stressors as possible. We are best prepared when we are proactive. A good example would be in crossing the street. We are taught when we are very young to look both ways before stepping into the street to ascertain that the way is clear; that there is nothing to harm us if we proceed. This is smart. We will avoid the stress of being run down by a vehicle, and we did this by acting ahead of time, by taking a stress management method and applying it to bypass a stressful event. Note how much better this method is than in stepping into the street without looking, getting hit by a car, and then trying to allay all the stressors (physical and emotional) with other methods of stress management after the incident. As the old adage states: “a stitch in time saves nine”.

The Most Needed Element

It is a great idea to utilize common sense in constructing a good proactive stress management system. Unfortunately, most people these days do not know what common sense is; much less do they know how to apply it. Common sense is something that is not taught, in fact, cannot be taught because it is, or ought to be, inherent in a person’s personality. Hence the “common” in common sense. My feeling is that common sense is but one measure of intelligence. To be intelligent one must exhibit many attributes, such as an ability to think independently, to be somewhat creative, to be able to problem solve, and to demonstrate a ubiquitous overtone (or undercurrent) of understanding that imbues every aspect of the person’s personality with a reality of purpose. Attempts to measure intelligence are fraught with flaws that rarely measure what they are intended to measure. As such, most instruments (IQ tests) are invalid. The standard intelligence test merely measures a person’s ability to remember thousands of facts. We say a person is of a certain IQ level because she has scored very well on an IQ test, but this is misleading because this same person may have trouble crossing the street. She may be smart in one isolated area of learning, but she may not possess common sense. Therefore, this high IQ person may not be able to construct a viable stress management system that is proactive.

Some folks possess common sense but they were taught not to use it. This is done in the school system where students are simply battered with certain facts that they are told to learn because they will be asked to regurgitate them on a test. The students learn quickly that isolated facts must be memorized ad nauseam until they are to be recalled on a test. Once the test is done, the knowledge may be forgotten; nowhere is common sense applied to teach the students that they are to apply these facts in everyday life. As I have always told my students: “You are learning to live life. Everything that you come across must fit into your life somewhere; it is a part of the whole. To understand how the facts affect your life is to measure your level of education”. When I teach teachers what to do in the classroom, I remind them that they are teaching “life and living” to their students, not a particular subject. Regardless of the subject matter teachers are teaching their students about life and how to live it. If this is done well, then the students become educated (instead of being brain washed) in life; they expand their common sense and they learn to apply it for a better life.

A Proactive System

Having a good stress management system in place, that is constantly upgraded, is the best way to avoid most of the debilitating aspects of stress. Most of our strategies come after the fact; this is effective, but the damages are already done. Think of how much better it would be to head off stressors before they take hold of us. Imagine how much time could be saved if we had a proactive system of stress management rather than the reactive system that we all presently use. If we spent our time honing a system to prevent stressors from taking hold in us then we would not have to spend any time trying to compensate after we have become stressed out.

We can take a lesson from the medical/physical sciences to illustrate. When we go to the doctor and he or she tells us to stop smoking, to lose weight, and to get some exercise, we would be wise to follow this good advice. It is proactive preventive medicine. If we refuse to do what the doctor tells us, we could fall ill with heart disease or cancer. Certainly we would want to prevent heart disease rather than to fight it with operations and drugs after we have fallen ill. Actually, once you have developed a serious illness because you have not treated your body well, there really is no complete cure. You will be disabled (or dead); there is no going back. It is easy to see the wisdom in doing what is necessary to keep from getting seriously ill. Why can’t we follow this same preventive regimen for keeping ourselves from falling prey to stress? Remember that every ailment has a stress component that may also be a cause for the physical disease.

Instead of getting sick (physically or emotionally) it is better to develop a proactive system to keep us well. This would be cheaper in terms of time, effort, and money and it would be more efficacious than treating the malady afterwards. Your body is the entity that does the healing for every disease known to us. The doctors can only assist our body in its task by helping to remove obstacles or replacing lost fluids or giving us sound advice. Therefore, we must understand that our body/mind is the scale upon which we measure our comfort and health. The best thing we can do to help ourselves be healthy and comfortable is to apply preventive measures to try to avoid getting sick. This is why we are wise to eat healthily, to get a moderate amount of proper exercise, and to construct a proactive stress management system. Stress is always the precursor to any disease. When we overload our system with too much stress (even good stress) we put a strain on our ability to maintain our internal equilibrium. Once we allow too much pressure, frustration, or other stressors to overwhelm us, our body breaks down in some area, which leads to disease. At that point our body tries to cure itself but it is already weakened by the stress. Stress is stressful in and of itself. It is like a vicious circle ever compounding to lead to more virulent medical complications. Wouldn’t it make more sense (common or otherwise) to prevent illness rather than to treat it? Of course it would; and the way to start preventing illness is to actively use a proactive stress management system.

Almost everybody thinks that they know all about stress, especially around the holiday season. Some people just accept the fact that stress and holidays go together. Others are completely decimated by the emotion; they feel as if they are living in Hell. Most people just wonder why it is that we must have increased stress when we are trying to enjoy ourselves during what is supposed to be a happy time. Holidays are supposed to be cheerful and enjoyable. Or are they?

Many Ways To Look At Stress

Most folks regard stress as an ugly thing; something that ruins our day or activity; something to be avoided if possible. Other people need the pressure to encourage them to achieve a higher level of success. Would the Wright brothers have persisted with their airplane idea if there were no problems? Only the weak-minded would give up when the going gets a little rough. A little pressure now and then helps to move us along the path we need to be pursuing. For events such as holidays maybe stress is supposed to be an integral part. The holiday would not be a special event without the stress. Or, maybe pressure and frustration occurs because we are fighting our natural desire to enjoy the event; thus we thwart the happiness that we feel inside and this internal struggle causes a fight-or-flight response. Stress, pressure, frustration, or the possibility of failure may occur with the holidays for many reasons and it may come in many forms. And different people may perceive stress in their own, quite divergent, way. Some people will see a holiday as very frustrating; others may see the same event as very exciting. How can both of these people be right?

The Simple Answer Is…

Obviously, both people can be right because they see the event from different viewpoints. Take, for example, a thunderstorm. For one person, it may be an exciting situation because he/she experienced it from a distance that presented no danger, and maybe that person had other people around them who reacted in an excited way – no fear – just enjoyment of the event. Another person, not so lucky, may have had a frightening experience during a storm or maybe that person had others around him who reacted in a fearful way, thus teaching that person that storms are something to be feared. We can easily see that two people can be involved in the same situation (the storm) and that they can have two very different reactions to it. How can this be?

“You Can’t Give What You Don’t Got”

The storm is the same, but the people have been led to different levels of emotion. In the first, it may have been wonder and excitement; in the second, it may have been fear and helplessness. Notice also that the other people present were an integral part of the reason for the decisions of both people. We take our cues from others before we are mature enough to form our own accurate opinions. If those other people are immature themselves, they can only demonstrate their limited emotional responses to us. “You can’t give what you don’t got!” This is one reason why so many people become stuck at an immature level of development. They may have been shown how to be immature. Notice how most people talk to infants or small children. They don’t speak in a normal voice; they raise the pitch and speak as though the child were moronic. This is confusing and it raises the question in the child that the “adult” may be the moron. Thus, the person thinks that they are supposed to be this way and they may act out for the rest of their lives not realizing that this is why they have trouble in so many areas. This is called “arrested development”.

Only Experience Is Educational

In order to overcome stress during the holidays, or for that matter at any time of the year, we need education (not schooling where the students are spoiled and encouraged to be infantile) in real life situations. Take our example of the thunderstorm. Let us say that we were frightened when we were young so that we run and hide whenever a storm appears. This neurotic response is preventing us from enjoying our life in many ways that we don’t realize. We need to take instruction from a trained counselor so that we can face the storm and be free to form an accurate opinion of the event. Note that we need to face the event head on through the guidance of a mature individual. This mature person will affect us in such a way as to cause us to view the storm as what it really is, not perverting it into something that causes us to react in an abnormal way. This process causes us to grow. We are able to leave our infantile prison and proceed to the next normal level of development. This process is called psychotherapy.

Some Harmful Examples

To apply this procedure to the holidays we would have to sit down with a psychotherapist to find out how we came to associate stress with the holiday. Maybe it was all the stressed out behavior of our parents or other caretakers. Possibly it was the pressure of all the advertisements to which we were subjected. Since commercials and other advertisements are aimed at the children of a society, and we are vulnerable when we are young and immature, the companies who target the young children are contributing to the building of neurosis (and psychosis) of the upcoming generation of people. Toys are not manufactured for children, but for adults – infantilized adults. Just think about that for a minute. Look at most of the toys that are in the marketplace. They do not appeal to young children. Young children will happily play with the box that the toy came in and they will have a grand time discovering all the neat ways a box can be used. What is the use of a toy that can be manipulated into another toy? All of the creative thinking that could be applied has been taken away. Only the two forms that the toy can be manipulated into can be used. How utterly boring! Any child possesses more creativity and critical thinking ability than any of the adults who have thought up these boring toys. Who buys the toys? Infantilized adults who are trying to find a way of reaching their children or have children so that they can buy the toy for themselves. They would feel embarrassed to say that they bought the toy for themselves, but hey, “I bought it for my child” provides a ready excuse. The result? They are causing their children to mimic the parent’s behavior – a false, neurotic way of viewing the world; they are not giving the children the opportunity to recognize reality.

There are many reasons why we may have connected stress with happy events. Rare is the person who can work these things out without the help of a mature therapist. We may have learned to be infantile by another immature person; to go forward we would need the help of someone who has matured unfettered by infantilization. Happy holidays.

There’s one item that people never have to buy when preparing for the holidays. That item is stress. It is free, it is always available, and we never have to remember to acquire it for our holiday festivities. Stress seems to just “show up”, uninvited, at all of our functions. Because it is usually unwanted, maybe there are some things we can do to assuage stress’s impact.

The first thing that we can do is to recognize the many warning signs that stress, tension, and frustrations are upon us. Are we irritable? Do we find fault at the least provocation? Do we feel “stuck”, unable to move on with our activities? If so, we can attribute these feelings to heightened stress. Once we are cognizant of the situation, we might be able to talk to ourselves to make things better. So long as we realize that stress is making us uncomfortable, maybe we can relax a little.

Sometimes our feelings are not what come to our attention. There are many physical warning signs that may appear. Depending upon your particular genetic makeup, you may show physical signs of stress before you become aware that there is anything wrong. Physical indications include headaches, backaches, joint pain, stomach upset, and skin problems. There are potentially as many problem areas as there are parts of the body. The individual person’s weak spot will be where stress symptoms present. Knowing yourself, the second thing we can do, will go a long way toward understanding what is happening. If you feel your stomach tighten involuntarily before a holiday, it is probably the stress of the upcoming event that is causing the upset, not a medical problem. The way to tell is if the same pain shows up in the same way before each stressful event. Physical problems don’t do that, they present at odd times and they probably persist. They wouldn’t “come and go” with the holidays. So, if you have a persistent pain in the abdomen (without the holiday), you could let a physician check it out. But, if you always get the discomfort in connection with the holiday, you can bet that it is stress, an emotional issue. A trip to the physician is not called for; she will just give you some pills to relax you. However, these pills will only work for a short while; they cannot cure the real problem. Living on pills never works; it only allows the stress to stay inside you, ready to emerge again.

A third thing we can do is “have a plan”. When stress appears and we can recognize it, there should be a plan of action to immediately administer. All stress is recognizable once we put our mind to it so, as soon as symptoms appear, waste not a single minute in applying your plan. Simplicity is key to success. You don’t want to complicate things by making your response too difficult. Think of a single thing, like a mental picture that you have previously enjoyed, or a special song that you can sing to yourself. These are triggers that tell your mind to focus on getting rid of the discomfort and to calm the stress that you are feeling. Construct your plan well in advance of the holidays. Decide that your trigger will work on any kind of emotional stress. Practice your trigger thought every time your encounter stress in any form and under any condition. You want to be so confident in your trigger that your mind will automatically put your plan in motion. There wouldn’t be time to stop in the middle of a holiday to run through your plan; you want your trigger to immediately work to calm the stress. Once practiced, you might find yourself humming your “tune” without realizing why you are doing it. If this happens, you can smile to yourself knowing that you have a good defense that is working to make the holiday more enjoyable.

For our 1-2-3 stress busting approach for the holidays this year, think about (1) recognizing that you are stressed, (2) know yourself and how you respond, and (3) have a plan of action to immediately implement. There is enough busyness in the holiday season without complicating it with unwanted stress. This three-step method will go a long way toward making this holiday season a little jollier.