What is a little stress/

How simple it is to create situations of stress for yourself and others. Without even trying we can find ourselves in such situations.

I walked with my son and daughter in law yesterday. It was for my son a walk we had never done before from where we started, he so wanted to get it right. This desire to get it right meant he spent a great amount of the walk reading the route from a book of walks. Rather than help, the book, in fact, caused more stress. The instructions were, to say the least, less than helpful. 

Meanwhile, my daughter in law, not knowing the walk was concerned for all the possible dangers that could befall when walking with a dog in strange places. 

Kevin Carter, a young and enthusiastic photographer had for a decade,  captured vivid pictures of repression and strife in his native South Africa. Then he went to famine-racked Sudan and came upon a starving toddler stalked by a vulture. He photographed the scene, an image that won the year's Pulitzer Prize. He then chased the vulture away. As the child resumed her walk to a feeding station, he lit a cigarette and wept. At 33, he killed himself with carbon monoxide pumped into his pickup truck. Explained his father: "Kevin always carried around the horror of the work he did."

Stress is a frightening thing, it comes in many guises and can so easily become life-threatening. It can creep up on us when we least expect it. 

Over the years I have become aware of some of the many danger signs of living with hidden stress.

How often I have made plans for my day that was from the off unrealistic.

How often I was first to arrive, last to leave.

I was always in a hurry.

I seldom if ever made a plan for relaxation.

I frequently felt guilty about doing anything other than work.

I often saw the unforeseen problem as a setback or disaster.

I was always thinking about several other things when working.

Those are just a little few of the many signs of a life lived in stress. The trouble is that we seldom see them creeping up.

So what does my favourite sage say about just such things?

 Recognize aggravating aspects of your life and accept them rather than fight them. 

Seek the wisdom to discern what can and cannot be changed, attempt to change the first and accept the second.

Identify your emotional needs and find ways to meet them.

Practice listening, it is more relaxing than talking.

Be sensitive to change, sense it coming and make adjustments. This makes change manageable rather than insurmountable.

I am wondering why it is that I am aware of the signs of stress when I am in fact off and away from home relaxing?  Because even though most of those around me are like me supposedly on holiday and relaxed, the signs of stress are all around.

We have created a stress-filled world full of high and often impossible expectations. The sage says again, "Go with the flow.

Have a marvellous day.