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When the distress in life is too much,
you suffer from stress of life; and when restraint in
life is too great, you suffer from strain of life. So
said a wit; but there is much more to stresses and
strains of life than contained in the above statement.
In modern times, the word ‘stress’ has
different meaning in different contexts. Engineers
measure stress by applying forces or pressure or tension
from two or more directions till the substance being
tested is broken or torn or it crumbles. They measure
stress of mental, wood , etc. They talk of metal fatigue
these days ; some say the increase in avitation accidents
is due to metal fatigue. We are living in times when the
fatigue and stress of metals are studied; what about
study of stress in human beings ?
Well, research is being done about our stress also. I
would define stress as the sum total of mental and
emotional tensions that are encountered in modern life.
When irritations, frustrations , disappointments,
injuries, insults, anxieties etc. accumulate in the mind,
stress is built up. Negative emotions such as anger,
jealousy, greed etc. also contribute to stress.
Is there more stress these days than in the days of our
forefathers ? Some say ‘no’. I personally think
there is more stress now, for all of us in general and
for those in the urban areas in particular. Spiralling
high cost of living, threat of war with belligerent
neighbouring nations, continued cold war and dozen other
factors contribute to stress all over the world.
Tension-producing factors and situations are on increase
in modern times especially in bigger towns and cities.
Take for example, the congestion in trains and buses for
the commuters, which results in fatigue ( an important
cause of stress ); or the water scarcity, etc. Women too
have to bear more stress at home and outside ; in cities
in-laws problem may not be there, but servant’s
problem faces them acutely at times ; sometimes they have
to go out to earn and in absence of a proper care-taker
suffer the guilt of neglecting their home, hobby and
children ( guilt is another big factor in stress).
Children, poor darlings, have an increasing stress put
upon them ,especially in schools where they are compelled
to learn a number of things which are really difficult to
learn . And with approach of examinations , stress
increases. So, stress is with us all, most of the time,
and it is likely to increase all the time.
Our
immunity against stress decreasing : At the same time that there is an
increase in stress, there is a decrease in our ability to
withstand stress. Our physical vitality as well as mental
and emotional strength are going down. Our modern living
habits and pattern of life both contribute to this
decline. Few know that we can withstand stress better -
with more tranquillity and poise - if we have the right
eating habits. Nervous tension affects us less if we have
enough of vitamin B factors. However, with all the sugar
and refined starch that we normally consume, vitamin B
factors lack in our food; deficiencies of minerals ,
calcium, potassium and phosphorous which are also
essential nerve nutrients, are also commo .
Sedentary habits also affect the nerves as we shall see
later. Then there are drugs which break down nerve
strength. Some drugs create tensions ; some create even
suicidal tendencies. We will find this recorded in books
on Side Effects of Drugs ( such as by Dr. L.Meyler). We
may not be aware that the innocent-looking aspirin can
affect the psyche. A person may behave like drunk, his
mind may become confused, he may suffer from
hallucinations, all because he is habituated to taking
aspirin for his minor ills such as headaches or colds.
Then there is the factor of pampered early life; an early
life that has been too soft ,in which there have been no
disappointments or difficulties, builds up no immunity to
stress. Another reason we experience more stress is that
we expect too much of life; too high an ambition without
the necessary basis for such ambition can frustrate us
greatly. We read about suicide committed by a couple
which gives us an insight into an average person’s
mind. This couple left a note behind in which they
mentioned that they were tired of " difficulties in
day-to-day living such as having to stand in queues for
long, to get food rations and for travelling. " (
Times of India 10th Aug. 1965). It was also mentioned
that " they could not lead as comfortable a life as
they liked - living in air-conditioned flar or owing a
car. "
Now here we see two different types of stress-building
factors. The couple was irritated because they had to
stand in queues ; it is worth noting how small
irritations day after day can build up stress. The other
reason for suicide was that they could not lead as
comfortable a life as they liked - " living in an
air-conditioned flat or owning a car. " Here is a
clear case of false sense of values. No one need die for
want of luxuries of life in our country where even the
necessities of life are not easily obtained. Anyway, the
suicide pact of this couple tells a sorry tale of our
modern concept of life. This is the age we live in.
Stress is all around us and within us, very rarely for
justified reasons, mostly for wrong reasons, and often
for trivial reasons.Psychosomatic diseases
: Apart from
the functional conditions,psycho-emotional tensions can
cause a number of organic diseases. Psychosomatic
diseases or stress diseases are on an increase. Here is
one investigator’s findings regarding the percentage
of times physicians find physical complaints to be
emotionally induced in whole or in part :
| Pain in back of
neck |
75% |
| Ulcer like pain |
50% |
| Gall stone-like
pain |
50% |
| Dizziness |
80% |
| Skin Rash |
30% |
| Flatulence |
90% |
| Headaches |
80% |
| Constipation |
70% |
| Fatigue |
90% |
Though the result of 15
years’ study, these figures do not tell the complete
story ; apart from emotional factors there always are
other factors to induce conditions such as, say,
constipation, which is often due to lack of tone in the
bowels and lack of roughage in the food. Nevertheless, it
may be correct to surmise that in 60% of all our
ailments, emotional factors play a great or major part.
Some scientists have put even diabetes and cancer in the
category of emotionally induced conditions; and their
assumptions are mostly correct.
The
chronic worrier : Worry is a well-known cause of
tension. People worry for all sort of reasons, or for no
reason at all. A university study has shown that 40% of
the worriers worry over things that never happen or never
could happen ; 30% over things in the past ( the
irrevocable past ; why can’t they let "the dead
past bury is dead?"); 12% over petty trifles ; and
only 8% have really something worthwhile worrying over.
The sobering conclusion is that more than 90% of our
worries are unjustified or baseless.
Dealing
with the stresses: Now, how can we deal with these
worries ( the real 8% ones!), tensions, stresses and
strains ? Over the ages, the sages have given a root
cause of stress as the unbalanced life ; modern doctors
tell the same thing in scientific terms. Dr. E.J. Kepler
of the Mayo Clinic, USA., suggests that we should adjust
our personal life carefully so that it is equally
influenced by four things :
Work : Play : Love :
Worship
They are not mentioned
here in order of importance. And as noted in the lst
Chapter the choice of words ‘equally
influenced’ is very suggestive. It means that we do
not spare equal time for work, play, love and worship,
but that our life be equally influenced by the four
factors. Sometimes in a stressful person, one of these
four factors may be entirely absent, as happens when a
born -rich guy may have absolutely no work; he may feel
very unhappy because his life is unproductive, worthless
and meaningless. Or, one may have no love in life; there
are a few persons who love nobody (misanthropists) and
who are loved by nobody. This is a very dangerous
situation, for no human being can live without love.
Those that do manage to live, merely exist. So, there
needs to be a balance between the four factors. Let us
consider work first.
Work
: Work needs
to be such as we like. We cannot give of our best if we
do not at least like our work ; preferably we should
enjoy our work, but so often people endure their work,
and then there is no devotion to work; work becomes
drudgery, boredom, and fatigue is the first symptom
noticed.
Studies conducted by the University of Chicago show that
people who keep the busiest are the healthiest. Those who
do not keep their hands and head synchronisingly
occupied, deteriorate mentally and physically. Their
resistance to disease is lowered. They are more likely to
be hypochondriacs. ‘It is better to wear out than
rust out’, someone has said. And it is better ; but
there is no need to be either too active or too passive.
A healthy mean can be struck.
Recently we had Mrs. Indra Devi of Hollywood speaking to
our group. She talked about Lal Bahadur Shastri; she
considered him a Yogi ; and he was truly a Karma Yogi. He
had said after becoming the Prime Minister that he was
finding less time for prayers, and usually he consoled
himself with the fact that he worked with a devotion, and
that his work was his worship. I talked with Mrs. Indra
Devi last week in a temple and she mentioned the name of
the great Dr. Albert Schweitzer, a Nobel prize winner.
Not all Nobel prize winners are great, but Dr. Schweitzer
was a truly great Karma Yogi. We have to learn the real
meaning of WORK from such person’s lives, who did creative
work, and who worked for others. The more we live
for others, and the more productive work we do, the
happier we feel. We should not work to merely eke out a
living, or to raise a family and maintain it, or to amass
wealth. We must work for others’ weal and welfare
also, not only our own.
Play
: PLAY here
does not signify the play of famed and ill-famed playboys
of the world. Play does not mean fooling around with
leisure time. There is a saying that " All work
and no play makes Jack a dull boy", but all play
and no work is even more harmful. As G.B. Shaw has said, "A
perpetual holiday is a good working definition of
hell." Play can be anc engrossing hobby, say,
music, art, stamp-collecting, etc. But the obese should
try to have hobbies that involve their bodies ; sedentary
hobbies are no good for them. Leisure time is precious ;
it should be carefully utilised so that it relaxes the
mind. Some unfortunate people have a lot of time on hand,
and they do not know how best to use it ; so that devise
ways and means to kill time ( how murderous !)
Love
: First, you
must love yourself; this is not a plea for being egoist
or narcissist. How often we say, "I hate myself for
this." That hatred of self, if frequent or
continued, is bad.
Secondly, you must love life ; but this love should not
exist because of a fear of death ; it should not exist
because "tomorrow we die." The Bible says,
" Love thy neighbour as thyself". Some take a
very narrow meaning of it, and fall in love with the
neighbour’s daughter! So ‘Love thy
neighbour’ does not mean love if she is beautiful.
As ‘neighbour’ need not mean the person next
door. A neighbouring country also is a neighbour !
Love does not mean merely romantic love ; love means an
all-pervading universal attitude wherein all living
creatures are included and in which there is
‘reverence for all life’ that Dr. Schweitzer
taught us to have. This love is a complete negation of
all the negative emotions such as jealousy, hatred,
anger, lust and greed ; such negative emotions sap
one’s vitality more than any abuse of one’s
body. We cannot perhaps really love all ; we are likely
to dislike some persons, but that dislike should not
mount to the pitch of resentment and hatred. We must
increase our capacity to give more love ; for
"ceasing to give, we cease to have, such is the law
of love." When we are in the mood to go all out to
do something to alleviate other’s suffering or to
help others, we are in love with the world and in tune
with life. In a phase of some young people’s
romantic life, such universal love is occassionally
observed. All the world may or may not love lovers ; but
lovers are likely to love all the world.
Worship
: Worship is
defined by Dr.Kepler as ‘devotion’ to something
greater than oneself. Nobody in the world is truly
agnostic or atheist. Looking at the star and the moon,
the sea and the trees, we cease to be atheists - that is,
if we really look at things around, however common- place
they seem. Worship should be of things ever-lasting or
ever dependable ; that rules out hero-worship and
idol-worship. Only the ‘sanatana’ things remain
therefore to worship. A deep and abiding faith in God,
the Omnipresent, Omniscient and Omnipotent Force is
absolutely necessary for freedom from crushing stress.
So much for the formula of Dr. Kepler. Now we shall study
what Dr. Hans Selye of Canada has to say on the subject.
Dr. Hans Selye
Dr. Hans Selye is the
scientist who has done the most research on stress in
human beings. He believes that a degree of stress is
necessary in life. A violin or sitar cannot be played
unless the strings are stretched tight ; below that
degree of tightness the instrument produces no music and
much above that degree of tightness the strings break.
Same, according to Dr. Selye, is the case with us, human
beings ; Some stress adds zest to life, but too much of
it can break us down. Some stress helps us to be aware
and alert. A public-speaking institute here advertises :
‘Nervous tension aids eloquence.’ It really
does. It is only the excessive tension that is bad.
Here are Dr.Selye’s rules to prevent harmful stress:
- Seek variety ; avoid
monotony; avoid rut. Variety may or may not be
the spice of life, but it definitely helps
prevent tensions if properly pursued.
- Do not keep emotions
bottled up. In Tokyo, workers in a factory have a
gymnasium equipped with punching bags onwhich are
painted the faces of bosses. The workers can
punch the face of any boss in this gym -
something they cannot do in reality without
suffering dire consequences ! (Of course, the
question can be raised : "Why not do away
with those punching bags by establishing better
employer-employee rela- tionships ?)
Dr. George Stevenson of the National Association
for Mental Health, USA, believes in physical
exercise for getting rid of stream. In a
University of California experiment, it was found
that students who exercised regularly, recovered
from or adjusted to imposed stress more quickly.
The report summarised, " Regular physical
exercise not only increases nervous stamina
appreciably, but serves another equally valuable
purpose ; it provides an effective means for
release of emotional tensions." What
this boils down to, is : do not boil within
yourself. Sometimes you may have to cut the
Gordian knot instead of fumbling for solution to
a problem ; sometimes you have to ‘hit out
before you get out.’ At heart I am a
pacifist and a meek person ; but I have learnt
through experience that having your say is good
for your health most of the time ; and blowing
your top is good occassionally. Of course, there
are ways and ways of showing resentment ; we can
do this in a sort of quiet and dignified way as
that elephant did. Here is the story of that
elephant. There was a lion in a forest; perhaps
he had heard the epithest that we have given the
lions ; he considered himself the ‘king of
forest.’ One day he was walking through his
forest ; when he met an antelope whom he asked
‘ who is the king of this forest?’ The
timid antelope answered ‘None but You, my
lord.’ And the lion walked on with head high
in the air; he encountered a number of other
animals to whom he put the same question and all,
for their dear life, answered similarly. But then
the lion met an elephant. ‘Who is the king
of the forest ?’ asked our lion. The
elephant ignored the query; but when the lion
pestered him with the same question repeatedly,
he calmly picked up the lion in his trunk,
whirled him a few times over his head and then
tossed him away ! The lion managed to get up and
limp back to the elephant, and in a whimpering
tone said, ‘Just because you did not know
the answer, you should not have lost your
temper!’ Some cheek that lion had ! The
moral of the story here is that we may have to
deal with certain people or situations in a firm
yet dignified, quiet yet drastic way.
Sometimes, I am given a lift by a lady in her
car; she is a very nice lady, no doubt. But she
cannot stand certain type of people. So, when she
is driving and some unfortunate creature of a
driver in a front car is making mistakes in
giving signals or blocking the road wrongfully,
she is ready with her irritation : ‘Look at
the idiot’ or ‘ Look at that
road-hog’. This giving vent to her
irritation may do her a world of good, it can
never harm her - at least as long as the driver
in the other car is beyond hearing distance !
The gist of these stories is that for us, average
human beings, occassionally it is good to let
the steam out in some way without directing the
jet of the steam towards the person who irritates
us. Till we achieve that stage of mental
comosure ( by meditation or other means) where we
are not affected by outside irritations, where
nothing ‘Touches’ us (how touchy we
generally are !) this is a comparatively
innocuous method of dealing with our irritations.
- Dr. Selye also
exhorts us : "Reduce problems to size."
Do not make a mountain of a mole-hill; or as I
put it " Do not make a melon of a
lemon." Do not allow minor frustrations such
as parking problem, your husband forgetting your
birthday, or remembering it but omitting to bring
you a gift, affect your composure. Be tolerant
most of the times. ( The previous ‘Blowing
your top’ was suggested ‘very
occassionally’ not ‘every now and
then’).
- Prepare for the
unexpected. Here again, unless we have an abiding
faith in God (as late Shastriji who died a poor
man had, in Providence), we do have to think of
all eventualities. What if I died tomorrow ? What
if I lost husband/wife tomorrow ? Such think
should not be in the nature of a worry; but only
in the nature of an alertness or consciousness of
a crisis. There should be readiness to face any
crisis with cheerfulness, fortitude and faith in
God - especially the last.
- Talk things over.
Patients talk over their problems with doctors
and psychoanalysts. All can discuss their
problems with friends and near ones. Talking is
important ; but talk with only one or two
persons, not with everybody. And never discuss
things with immature persons who may misguide
you; does not matter if - in fact, often it is
better that - people do not guide you at all. Your
talking helps you ; your listening to and
heeding other’s suggestions may not help you
at all. There are comparatively few really mature
persons in the world ; there may be none around
you.
- Do not procrastinate.
Procrastination is the chief of time and an
accumulator of stress. Do each job in a specified
time.
- Get experience where
needed and from all sources available. This will
increase efficiency, reduce stress.
- Let your evenings be
quiet ; so often then are hectic, and then the
tensions are carried in bed and over into sleep;
the result is that you do not get up refreshed
Dr. Selye says, " A successful activity
which has come to a definite stop prepares you
for rest and sleep, but one which sets up
self-maintaining tensions, keeps you awake ...
Stress produces hormones which key you up.
Activities that make for stress should be avoided
in the evenings. For better rest, reduce work in
evenings and relax after sunset."
- Seek solitude:
Solitude is the time when you are without company
except for the company of your thoughts. This
hour of quiet may be spent in meditation or
prayer. Or you may walk in a garden enjoying
Nature’s gift to man ; or listen to
soothing, relaxing music, enjoying man’s
gifts to man. Like the deep waters in the ocean,
which at two or three mile’s depth are not
disturbed ever at all, regardless of the storms
raging on the surface , all of us have a place
within us which is unruffled and quiet all the
time. From time to time, we have to learn to
enter this room within ourselves.
- Learn to relax
: Relaxation is Nature’s own tranquilliser.
Do not use tranquilliser drugs, alcohol or
smoking for relaxation. Physical and mental
relaxation has to be learnt from those who know.
Books by Eeman, Alexander and Jacobson are
available for study and application. In short,
relaxation is ‘letting go.’
- Get into right
relationship with others : Do not condemn
anybody; put yourself in other person’s
shoes and think how you would act under identical
circumstances. Judge not that ye be judged.
Remember the Biblical story of Jesus exhorting
the crowd : "Those among you who have never
sinned, cast the first stone." Seek to see
only good ; turn a deaf ear and a blind eye to
bad.
There is so much bad in
the best of us,
And so much good in the worst of us,
That it does not behove any of us,
To speak about the rest of us.
Being the substance of a talk on the subject given at
Wilson College,Bombay, in March 1966.
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