Are we stressed out
Are you feeling stressed? What is stress? How is this caused?
Doctors’ relate all illnesses to be caused by stress. How do I realise if I’m stressed? Is there a metric to decide stress levels?
I came across the story of the frog and the pot of boiling water. It’s derived from a fable that describes the frog’s reaction to boiling water. If a frog is suddenly dropped into a pot of boiling water, the frog will perceive the danger and jump out. However if a frog is placed in tepid water with the water temperature increased bit by bit to boiling, the frog will not realize the danger and will be cooked to death. My understanding of this fable was the frog would keep acclimatizing itself to the changing environment and not perceive the danger until it was too late.
Why is this story relevant in today’s day and age? I believe it is more relevant today.
To prove my point I need to share an incident from my life. A couple years ago, I received a visit from my brother who prefers to stay in a remote village in Punjab. During the course of conversation, he mentioned I looked stressed out. Believe me, this was the furthest from what I felt. I enjoyed my job. I was happy in my personal life. I was feeling fit. I meditated regularly. Everything was looking bright. There wasn’t a single cloud on my horizon. Stressed and me? I don’t believe so.
He didn’t look convinced and invited me to spend some days at his farm house. I had never spent more than 2 days there. I count myself as a city person. What could I occupy myself with at his remote farm house. Furthermore did I really need that break from my life as so obviously perceived by him? Trusting his advice I planned a six day visit in April 2017. When quizzed about what all he had planned for my visit, he laughingly answered “Sleep, eat, go for walks. Then sleep, eat and go for a walk”. I took it upon myself as a challenge. I believed I could survive six days leading a relaxed and leisurely life doing nothing. Having been there earlier I knew there wasn’t even a television present that could provide a distraction. Hence it would be a complete break from civilization. Or so it seemed.
The only promise my brother extracted from me was no mobile access for the duration of my visit. I do not believe I am addicted to my cell phone. Hence this was an easy promise to give. My visit started with an interesting occurrence. He had had stickers put up in my room ‘No mobiles beyond this point’ and ‘Mobiles are strictly prohibited’. The stickers were a surprising move, their message known. Eager to prove myself, I powered off my mobile phone and placed it out of reach. The first two days, the visit went ahead as planned. I walked around the farms. Saw the crops being harvested. This trip was 10 days prior to the Baisakhi (harvesting) festival and watching the machines cut and store the grains was enjoyable. Everyone there would be up at dawn, work hard during the day and there would be lights out by 9pm. The novelty started wearing off by the third day and my irritation levels increased. What more was I expected to accomplish here.
My brother patiently handled my queries always giving me the option of ‘Eat, sleep, go for a walk’. For a non-active person, my daily steps count crossed 10,000 and even reached 15,000 limit by day three. This was a personal achievement and I don’t believe I have ever achieved this limit again. By the fourth day things started settling down. I got used to the pace. Started participating more whole heartedly in the activities about the place. The funny thing is I did not feel in any way changed. I was the same person. Or so I believed.
On the eve prior to leaving, where I had to catch a flight from Chandigarh to Mumbai I finally unearthed my mobile phone. I needed to complete the web check-in process. Restarting the mobile data resulted in a bombardment of messages, emails, push notifications to news stories with added pressure from whatsapp and other applications. The 10 minutes it took me to complete the web check-in felt like the longest 10 minutes. My head felt close to bursting. I felt like I had fever. There was an uncomfortable sensation behind my eyes.
This trip made me realize the effects that staying in a fast paced city have on our body. I felt like that frog in the fable that had slowly and gradually acclimatized itself to the slowly heating water and failed to perceive its danger. If just switching on the mobile phone could lead to these disastrous side effects, what would occur when I returned to my city life?
This was an important and urgent wake up call. I remember the first few things I made myself do that evening on the fifth day of my trip was to delete many groups on whatsapp to which I had been added. Certain groups that I had felt important to be a part off. Certain other groups had their notifications muted for a year. I believe I uninstalled certain apps including facebook. I had never been an active facebook user but I vowed then to only access facebook if required on a desktop. Never on my phone.
Suffice it to say, the peaceful effects of the trip lasted only till maybe a fortnight once back to my regular life. However I had realized the problem. I had been feeling stressed out. I was in danger of burning myself out. My trip made me realize the need to simplify. To not stretch myself to breaking point. I realized, it’s important to take breaks. To spend some time doing nothing. To limit the extent of mobile and television viewing time. This vow is sometimes difficult to keep but at least my trip made me aware of the danger. It provides me to this day the impetus to take much needed breaks.
This was my wake up call. I wish for you all to find yours. Simplify your lives. Relook at all that you are adjusting and acclimatizing with. Be aware of the harm this can wreak on your mental and emotional health. We see around ourselves people reacting strongly to the slightest negative triggers in their life.
I again ask myself this question. Are we stressed out? I can positively confirm. Yes we all are.
