The effects of stress
How stress affects the brain.
There are many things that cause stress in the body.
It's how the body handles it that is most important.
When the body first realizes that it feels any kind of
stress,
the mind interprets the stressful feeling and assesses
the stress trigger,
to identify what is causing the stressful feeling.
Since the cerebral cortex (the thinking part of the brain)
of the human
is so much more developed than any other animals, it
allows us a far more
sophisticated way to react to stress triggers (feelings
of stress)
when they do occur.
While other animals usually only have to decide between
fight and flee
when they feel a stressful moment… the human mind
first attaches “feelings”
to the information. These "feeling" may include
what we consider negative feelings
such as fear, anxiety, anger and negative stress or it
could be a much more
positive feelings such as pleasure or joy.
Either way, the second we find ourselves consciously thinking
about any stress
we are feeling, the brain quickly accesses and interprets
each piece
of the stressful information and attaches these “feelings”
to it,
so that we can quickly interpret their immediate meaning
(and usefulness) to us.
One feeling of fear or stress may be good for us, while
another may be bad.
It is how our brain interprets (feels about) the information
that makes all the difference.
These feelings that get assigned to the stress (triggers)
are attached in such a way
that any recollection of this particular stressful moment,
or anything close to it,
will automatically trigger the same "stress response"
as it was originally assigned.
This is a "quick" way for the mind to make decisions on
stressful situations that
may or may not endanger your existence. A "quick"
way to have an appropriate
response to a stressful feeling without having to re-evaluate
the stress causing trigger.
In the long run, this helps us to recognize trouble ahead
of time. Saving us valuable
time avoiding things that we've already evaluated as
bad or troublesome, and possibly
getting us out of harms way a few seconds sooner.
The problem is, that many people
are in the habit of assigning the feeling of “bad”
to all stressful information,
and may be missing out on many of life's most rewarding
possibilities
and signing up for a life of quiet desperation... and
thereby resolving one
stressful immediate situation but creating another long
term stress at the same time.
Also, if you always label the stress you feel as a negative
feeling …
your body will always react with a high level stress
response and respond
by pumping adrenaline into your body to prepare you to
fight or flee from the
negative feeling. If that negative “feeling” can
not be fought… or fled from…
you will find yourself in the highly stressful mode of
“having to live with it”.
Living with the stress… and living with the extra adrenaline
in your system all the time, will make you feel stressful
and anxious all the time.
Like you should be doing something… but don't have a
clue what it might be.
Your body has you all pumped up… ready to fight (or flee)
but you don't know
what to choose… or how to choose… you don't know
how to fight
something you don't really understand… you don't know
how to flee from it…
or where to flee to, even if you should choose to flee…
and so… you feel stressed… you feel angry… you feel fear
telling you that
you “should” react… but you don't know how.
So we decide to just “live with it”.
Live with the stressful (unresolved) feelings… live with
the anxiety
and unresolved anger… live with the depressing feeling
of (being controlled),
and the unresolved fear not knowing what to do about
it.
Instead, we depress the feelings and add one more “live
with it” situation
to the already existing mountain of habitual stress you
may have been
building up using this thought process… just knowing
it's harming
you creates more stress… knowing you have no answers
compounds the stress.
But since the body can't just “learn to live with” the
mental abuse…
the adrenaline abuse, the stress abuse… it turns to a
safety valve that
allows you to “put it in the back of your mind” and not
“think” about it.
A place where you can store unresolved problems…
a place to store unresolved stressful information and
stressful situations…
a place that we hope will control all of this information
so it's not
constantly on our mind… or we'd never get anything done.
A place called “the subconscious”…
the underlying layer of our conscious thoughts.
Here in the subconscious… the brain blocks out your “feelings”
which
your mind instantly interpreted and attached to all the
information
such as feelings of fear or stress or inadequacy, for
not knowing what to do
with it all… and stores it in such a way that only the
subconscious side
of the brain can access the (feelings) part of the information.
Your subconscious doesn't “forget” the information.
It just disconnects it
from your conscious thought patterns. The fear…
the stress… and any other
“feelings” you originally attached to the information
stay intact indefinitely…
or until new information arrives to make you “change
your mind” about it.
Once these feelings of stress, anxiety and other fearful
subjects piles up in your
subconscious… you may start to “feel” the overload.
You may “feel”
the pressure inside your subconscious trying to keep
this unresolved feeling
controlled while it blocks out all the other unresolved
fear and stress from all
your past failures… possibly as far back to your
childhood.
These unresolved thoughts, feelings, and stressful problems
manifest themselves
into a compressed layer of the subconscious, and relay
the feeling of an “overload”
to your brain each time you try to file something else
in there.
When it does, you are instantly back in touch with all
those feeling you've been
filing in there since you were born. But not in
conscious touch
with the information that is causing them.
You can feel the “stress” from holding it all in… and
your body supplies the
adrenaline to help you fight or flee again… but there's
no one to fight…
and no place to flee… and you decide again that you will
have to just
learn “to live with it”… and filing that thought creates
more stress…
and the cycle repeats itself… stacking more stress on
top of the old…
while you try to just block it all out of your conscious
thoughts.
The overload has your heart pumping faster than it should
all day long…
creating high blood pressure and overworking your heart
muscle.
And because the stress is now coming from within… it
continues even as
you sleep… even when there isn't’ any more stressful
information
being picked up by your senses.
Layer after layer of stress piling up… your fear of the
consequences
adding a little more stress every time it comes to your
conscious mind…
along with the “feeling” that you can't deal with it
all… so you block that “feeling”
out some more… and you may wind up with an eating disorder,
smoking habit,
alcohol and/or drug habit that you use to self medicate
yourself so that you
can't “feel” the pain or the stress or any of the other
messages your brain is
sending to you that you also don't know what to do about…
and don't know
where to file them… and have a true “fear” of survival
because of it.
Stacking stress on top of stress and learning to “live
with it” instead of learning
to resolve it is the stacking
effect that takes place in the subconscious. Then, even
when you understand and agree that the stress should
be resolved…
you may decide that it would just be too difficult… or
too time consuming or too
stressful to try to clean the slate… so you decide
to pick up another bad habit
that includes learning to compress all these leftover
stressful “feelings” to make
room for more stressful feelings that may be headed your
way …a trick usually
done by changing your attitude to fit your feelings instead
of changing your feelings
to fit your person… with what we normally call a bad
attitude.
Now you can say and do whatever you want… and less stress
is applied…
because you've decided to change your attitude about
what you think…
you may decide you just can't care about others because
you
get too much
stress from it. So you may decide not to care about
others…
because it's easier on you.
It is the brain's solution to all your problems.
Don't think about them.
Maybe they'll go away. Maybe they won't.
But at least it buys you some time.
But does it really buy you any time if you must still
live this stressful life,
and possibly die much younger because of complications
with your internal
organs that couldn't quite live a normal life with all
the less than perfect,
stressed out cells that you produce every day.
The only cure is to change something in the stress cycle.
Resolve a few things… plan to resolve a few things… bring
them to a
conscious level and allow your body to do its job by
giving you the energy
to “fight” or “resolve” a few things… instead of using
the extra energy
to bury them deeper into your subconscious.
Your body can be taught not to stack stress just like
it can be taught
not to be dependent on alcohol, nicotine or drugs.
While it may seem or “feel”
easier to just cover up the feelings with these bad habits
and chemicals
and not deal with them in the present… it will probably
just compound
your problems in the future. And even though you
“think” you're not worried
about it… you subconscious mind knows the truth… the
whole truth...
and will send out stress warning signals whenever you
over eat,
over drink or smoke too much.
And just like all bad habits… the more you use them the
more difficult
it is to stop using them. Living in the present
is not as easy as it once was.
The only cure to the stacking that has already occurred is to learn to relax.
You must learn to relax just like you learn to do everything else.