STRESS - THE NEW NORMAL

THE NEW NORMAL STATE OF STRESS

Stress is a brain event and the bases of perception

Unlike the speed of light which is a constant 186,282 miles per second; humans travel through life without the benefit of a fixed speed.

I like to start off by saying being stress free is unrealistic, let’s compare it to driving your car. When you get in your car to travel to work or home, you never really know the conditions of the route you are going to take. There may be road work, detours, potholes, or accidents.

In fact, we move at a rate that shifts according to our capacity to absorb the stress associated with situation.

How well we absorb the effects of stress dramatically affect the rate at which we are successful managing the challenges we face day-to-day personally and professionally.

On a personal level we face unsettling amounts of individual change = stress as evidenced by the alarming frequency of divorces, layoff, suicide, drugs and overdoses, job changes, relocations, health issues, family strife, and political warfare.

Not to mention massive changes in technology, rightsizing, new policies and procedures, reorganizations, and constant shifting of duties and reporting responsibility.

FLAVORS OF STRESS

Regardless of whether it is positive or negative stress comes in assorted flavors:

Chemical

Physical

Psychological

Neurological

Emotional

Environmental

Spiritual

Financial

Technological

VOLUME-MOMENTUM-COMPLEXITY

Burning the Candle at both ends

“Slow Acceptance”

The stress and disruption associated with the magnitude of accelerating change can be seen in today’s work/home environment:

. More unanticipated consequences

. Less time to react to events

. Increased ambiguity and uncertainty

. Reduced predictability

. Less direct or indirect control

How can we fix this equation? Increased resilience minimizes stress. Resilient people are no less vulnerable to the stresses of change. They can’t prevent the disruption, yet they aren’t overwhelmed or victimized by what is happening to them. Resilience people do five things that appear to help them avoid stress:

. Positive. They view life as complex but filled with challenge and opportunity

. Focused. They have a clear vision of what they want to achieve. Know where your headed and stick to your goals

. Flexible. They are pliable when responding to uncertainty. Have a flexible mindset.

. Organized. They develop structured approaches to managing ambiguity.

. Proactive. They engage change rather than fight or defend against it

The single most important factor to manage stress (positive or negative) successfully is the degree to which that person demonstrates resilience: the capacity to absorb high levels of change while displaying minimal dysfunctional behavior.

ASK YOURSELF

Are you a Type-D or Type-O personality. Or in other words a glass half empty or glass half full?

To effectively manage your life, you must do as Type—O people do, embrace the stress associated with change as an opportunity to be taken advantage of rather than a danger to be avoided. If you can do this one thing you will be capable of absorbing most disruptions that are thrown in your path.

Try this, instead of viewing stress as a mysterious event, approach it as an understandable process that can be managed. This perspective allows you to avoid feeling victimized during the transition phase of a situation.

FUTURE SHOCK

Future Shock refers to the shattering stress and disorientation that we induce in individuals by subjecting them to too much change in too short of time. Future shock can result from not only danger but miss opportunities. An example was an open revolt of pilots against new technology. The pilots were saying, “Don’t put any more technology in my cockpit. I can’t keep up with everything that’s in there now and you’re going to kill me.” They liked the changes and even helped develop the changes, yet they were trying to convey that their plates were full, and they couldn’t take on anymore changes to the cockpit.

At this point the human species is ill-equipped to deal with the burden of major change on a global scale, let alone those that are coming.  Most people today handle change like they were on a houseboat on a lake. As long as the water is calm and there is plenty of room there is no problem but most people our finding themselves on a houseboat on white water rapids.