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Stress - Is It Really A Killer?
AllbuddhaBound
Veteran
Research says that the belief that stress is harmful to your health, is false. It appears that stress, along with the belief that it should be avoided, is what is harmful to your health.
https://www.ted.com/talks/kelly_mcgonigal_how_to_make_stress_your_friend
This research supports Buddhist beliefs about acceptance and compassion rather than some psuedo-science beliefs that have been blindly accepted.
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Comments
Right off the bat I don't believe it. I used to have a stressful job, and that stress caused me all sorts of problems... not a belief that stress was bad. Stress leads to high blood pressure, weight gain, anxiety and depression and a host of other problems. I'll take a look, but it's probably not what it claims to be.
I've assumed that stress was a potential life saver in small doses but was destructive to the body as a steady diet.
The presenter suggests that fear of stress could kill you. Even the idea that stress is a problem, stresses a person out. With an acceptance, let it come and go attitude, you face the stress without having to deal with the fear associated with it.
I'm watching this video. Stress is stress; how it affects you, adversely or beneficially, is a matter of perspective. The research driving this TED talk revealed that people who reported a lot of stress AND viewed that stress as adverse were 43% more likely to die prematurely of a stress related condition (heart disease). So if you viewed your stress as bad, THAT is what kills you, not the stress itself -- it is, well, neutral. What does this remind me of . . . ?
This sounds an awfully lot like pop psychology to me.
Think about what she is saying in simple terms -- stress is not dangerous unless it stresses you out.
Hmmmmmmmmmmm.
The research is done by reputable schools. Not shysters trying to sell a product. I don't think labeling it as pop psychology is fair. That is dismissive and not really productive.
Gee, don't stress out over it.
Oh, I mean do stress out over it.
But seriously, here's why I think it is pop psychology.
Her title: "How to make stress your friend."
The fine print: "Important: all these studies are about “acute,” “short-term” or “moderate” stress — the kind that is short-lived and related to something specific. “Chronic stress,” on the other hand, isn’t quite so great."
May I suggest the following article which is more balanced:
http://www.webmd.com/balance/stress-management/effects-of-stress-on-your-body
I didn't see anywhere that the stress was called acute, short term or moderate. She is a practicing psychologist from Stanford University. Some of her research was provided by studies conducted in Harvard. The lady is actually a researcher who spends most of her time applying research results to the real world. I would look a little further than the title.
I will read the article you quoted, and get back to you on it.
The article mentions scientific research without any citations of studies. We have no idea when the research was conducted and in many ways, the article agrees with much of what Ms. McGonigal stated, however nowhere does it consider the effect belief has on the extent of damage.
Scroll down to the "learn more" section, which outlines some of the studies she based her talk on.
No one is saying that she's not qualified.
But I have sat through many a speaker in the field of education who were well qualified with doctoral degrees, who presented nice, but slanted talks.
Well, the research she quotes (McGonigal), completely jives with Buddhist thought. I consider Buddhist thought to have been researched many times over. And her mention of oxytocin, is completely in line with the latest research on the workings of the brain, emotion and thought. That is just further confirmation to Buddhist thought about compassion
When one starts mixing science and religion, that's when I bail out.
How many religions say it is alright to doubt anything until you experiment with it?
Oh my god you two.
Don't mean to offend anyone. I hope that is not the way it was taken.
I imagine like everything else, each person is different. I can tell you that my response to stress is poor. Relationships, finances, work...it all completely encompasses and thus ruins my life. I had to find a way to deal. For others, similar stresses drive them. No one person can be put in a box as far as "this is good for you" or "this is bad for you." What is one person's poison is another's healing salve.
I never heard that stress was bad for me until the past 10 years. I felt, and knew, it was bad for me a long time before that. It is as simple as finding ways to manage it. Stress has it's place in our lives. But what place that it varies from person to person. There is no ideal stress threshold, diet, exercise limit, work limit, relaxation limit, tv time, work time etc that works across the board for everyone. If that was the case, someone would have figured it out by now and we'd all be our desired body shape and size, and happiness level in life.
Also, short term stress (OMG! How I barely just avoided that accident!) is far different from lingering stresses (OMG I have chronic disease that impacts my ability to work, to play, to sleep, to eat and to raise my family).
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who were well qualified with doctoral degrees, who presented nice, but slanted talks.
agree
When I think about it mechanically, tachycardia and hyperventilation are what happen to your body when you exercise to stay healthy. If you can use CBT to convince yourself that your body's reaction to stress is as beneficial as exercise......her theory may be correct, you'll live longer and stay healthier. IMHO.
Depends on the reason for the tachycardia.
Tachycardia can be caused by dehydration (trust me, I know).
Tachycardia can be caused by a compromised vagal nerve (again, trust me, I know).
Do you think having tachycardia to the point of having to have cardiac ablation is beneficial?
Don't be so negative, it's also caused by strenuous exercise, as is hyperventilation.
Actually let's call it elevated heart rate, sorry for the clinical error :skeptic:
Well, tachycardia is an abnormally high heart rate. Elevated heart rate during and immediately after exercise is not abnormal; in fact it is so normal that not having an elevated heart rate during and immediately after exercise is one possible sign of heart failure.
Gee you're hard to convince!
If my heart rate and breathing rate elevate because I'm running up a hill, it called exercising and is beneficial to your health. If the same things happen when having a stress attack, the only difference is that your mind is telling your body that it's bad for you. If you can convince yourself that the same symptoms are helping you rather than hurting you, it's conceivable that it will benefit you rather than harm you.
Well Che, I have paroxysmal tachycardia, have been in the hospital with it twice, in urgent care 3 times, been to the regular doctor multiple times, had it at a lower level countless other evenings over the past 4 years, take varying levels of metoprolol tartrate for it, and ironically (though you may not believe this) am having a mild episode of it tonight (been on oxygen and an increased level of metoprolol).
Most of the time now, though far from always, during walking and a workout on the machines at the YMCA, my heart now behaves somewhat normally...although it's taken 2 years of fairly consistent moderate level workouts to get it back that good, instead of staying high for up to 5 hours after exercise.
My doctor says that "down the road" I am looking at a "2-way" pacemaker that will be able to control both brady and tachy cardia, or a possibility of cardiac ablation, and that while episodes at my current level of tachycardia are usually not life threatening at their present level (there's only a slight increase in chances now of having a heart attack), in the future it is an indicator for a number of related conditions such as congestive heart failure.
So yes, it will be difficult for you to convince me.
Touché, I've had two triple bypasses and have two inoperable 100% blocked coronary arteries.
I have asbestosis, diabetes, PTSD, prostate cancer (in remission) and chronic fatigue syndrome. None of that is relevant to the facts I'm discussing. My point is that if stress creates the same symptoms as vigorous exercise, the mind is capable of using the symptoms of stress to your advantage rather than your disadvantage. It probably doesn't apply to poor old broken bodies like ours, but I'm basically agreeing with what that woman in the video said and wish I had discovered it 30 years ago before my heart problems started because I am (and always have been) an extremely stressful person.
Namaste
I don't see how you can say all that and then state that position.
But, to each his own.
What about adrenaline junkies who love dangerous sports - don't they thrive on stress? It seems that what one person experiences as "stressful" could be experienced by another as "exciting".
Stress or dukkha is inevitable for those that exist (see next post for an example of the non existent). Has anybody been paying attention?
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However we of a Buddhist persuasion aim to negate the elements that produce negative stress. Some here indulge in running or other exercise or have stressful jobs, how we deal with dukkha/stress determines its healthy or unhealthy outcome.
That is my experience. :wave: .
According to the 4 Noble Truths, dukkha isn't inevitable. So presumably stress isn't either. It's all very subjective.
Thereby reducing stress!
But I don't think that invalidates the idea that "less stress is better". They're just saying that aversion to stress, causes more stress than necessary. The presenter is still saying "less stress is better".
Stress has become a commonly used term with little understanding of what it is really is. But I do believe that unknown or unrecognized stress can have negative consequences. I have personally known soldiers who after being deployed to combat zones come back with issues they will not talk about. So in order to find relief they resort to their old friend alcohol. In some areas of military service seeking out help can kill a career.
When they refuse to talk about it, they obviously see stress as something that is negative and something that needs to be avoided. Do you really think a traumatized combat soldier is unaware they are experiencing stress?
The fact that they fear stress re-traumatizes them all over, then they turn to alcohol. A common therapeutic approach under those circumstances is to have the person re-experience the stress under controlled conditions, such as bringing on the stress in a calm and relaxed way, such as might be done in exposure therapy. Which further supports Ms. McGonigal's presentation.
If stress is bad and needs to be avoided, then how can exposure therapy work?
I've heard of stress as the natural fight or flight response.
Yet we initiate this response not because a bear has walked out of the bushes but because we are not sure if we can pay a bill.
This in turn causes muscle tension, elevated blood pressure, increase in respiratory and cardiac rate. Doesn't sound healthy to me.
We don't need stress unless a bear attacks!
Which brings up extremely stressed people. I would think a phobic person would have to rate very high on the stressed scale. The accepted approach for treatment, is exposure. It is to re-expose them to the stress in a controlled environment where they accept the stress and use it as a tool to get better.
Should phobics be trained to avoid stress, or use it as a tool to get better?
I sometimes wonder if this is a chapter of the Flat Earth Society, rather than a Buddhist discussion board
I respect that you have a different opinion than mine on stress, and I have considered the author's material.
You criticized me in an earlier post saying, "I don't think labeling it as pop psychology is fair. That is dismissive and not really productive."
To be fair, I think your comment: "I sometimes wonder if this is a chapter of the Flat Earth Society..." is equally "dismissive and not really productive".
It seems to me that good people can heartily disagree on some topics. I have 2 degrees in the Geosciences and have taught evolution and earth history...two topics many people cannot agree on; I understand the viewpoints of Creationists and the like, even though I don't agree with them. I also have 3 degrees in Education (2 in teaching and one in administration). I've seen a lot of pop psychology out there, often by authors who attempt to stitch together smatterings of information into a whole that is greater than its parts. There's no question that certain degrees of stress prompt humans to take action. Our bodies get stressed when we become dehydrated and we respond by drinking water. A politician may not take action until his constituents cause him stress. The neighbor may not silence his dog until his neighbors are in an uproar and cause him stress.
But there are a great many types of stress situations which also lead to serious consequences -- suicide; mental illness which can be induced by chemical changes in ones mind and body (including serious depression); stress levels at work and at home which can lead to increased risk of high blood pressure, heart attacks, and strokes; inflammatory conditions; insomnia; migraine headaches (which can also increase one's likelihood of a later stroke); digestive problems and irritable bowel syndrome (some of which can increase chances of cancer); and substance addictions which can lead to a shortened life span.
There's nothing wrong with "self-help" in certain situations by intelligent people. But all too often "self-help" results in people in need of treatment by professionals not getting the needed treatment. As I understand it, groups like AA are run by trained people.
While smaller issues of stress can be treated by hearing good speakers or reading good articles, the best purpose of such venues -- IMHO -- is to educate the listener/reader with what I'll call background information. I do this all the time. In fact, I'll do it today when I go to the doctor about last night's very long (but not too severe) case of tachycardia. I'll tell him my self-diagnosis based on fairly extensive reading. And then I'll let the expert physician take over the lead. I'll ask more intelligent questions because of reading background information, but I'll do so being aware that I don't have the real expertise or the answers.
My feeling about the talk cited is that in its place, it's fine. But I think it goes too far because we don't know the caliber of the thought process in all who may hear the talk. And then it comes down to (paraphrased) that old adage, "A patient who treats himself has a fool for a patient", because the expertise usually isn't there to differentiate between serious and non-serious situations.
Soldiers do not fear stress as much as the reaction of the military culture to their seeking help for it. Exposure therapy for soldiers conducted by those with no experience of combat stress themselves is very dangerous. After a meeting at the Va not long ago several doctors called exposure therapy little better than snake oil. I was there.
Interesting, grackle. Sorry to hear that...again...cause I have heard that numerous times in the past. Is it similar in the VA?
The VA has both ex military as well as those who never served as its employees. So a soldiers reception varies. Those who have seen combat are not likely to easily extend their trust to those outside the brotherhood if you will. I still carry the effects of my time under fire. But I feel well cared for by the VA. I no longer am subject to a command structure that could get away with calling soldiers names for displaying what that structure to use the nicest term called weakness. That structure can be very supportive of the physically wounded but the invisable wounds to them seem an affront to one of their holy cows. That being good order and discipline. Forgive the rant Vinlyn but this a both a touchy and passionate subject.
During the last month of his life, my father ended up in a VA hospital. Although physically it didn't appear to be the most modern hospital I had ever been in, we actually thought he care was excellent and actually "caring".
Exposure therapy is a well recognized "best practice" approach to treating PTSD.
The authors examined the efficacy, speed, and incidence of symptom worsening for 3 treatments of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD): prolonged exposure, relaxation training, or eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR; N=60). Treatments did not differ in attrition, in the incidence of symptom worsening, or in their effects on numbing and hyperarousal symptoms. Compared with EMDR and relaxation training, exposure therapy (a) produced significantly larger reductions in avoidance and reexperiencing symptoms, (b) tended to be faster at reducing avoidance, and (c) tended to yield a greater proportion of participants who no longer met criteria for PTSD after treatment. EMDR and relaxation did not differ from one another in speed or efficacy. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/ccp/71/2/330/
@Che, it's not nearly that simple. Yes, to some degree you can control things with your mind. Stress might resulted in elevated heart rate and other things you mentioned, but it involves a whole host of complex hormonal and chemical systems in the body that are impacted when the stress is long term versus the short term stress that comes with exercise. With exercise, you stress the body and then you are done. Most people don't exercise 8+ hours a day for years on end. However, a stressful job with the same effects is what makes cumulative stress over time so dangerous and so bad for a person. Exercise would be the same except we don't do it for those extended periods. It's not nearly as simple as just elevated heart rate. A consistently high (but not horribly high) heart rate has been shown to shorten life spans. Your argument also only works if a person believes they are under stress. Often times people don't even recognize they are stressed much less what it is doing to them. It's similar to inflammation. Exercise also causes inflammation. But then it settles down again. When you are living a lifestyle that is causing inflammation in the body that continues over years, it causes numerous problems in the body, including cancer, heart disease, diabetes and all sorts of other things. Inflammation and stress during exercise is considered ok for most people because of all the benefits that come with it. Long term inflammation and stress due to lifestyle for years on end is not nearly the same thing.
@ Karasti, I must apologise then because I was referring to stressful situations that occur either frequently or infrequently when a problem arises, which I experience often but have trained myself over the years not to hold onto. I imagine if I were in a situation that was stressful full time, I'd get out of it.
The flight/ fight/ freeze scenario (that when prolonged, is a big PTSD factor) is stress personified as was the cause of my PTSD, diving in Vietnam searching for IEDs and mines on ships cables and bottoms in absolute nil visibility using only our ten eyes (fingers) to search. It's probably hard for people to grasp the real benefits of self talk, but I've been seeing my psychiatrist twice a month for 20 years and it's become second nature for me, that's why I understood the principle the woman in the video was professing.
Again, my apologies for any misunderstanding.
For me dealing with stress/dukkha in unhelpful ways, causes health problems and leads to secondary problems. From experience we all find that existence is stressful, apart from the practice of dharma which provides a more helpful approach.
I feel I will be taking refuge in the removal of stress, which includes a realistic view that stress is part of life/existence, apart from the blessed and lotus born . . .
Making friends with life's inevitable course of ups and downs is not easy. As soon as a viable strategy emerges, I'm in . . .
:wave: .
No offense taken, it's the damn bickering I reacted to (I own my reaction). It was distracting, and I own my distractibility and reactivity.
Maybe 'bickering' is a form of dialogue I am just not personally comfortable with. That actually makes sense now that I write it.
Regarding your remark about the Flat Earth Society, I get tired of the fencing and verbal dueling, aka bickering. It draws attention away from the subject and toward the selfing of the bickerers. I own that judgment, too. So from my POV it's not so much the Flat Earth Society but the Lookit Me Society. Whether or not this has anything whatsoever to do with what is really happening (aka bickering) . . .?
I watched the video and 'got it', and 'it' was a new and refreshing perspective to take on stress. I've had the experience of suffering severe stress and then experiencing a tangible, real shift in how I interpret the stress -- viola', the suffering diminished dramatically.
There is huge uncharted territory for us Buddhist explorer types, within very mundane psychological states, to discover or REcover what we've forgotten, not seen before, or gotten the habit of interpreting a certain way for whatever reason. This video reminded me of what we have yet to discover or recover
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I really don't want to bicker. I find approaches that work with the people I serve, and I like to share it. I guess I am sensitive because in my work, there are some people who dismiss anything that is outside their view of good practice, and they belittle it and minimize it. Many consider Buddhist thought hocus pocus or new age which is funny, because in relation to Buddhism, Freud's psychotherapy is much more recent or new age.
When you find something that works, we need to share it. Or at the very least look at it with an open mind. Look at it, dispose of it if it does not fit with your frame of reference, but to dismiss things with a pejorative label, is hardly opening one to discovery.
And besides, this is a forum for thoughts. Do we really need to assume ideas are not worth considering because you can attach snappy put-downs to them?
Well said @Allbuddhabound
. Well said indeed.
When you (me, us) find something helpful or useful, sharing it with other people is compassion in action. It is an offering, a kind of gift.
I sense that to criticize it in any way is somehow inappropriate. If you handed me a rock you picked up because it attracted your eye, and I remarked what a ridiculous rock it was, I am shoving aside the simple fact of your offering so that I can make some sort of statement about myself, my views, my ideas, my me me me. It lacks baseline empathy!
And like any offering given that isnt particularly beneficial once received, that it was given as an offering in the first place seems more relevant than the offering's lack of benefit for the receiver, don't you think?
I invite the researcher to live a week in my life and to rethink the theory.
I call bullshit on the research
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Welcome to membership in the Flat Earth Society! For $25 you can be a deluxe member, which will earn you a special harness that will prevent you from falling off the edge! Glad to have you aboard!
Yes.
This is part of the universal stream of interaction (stress or dukkha if you will) that has a sub-text or greater potential. A gift from a well meaning child or a clawless, clueless cructacean is more important than the outer form.
In a similar way pointing out that we disagree or find a study of limited value is not a criticism of the gift or bestower.
As pointed out and I suggest of value, is the very difficult process that some call 'the path' and this involves doing everything in our power, however limited, to change our attitude to life the universe and samsara (stress world).
Sub-text in this sense does not mean lower than the outer or obvious, it refers to layers or aspects of meaning in even the ostensibly wrong or that we disagree with . . . :wave: .
Give my harness to someone who can stand unaided. I have other things to worry about and other people to give a toss about
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