Lifestyle Choices

4. Discover Your Own Guidelines

Find out how many different principles and ways of managing stress you can successfully incorporate into your life. Then do it. Stress in a relationship can be a way of improving not only the quality of the relationship but also the value that one places on it. This demands facing discontent clearly and squarely and expressing it in a way that doesn’t try to make someone else responsible for it. For instance, there are two ways of complaining when your mate squeezes the toothpaste in the middle. One is, “My God, you did it again. What’s wrong with you?” and the other, “You know, I have a problem. I am really bothered by people squeezing the toothpaste in the middle. I can’t seem to get over it. I’d be grateful if you didn’t do it. It would help me a lot.”

Another thing it demands is looking at every relationship as it really is,rather than as you would like it to be; also it means being aware of your own needs and expressing them clearly and openly instead of being quietly resentful that they are not met automatically by others.

It will help protect you from stress you^learn to deal with one thing at a time—living in the immediate present which, after all, is the only time you can really know, rather than worrying about the future too much. The past is completely_. dead. Only now exists. Knowing this can immediately transform a lot of distress into simple, exhilarating stress.

5. Learning to Turn Off

There are scores of effective techniques for quieting the mind and recreating the calm serenity that puts you more and more in touch with your own creative center. They include autogenic training in self-hypnosis, yoga, biofeedback, transcendental meditation (TM), zazen, creative imagery, movement, exercise and breathing techniques. Learn about them and then make them part of your life—and, most important of all, enjoy doing them. Of course, they are doing you good and you should do what does you good, but they can also be a lot of fun. And no matter who you are, they can lead you into realms of awareness you have never lived in before, literally opening up whole new worlds of possibilities in your life, your relationships, and your work.

6. Take a Look at Your Life and Throw Out the Chronic Stressors

Every stressor—every situation that triggers off the stress response in you—is like a challenge. And one way of dealing effectively with longterm stress is to take a good look at what continues to trigger the stress response in you and to ask yourself the question “Is this particular thinga challenge I really want to meet or is it something_.. I would be better off eliminating from my life?” The question is an important one. Many stressors provide challenges from which one can grow, but some are simply habitual, rather like the treadmill in a hamster’s cage. They lead no where and they bring you little in terms of increasing awareness or an ability to make better use of your life and energies. If there are habitual stressors in your life, then consider eliminating them.

For instance, take a look at the work you do and ask whether it is really satisfying to you.

What about the financial demands you have taken on—are they really necessary? If so, is there a way you haven’t thought of to reduce them? If not, have the courage to drop them and accept the changes which doing so will bring about. We all have a tendency to hang on to the status quo at all costs—and usually the cost is the loss of a lot of our energy and life. Even if you learn the finest techniques for meditation and stilling the mind, if you are in a job year after year which you hate, or if you are faced with a relationship that no longer has meaning for you, they will all do little good. For while they may protect you from serious illness, you will still be banging your head against a brick wall. It is not only important to take responsibility for facing up to the demands of stress instead of trying to avoid it, it is also important to take responsibility for removing stress where it is no longer, useful and relevant to you.

7. Develop Your Own Personal Ways of De-stressing

Explore them all, not only the meditative techniques—try a walk in the woods for clearing consciousness (something quite specifically ordered by Tibetan doctors for patients who suffer from worry and rapid swings of mood), sailing, running, dancing, gardening, listening to music, or a hobby.

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