The Stress-Free Zone

"Stress is an ignorant state. It believes that everything is an emergency. Nothing is that important."

-- Natalie Goldberg

Have you noticed that when a real crisis happens, you respond instantaneously. There may be fear, you may get a huge adrenaline rush, but there is no stress because there is no time for stress; an immediate response is required.

Stress is born of the mating of thinking and time. You create it between your ears, and mistake this phantom being for reality. It's not, it never is.

Stress takes root in the fantasy world of "what if..." It is a form of the Catastrophic Expectations Game. What if I fail the test? What if I oversleep and miss my flight? Or, worse, yet, what if the plane crashes in a wheat field in Kansas? Stress is the byproduct of what motivational speaker Zig Ziglar calls "stinkin' thinkin'."

There's no use stressing out about the things you can't control, like the flight of an airplane. And for the things you can control or influence, you can only do your best, no more. The simple fact is stress never helps you do your best. If anything it robs you of the energy you need to be at the top of your game.

So, next time you feel yourself stressing out, check you're thinking. Look specifically at your self-talk. What are you telling yourself about the over-importance of the event, issue, or person over whom you are stressing? What catastrophic expectations are you feeding? And then burst out laughing! Or at least shake your head and mange a wan smile.

The old chestnut "Let go and let God" is a powerful course of action to dislodge stress. It doesn't even matter if there's a so-called God or not! The let go part is really the most important. No forthcoming emergencies. No catastrophes on the horizon. Let go of all that nonsense and be right here, right now. The present is always the stress-free zone