STRESS: USE IT AND LOSE IT
A PRESENTATION BY COUNSELING AND CONSULTATIONS SERVICES
STRESS
THE GOOD—THE BAD—AND THE UGLY
 Stress is a bad thing—right? Well, it sure can be.
 BUT it is one of the reasons why you are here today, and reading this screen.
Without a stress response to times of danger and threat, homo sapiens may
not have survived as a species.
 As a matter of fact, stress is sometimes a very good thing!
How? Let’s find out!
STRESS CAN BE QUITE USEFUL IF YOU WANT IT TO
• In simple terms:
Stress can allow you to:
Perform at your peak level.
 Fight for your life.
 Run for your life.
 Do something super.
Stress is your mind-body
preparing for an activity that
requires extreme, i.e. greater
than normal,
energy/performance. The
ultimate would be a life or death
situation. Except then we don’t
call it stress any more— we’d use
terms like fight or flight,
adrenaline rush, etc.
How about an example?
• You could think of stress as a
general arousal level—mental
and physical—on a scale of 1
– 10. A zero would not be
desirable, or attainable (that
would mean you were dead).
A ten would not be desirable
in most circumstances in life,
but it might be, in very
extreme situations.
FOR EXAMPLE:
If you wanted to compete with some of
the world’s greatest athletes, you might
want a somewhat greater than average
arousal level, say 6 – 8.
Or if you were fighting
to save the human
race, you might want
an even greater
arousal level, say 7 – 9.
Or if you were running for your life, you
might even want to get close to a 10…
You would be glad for every ounce of your arousal if you were fighting to save
humanity or running for your life. The difference between this type of arousal and
the “bad” kind—what we usually call stress— is a couple of simple, yet VERY crucial
elements. In a truly dire situation:
 The pumped-up-ness can be used to
take positive action. (Psychologists
and other scientists actually have
funny terms for this, but they’re not
very funny.)
 When action is over, that is a cue for
your mind-body to wind down to a
more useable level of arousal.
NOW THIS IS WHERE IT GETS BAD
If your mind-body is geared up to take
extreme action, and there is nowhere
to run or jump, you get…
AND THIS IS WHERE IT GETS UGLY!
• If your mind-body is prepared for battle, and there is no way to
fight or nowhere to run, you get…
Excitement and panic/anxiety/stress are really very similar reactions (to
different extremes). One critical difference is whether you are able to use the
mind-body arousal. The other side of the coin is whether you are creating more
arousal in a situation than you can use productively.
VS
SO, HOW DOES THIS HAPPEN THAT YOUR MIND-BODY GETS
AROUSED FOR DO OR DIE, WHEN ALL YOU HAVE IS TO DO?
There is good news and bad news!
The bad news is that it is all in your head, (and by association, your body as well).
The good news is that it is all in your head, and…
More good news you can learn to focus in a way that you can control your arousal level, or
at least lower it.
Even more good news if you practice, you can get a calming response quickly.
And yet more good news you can feel better about yourself and what you do.
At times when you are stressing out, there might be a few things you are
doing that are causing distress…
And therefore can learn to do differently.
 Time traveling.
 Focusing on What Is Not/Nothing.
 Bad coaching—being negative
when optimal performance/results
calls for encouragement and
support.
 Imagining things (and not good
ones)!
 Practicing a stress imbalance.
FIRST THE TIME TRAVELING:
THE TIME MACHINE CAN TAKE YOU ONE OF TWO PLACES
The past:
The future:
AND THIS IS WHAT YOU MIGHT GET
The past will get you:
The future will get you:
 Recalling past failures
 Imagining future failures
 Accidents that validate that bad things happen
 accidents that validate that bad things will happen
 Things that you’ve messed up
 things that you might mess up
 Mistakes made
 mistakes that could be made
 Anything negative others might have thought about you
 any negative judgments that others could make
 Areas of weakness
 areas of potential weakness
 Ways that you were not good enough
 ways that you may not be good enough
 Anything that might have gone wrong
 anything that might go wrong
 What you might have been to blame for
 what you could be to blame for
 etc., etc., etc.
 etc., etc., etc.
NEXT FOCUSING ON WHAT IS NOT/NOTHING
Concentrate very hard on not thinking about a
purple elephant. Don’t think of the color purple or
an elephant. Don’t think about what it would be to
like to see an elephant that was purple. Don’t
imagine how strange it would be to see a huge
purple elephant walking across campus.
Remember this!
WHAT ABOUT COACHING?
Think about the kinds of things you say or
think to yourself when you are stressing vs.
when you are feeling confident. If you are
stressing out, it’s a good bet that some of
the ideas are negative, blaming,
highlighting weaknesses, past or future
mistakes, not motivating, deflating, etc.
For example:
NOW, COULD YOU IMAGINE MICHAEL’S COACH
SAYING THIS?…
 Now Michael, our whole season is on the line and we don’t have
time to get a very good shot. Remember that last game when you
took the last shot—it was such an easy one and you missed it! I sure
hope you don’t do that again. And you haven’t been playing very
well today. Your shooting has been awful—you are making me a
wreck! The way that you’ve been playing, I’m not sure I even like you
any more. Now that I think about it, I’m not sure I want you taking
the last shot—you missed your last one and I’m afraid you’ll screw it
up. If you miss, the whole team will be down on you and we’d all be
so disappointed in you for ruining our season. So don’t you dare
miss this shot—or I’ll bench you until you get hemorrhoids from
sitting so long!
“
ANOTHER OLD SAYING:
Tomorrow is a mystery, and yesterday is history; but now
is a gift and that’s why they call it the PRESENT.
”
Remember, when you are stressing, you are preparing your mind-body for action. Bring your
focus back to what you can do now, something about which you can take action.
When in doubt,
HOW ARE YOU COACHING YOURSELF?
Think about it:
What kinds of things might a first rate coach might be saying instead? What are
the kind of messages that would produce the best shot at winning? Then you
have a clue as to what kind of messages you want to be giving yourself. Which
of these 2 thought clouds would you want in your own head?
Are you coaching yourself towards Success?
Or Something Else?
ONE LAST THOUGHT EXERCISE
 Imagine taking a deep bite of a large,
very tart, very juicy lemon slice.
Imagine that it is cold and oozing with
juice and that the juice is swirling
around your tongue and your teeth.
Take a moment to focus on this picture
and imagine your teeth sinking into this
lemon slice. Feel the texture of the pulp
and the sensation of the tart, cool juice
swirling around your tongue and your
teeth.
 If you have a good imagination, you
probably found yourself salivating.
This mind-body connection is a
simple reminder that your mind is a
powerful and complex tool. It is
well worth your investment to make
sure that you make it work for you –
not against you.
When you think about the
worst that may happen, you
are giving your mind-body the
message to respond to the
worst. You may know in your
head that the situation is not
really life and death, but your
body does not necessarily
know what level of danger
exists, only that there is
danger.
The message may sound
something like this:
This is what your body might hear if it were in words:
 There is a potential catastrophe coming—gear up to meet the threat. Heart
pump harder to give extra nutrients to my cells. Breathe faster to oxygenate
my muscles to be more efficient. Sweat more to cool me off in case I have to
run or fight hard. Give me adrenaline so I can be stronger and faster. Muscles
tense so that you are ready for action. Stress hormones and other brain
chemicals contribute here too, because this could be a life or death situation,
and we must be ready for anything! Brain, kick into hyper gear so that I can
make quick decisions—think fast; obsess on all potential dangers in the
environment—my life could depend on it; focus only on the dangers—I must
survive!
This would be great if you
were doing this:
But not so great if you were doing
this…where an arousal level of 2 or 3.
THE SERENITY INJUNCTION
 There is a saying that has been
passed on from generations past,
attributed to many different people.
I do not know the truth of just
where it came from, but I think the
person who came up with it must
have been pretty smart. It goes
something like this…
 Grant me the Serenity to accept the
things I cannot change, the Courage
to change the things I can, and the
Wisdom to know the difference.
If you practiced this in all the stressful areas of
your life until you got very good at it, you’d be
more serene!
TIME TRAVELING
 When your mental energy is focused on the past
or the future, you are in a place of focus on what
you cannot change nor take any useful action
about (unless you really do have a time machine).
That typically involves a situation where you
would like to be able to do something, but
cannot—so you add feeling out of control and
helpless to the tangle.
 The present is in reality the only place we can do
anything useful.
 We can think about past mistakes in order to do
something better in the present.
 We can think about the future in order to add
motivation and meaning to present efforts. But
all ties back to how you influence present actions.
ANOTHER OLD SAYING
“
Tomorrow is a mystery and yesterday is history;
but now is a gift and that’s why they call it the
PRESENT.
”
 Remember, when you are stressing, you are preparing your mind-body for action. Bring your
focus back to what you can do now. Focus on something you can take action on.
FOCUSING ON WHAT IS NOT / NOTHING
 If your mental energy is focused on what is not,
or what you don’t want, you are more likely to
get more of just that.
 We can think about what we don’t want to
happen as a means to help clarify what we do
want to happen.
 Thinking about what we don’t want can add
motivation and meaning to what we do want.
But the latter is our destination.
Bring your focus back to what you do
want to happen. Recognize that your
mind is a powerful tool, and your
mental focus has a strong influence
on the outcome. Whether you think
positive, or think negative, you are
setting forces in motion to move you
in that direction.
BAD COACHING
 Being hard on someone—pointing out flaws, deficiencies, inadequacies, ways they are not as
good as they could be—can be useful IF it serves as a challenge that motivates a person to
perform better.
 However being harsh may do just the opposite if a person is already in a slump, feeling
unsure of themselves and questioning their abilities.
Listen to the messages you are
giving yourself, or taking in from
others. Honestly assess if they
are really the most helpful to
achieve optimal performance.
GOOD COACHING
 Ask yourself: is your attitude and
thoughts what you would tell a best
friend or a person you really cared
about and wanted to do well? If the
message is damping your motivation
and your confidence, then get clear
on your intentions, and modify the
message so that it fits your goals.
 The suggestions that you give
yourself have at least as great of an
effect as what you say to or hear
from others. It is well worth the
effort to attend to the quality of
your self-coaching—good or bad, so
shall go the direction of your
performance, with self esteem in
close tow.
IMAGINING THINGS
 Imagination can be a wonderful
tool—thinking outside the box can
enable us to build better boxes.
 Imagining a desirable vision of the
future can be a good thing if it
motivates and empowers action
toward building a better future.
 Imagining catastrophe, or the worst
case scenario, can even have its
place if it leads us to take action
towards preventing it.
• Mental rehearsal is a
natural and useful ability.
Again, it is important to
evaluate what you are
rehearsing for. Are you
practicing failure scenarios
or empowering ones? Are
you tying yourself up with
“What if”-ing? If so, you
may be suffering many
negative outcomes in your
mind whereas when you
focus on what is, even if
the worst scenario came to
pass (and usually it doesn’t
anyhow), you’d suffer only
once.
 Stress is a very useful response, or
it wouldn’t have survived within the
human gene pool! Especially in the
fast pace of life in modern times, it
can be very advantageous to be
moving at a hundred miles an hour,
thinking fast, working hard and long
to accomplish important tasks.
PRACTICING A STRESS IMBALANCE
 However—just like humans need
sleep to recover and repair from the
day’s activities—people need to
have a balance of periods of
relaxation to recover from periods
of stress. We’ve all heard of “All
work and no play…” Equally as true:
“All stress and no relaxation…”
THE STRESS HABIT
 Also consider that what you practice over and over becomes the
automatic response that you get most easily. Consider the common
example of your signature. Even though it involves the precise
coordination of hundreds of muscles, not to mention thousands of
nerves, you produce it exactly so every time you sign your name.
Through repetition, you have trained your nervous system. You might
remember back to the first time you ever wrote your name in cursive—it
wasn’t nearly so easy! But with enough repetitions, it becomes an
automatic and near perfect reproduction, without even thinking about it.
PRACTICING A BALANCE
Think about it. How much have you practiced a stress response; for example, getting
yourself pumped up more than is needed or desirable for a given situation or task?
 Most people don’t spend nearly as much time
practicing a relaxation response, so feel that it
doesn’t come as easily or as naturally.
 It starts to feel like that it is “just how I am,”
much as it feels that your signature is just what
it is. It is easy to forget that you once learned it,
and probably have figured out how to change it
some over the years (perhaps without
recognizing just how you did that). Therefore
you can learn to do it differently.
 There are quite a number of useful ways to
practice a relaxation response. People have
been doing this in a variety of ways for about as
long as they have been walking on 2 legs! The
key is to identify what works best for you, and
practice it enough so that you are able to use it
when you find your stress level is higher than
optimal for your current situation or activity.
BREATHE WELL & USE A KEY WORD
There are many techniques used to cope with stress. Deep breathing
and using a key word that you most associate with a state of
relaxation is another way to cope with stress.
One simple method: Breathe in deeply for a count of 1 - 5, hold for a second or 2, then
breathe out slowly for a count of 5 – 1. Focus on a word or two as you exhale—a word like
relax, calm, cool, tranquil, peaceful, ohm, whatever floats your boat—whatever gives you the
strongest association with the state of mind that you want to move towards. Imagine as
though it is reverberating from the back of your mind. Repeat as many times as works for
you. The more you practice attaining a relaxation response, the more automatic and easy
and natural it will become when you really want to get it, when you need it.
Stress level and optimal performance is very individual. Some people are
naturally more high strung and may do well with a slightly higher level
for many types of activities.
Some people are naturally more “low strung” and the same level would
impede their performance, and would want a lower level to do their best.
Develop awareness of your own level of optimal performance. When it is too high
for your current activity, practice your relaxation response to move down to a
better zone to enable useful action.
THIS PRESENTATION WAS BROUGHT TO YOU BY:
Counseling &
Consultations Services
For more information, please visit us at: http://www.nmu.edu/counseling