What Force Serves and Protects Against the Seven Deadly Crimes of Stress?

The Seven Deadly Crimes of Stress

1.     Unmanageable Emotions

2.     Loss of Intellectual Capacity

3.     Poisonous Psychology

4.     Destructive Behavior

5.     Abnormal Metabolism

6.     Disturbed Sleep

7.     Hyperactive Muscles

(See the Addendum at the end of this article if you love lists of details.)

It tugs at my heartstrings to see great people so burdened by stress. Especially because there are several easy answers to minimize stress. 

Yes, I said easy. Why did I say easy? Because you are human being. Because you have a frontal lobe under your control. Because you are the only mammal with the ability to be self-aware.

Cut to the Chase: No One Can Rely on Drugs to Cure Stress.

Drugs are not an answer to - and in fact are contributors to - stress.

Do you know that ‘polypharmacy’ (a fancy word for using more than two drugs at once) is considered a prognostic factor when predicting the severity of stress? (Just reporting that in case someone out there still believes there is a drug to relieve stress.) That includes the drugs we call alcohol, caffeine and cannabinoids.

There is not a drug on earth that will cure stress. Some pharmaceuticals will aid (for the short term) in reducing one of the expressions of stress, but no drug will take stress away.

The Inner World of Stress

Stress is caused by how we handle outer world events; not by whether or not they happen. It is in the inner world that the problem of stress occurs, and it is there that it is solved. Yet, in my nearly three decades in healthcare, I have met only a few people who understood that fact; even fewer who chose to transform their experience, to make sure they felt free from stress.

To be fair, we don’t receive much early education about how to prepare for and handle stress - even less about where it actually comes from. No matter who has reported to me the feeling of being oppressed by stress, it seems to have come by surprise.  So many patients have looked at me with a kind of shocked expression, like ‘How did this happen to me?’

Without self-reflection and a great healthcare team to add reality to what is and is not acceptable as human function, I can understand that people feel broad-sided by the impact of the culmination of years of non-action towards or unwitting compliance to stress. 

There are so many solutions to decrease, minimize, reduce and eliminate stress. Meditation is only one. It is not a billable code in our healthcare system, and I stand to gain nothing in the way of revenue by prescribing it. The reason I offer it is because (a) it works (b) it is always accessible (c) it is free and (d) I believe in the awesome power of human beings to create their own reality.

Meditation takes much less effort and time than you might think, and it is customizeable to your learning style and belief system.

Stay YOU.

Let's get this out of the way right now. To meditate:

You do not have to join a cult, become a yogi or a sufi, or get your PhD in Mindfulness. You do not have to be off-the-grid or give up your cell phone. You do not have to stop enjoying a good cry now and then. You do not have to be nice to everyone. You do not have to become soft-spoken or hold your tongue. You do not have to say No to wine, weed, coffee, chips or chocolate. You do not have to be spiritual or get a guru.

You do not have to become someone new to use the software of your mind to meditate to feel refreshed. The mind, once it is calm, acts like the refresh button on your browser. You know how this works on your laptop. It works the same way in your mind. Think of freeing up the cache of memory and thoughts that are right now taking up space in the browser of your mind. After it is done, everything works more easily and quicker.

So, what is the Force that Serves and Protects against the Seven Deadly Crimes of Stress?  It is your own mind. The fanciest laptop, desktop or cellphone needs an upgrade. Even though the human mind moves and evolves way faster than any device on the planet, it does not need an upgrade. It just needs refreshing. You don’t even have to upgrade. Keep the one you have and clear your cache regularly. You are in charge of your own mind-system’s RAM.   

Make Waves.

The fact that human beings are in charge of their own brainwaves escapes a lot of us.

So, here is the famous tale of Darla from Finding Nemo. It will help you understand your brainwaves.

Think of your brain as the cute little goldfish. Think of the goldfish bowl (or in this case, the plastic bag) as the skull. Think of the water your little goldfish swims in as your thoughts. What happens if, like Darla, you shake the bowl like mad? What happens to the fish? ...poor little fish. The moral of the story: Don't shake up your waves.

If you don't even know where to begin, try Rick Hanson's book called Buddha's Brain. It will give you the basic vocabulary and neuroscience to get you going. Here it is:

Finally, if you don't know what I mean when I say "Meditation: Surf the Waves of Your Choice!", here is a little bit about you...you amazing human being.

ADDENDUM (for List Lovers):

For those of you who love lists, I have been keeping track of the presentations of stress reported by many thousands of patients in the last 28 years. I am not a social scientist keeping exact data, so I cannot tell you precise numbers. However, I have kept a practice journal since I started practicing in 1990. I create a journal entry just about every other day. So, I share a bit of my journal with you. It is the top four signs and symptoms presentations within each category of the Seven Deadly Crimes of Stress, courtesy of roughly250,000 visits made my many thousands of suffering patients of every age, profession, sex, ethnicity and religion:

Unmanageable Emotions.

• Feeling anxious and worried.
• Feeling irritable and agitated.
• Hypersensitive emotions (weep at commercials, defensive with friends, fed-up with family challenges).
• Desire to run away to escape.

Loss of Intellectual Capacity.

• Non-focused phrenetic mind.
• Hard to maintain Concentration.
• Diminishing ability to be creative with new ideas.
• Forgetful.

Poisonous psychology.

• Saying terrible things to yourself about yourself .
• Urge for sugar, alcohol or junkfood.
• Hopelessness: Feeling flat, indifferent, and uninspired.
• Anger management problems.

Destructive behavior.

• Argumentative.
• Annoyed without much provocation.
• Procrastination.
• Clamming up.

Abnormal metabolism.

• Urge for sugar, alcohol or junkfood.
• Muscle cramps, including foot cramps.
• Indigestion, including reflux and bloating.
• Loss of sex drive or decreased libido.

Disturbed Sleep.

• Interrupted sleep (waking up at odd hours).
• Restless sleeping, including Restless Leg Syndrome.
• Not refreshed by sleep.
• Insomnia.

Hyperactive Muscles.

• Tight muscles.
• Tension headaches or migraines.
• Grinding teeth.
• Legs feel heavy and swollen.