Psychological Stress

All stress is psychological. In other words, all stress is created via thought in the moment. It doesn't come from the outside world. That's a misunderstanding. Join me as I explore this topic from a new perspective.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to the Calmcast,

A time to feel calm and think clearly.

I'm Claire Downham,

The Queen of Calm,

A Transformational Life Coach.

I was a burnt out headteacher who finally made the journey to calm after years of trying and I want to prevent you from having to do the same.

The Calmcast is a series of short explorations gently guiding you back to your natural state which is calm and clarity.

Just listen like you would listen to music with an open mind and curiosity.

There's nothing else to do.

Now let's relax into today's episode.

So today's episode is called Psychological Stress and it's being recorded on Stress Awareness Day or here on Stress Awareness Day.

So I did a little bit of poking around this morning about stress because it's,

You know,

We talk about it a lot as a society and when you start to research it you will find an awful lot of pointing in the direction of stress being a creation of the outside world.

It is,

I would say,

An epidemic of understanding or believing that to be true and goodness only knows when it started it probably seemed like it's always been that way that we point to the outside world for where stress comes from.

And I've done work with stress.

I used to do a workshop called Stress to Success Habits.

I still do work with stress all the time but in this particular workshop I used to do some surveys before I delivered it and the majority of people who fill in their surveys pointed to something outside of them that was creating the stress that they were experiencing.

And also like I'm not,

We need to take stress seriously.

Like not our own personal,

We need to look at that in a different way but the impact on society is serious.

You know,

That it's,

They do say that it is a co-factor in 90-odd percent of illness.

I used to,

The statistics used to be 70.

It's like they're saying now no matter what you've got going on physically if you're stressed it's going to be worse.

And I've experienced that going through the menopause I think really.

The calmer I've got the less menopause symptoms I've had and stress is definitely a huge factor in menopause and the symptoms that we experience.

But that's just one thing.

There's many,

Many things that are worse if we're stressed.

So I did a little bit of research and I came across one particular article that was about types of stress.

So it kind of categorized them into different things and I want to talk about that because I was really interested to read this particular article and see that they were pointing to stress coming from all sorts of different places.

So they categorized it in four different ways.

Physical stress,

Psychosocial stress,

Psychospiritual stress and psychological stress.

And you'll have noticed that this broadcast is called psychological stress.

So I wonder where I'm going to go with that anyway.

So obviously physical stress is to do with things like illness and things that are physically happening to your body.

Now our experience of those things,

Like I am not a denier of your physical body having things going wrong in it and things breaking and pains happening.

But what I am saying is that your experience of that and the levels of stress that you have due to,

You know,

Because of that thing,

Looks like it's because of that thing,

Is not created by the thing.

And we can see this,

Like for all of these things I'm going to talk about,

We can see this when we consider two people with exactly the same symptoms,

Exactly the same illness,

Experiencing it completely differently.

Completely differently.

So what's the factor?

What's the difference?

Well the difference is thought,

As I will continue to point to in this broadcast.

Psychosocial stress.

These words,

I've got them on a poster note stuck here because they are such tongue twisters.

Psychosocial stress.

Psychosocial stress is where it's the people basically.

It's the wife or the husband or partner.

It's the kids.

It's the elderly parents.

It's the job.

It's my boss.

It's my colleagues.

It's other people doing things.

It's middle lane hoggers.

Definitely,

They are definitely a stressor.

I'm sorry if you're middle lane hogger,

Please explain it to me.

Anyway,

There's all these people doing things we don't like,

Behaving in a way we don't like,

And that they are creating our stress.

But again,

This is about getting curious about where you can see that just doesn't quite add up because we can both have the same really unpleasant boss who is treating us in a very similar way and have a very different experience of that.

You may have noticed in your own family if you've got kids that your children can be doing something,

You might be feeling super stressed and your other half's like totally chill about it.

They often talk to people,

Clients about things like that,

Or they've noticed,

Oh,

Yeah,

I feel really stressed,

My child's doing this,

But my other half doesn't seem to be that bothered.

So it's seeing that it's not the person doing the thing that you don't like.

It is to do with your thinking about it.

And then psychospecial stress is really about your crisis of beliefs and things like that.

But again,

It's kind of seeing that those things are okay to experience.

You don't have to feel stressed about them.

So the fourth one that they mention is psychological stress.

And then in the psychological stress,

It goes through all different types of thinking.

And actually it's seeing that the psychological stress is the umbrella over all of it.

Now here are four ways that I often mention to people that I think are really fun to go into an exploration about.

Like you're not a scientist,

You're not trying to prove this right or wrong.

You're an explorer hoping to see something new.

I just heard Michael Neill talk about it like this yesterday.

This is about just putting down all the things you thought were true for a little minute and getting into that kind of exploration you have when you go to visit a new place on holiday or something like that.

Just open-mindedness.

So firstly,

Have you noticed that you can feel stressed about something,

Really stressed about it,

And you're not even there?

So that's that thing like on a Sunday night where you start to think about work.

I know a lot of people who don't sleep well on a Sunday night because they're thinking about work.

You're not at work,

You're not doing your job even.

You're literally sat on the sofa watching television and feeling stressed about work.

How on earth can it be work that's doing that?

You're not there.

It has to be your thinking about work that's creating that experience.

Then there's the second one is how other people don't,

We've mentioned,

I've mentioned this already,

But other people don't seem to be having the same experience as you.

You might be sat with somebody who's doing the same job as you.

You might be chatting to other parents who seem to have the same issues with their children as you or whatever it is,

You and your other half and your children experiencing them differently,

Feeling different levels of stress or perhaps one of you not feeling any stress at all.

If the thing was creating the stress,

Then everybody would experience that thing in exactly the same way.

And if the last few years from March 2020 have taught us anything,

If you've been open to see it,

It's,

Whoa,

There's a thing happening to all of us.

We've all been locked in our houses.

We're all not allowed to do X,

Y,

And Z and such a variable stress,

Variable stress levels.

I was the calmest I've ever been literally just like,

You know,

But that was because I was understanding what I'm sharing with you now or beginning to understand it.

It wasn't anything to do with the outside world,

But I could see the suffering and I felt a lot of compassion.

I felt okay,

Actually enjoyed it.

Now I know that's not everybody else's experience and that's okay,

But it's seeing that it can't be the things outside because we're all experiencing them differently and creating our own reality through thought in the moment.

So the next one is how you vary in terms of how stressed you feel about something.

So during lockdown is probably a great example because probably on a day to day basis,

You went up and down.

You know,

Some days you first really felt really stressed about other days you were like,

Oh,

Well,

It'll be okay.

You know,

You can hear that kind of inner talk that we do to ourselves sometimes,

But it's seeing that the thing can stay the same and we can really vary in terms of how we feel about it.

And that's because our thinking is variable.

The thing out there could be just the same all the time,

But we fluctuate.

So we feel very stressed about some days and really not bothered by other days.

We go up and down because we're human beings and that's what we're supposed to do.

And the fourth one is,

You know that thing when,

I don't know if you kind of have a proper job or whether you run a business or whatever,

But you can get to Friday afternoon,

You've had a bit of a week and you still got lots of things to do,

But you start to feel less stressed if you noticed because your thoughts are starting to drift off.

So the weekend,

We've got something nice planned,

Going out for a nice meal tomorrow,

Spending some time with your family,

Whatever.

And you start to,

You know,

You're like this,

You've been like this all week,

But Friday afternoon you're kind of doing the same things.

You've still got loads to do,

Still got lots of stuff to finish,

But you're not feeling as stressed because your thinking has already gone off into the weekend.

So as your thinking flits off into nice thoughts about the weekend,

You feel less stressed.

You're still doing the same job,

The same job that you weren't doing on Sunday night when you did feel stressed.

It's thought,

It's all thought.

Now stress is causing a lot of ill health,

A lot of unhappiness,

A lot of awful things.

You know,

I didn't work for a whole year.

I was sick for a long time after that because I got so stressed that I couldn't function.

I burnt out.

Nobody needs to do that.

That does not need to happen to anybody.

When we understand stress better,

We are less likely to experience it.

It's just the same as understanding anything.

Like I understand how to drive a car now,

So I'm less likely to have an accident.

It's that simple.

When you understand how things work,

They work better for you and you work better within them.

So I've gone way over what I know I do,

Which is fine.

It just,

It's just,

It was a more in-depth study today.

All this is about is starting to open up your mind to be curious about what is possible to see.

And I can honestly say,

And this is no,

This is not me big in me up or anything.

It's hopefully a message of hope.

I don't feel stressed at all ever.

I get upset about things.

I get wound up about things momentarily,

But don't feel stressed.

And that is from somebody who was so stressed you burnt out.

So if it can be possible for me,

It can be possible for you.

That was a long one this morning,

Wasn't it?

Anyway,

Lots of love.

Have a wonderful and hopefully stress-free day.

Thank you so much for listening.

There's nothing to do now,

But bring some awareness to how this is working out in your life.

Listen regularly to experience longer and longer periods of calm.

This has been the Calmcast with Claire Downham,

Queen of Calm.

Take care and keep listening.