Stress Outlet Quotes

Let’s imagine a running washing machine. Let’s imagine the dirty clothes in the machine and how the liquid detergent is getting the dirt out of clothes and draining it to the waste outlet. Now imagine brain surrounded by a large pool of cleaning fluid called CSF (cerebrospinal fluid). Imagine CSF pulling the wastes from inside the brain and draining it into the blood, which routes it to the waste outlets. CSF clears waste many times faster in sleeping brain than in the waking brain.

The subject of one experiment is a rat that receives mild electric shocks (roughly equivalent to the static shock you might get from scuffing your foot on a carpet). Over a series of these, the rat develops a prolonged stress-response: its heart rate and glucocorticoid secretion rate go up, for example. For convenience, we can express the long-term consequences by how likely the rat is to get an ulcer, and in this situation, the probability soars. In the next room, a different rat gets the same series of shocks—identical pattern and intensity; its allostatic balance is challenged to exactly the same extent. But this time, whenever the rat gets a shock, it can run over to a bar of wood and gnaw on it. The rat in this situation is far less likely to get an ulcer. You have given it an outlet for frustration. Other types of outlets work as well—let the stressed rat eat something, drink water, or sprint on a running wheel, and it is less likely to develop an ulcer.

Why do we despise, ostracize and punish the drug addict when as a social collective we share the same blindness and engage in the same rationalizations? To pose that question is to answer it. We despise, ostracize and punish the addict because we don’t wish to see how much we resemble him. In his dark mirror our own features are unmistakable. We shudder at the recognition. This mirror is not for us, we say to the addict. You are different, and you don’t belong with us. Like the hardcore addict’s pursuit of drugs, much of our economic and cultural life caters to people’s craving to escape mental and emotional distress. In an apt phrase, Lewis Lapham, long-time publisher of Harper’s Magazine, derides “consumer markets selling promises of instant relief from the pain of thought, loneliness, doubt, experience, envy, and old age.” According to a Statistics Canada study, 31 per cent of working adults aged nineteen to sixty-four consider themselves workaholics, who attach excessive importance to their work and are “overdedicated and perhaps overwhelmed by their jobs.” “They have trouble sleeping, are more likely to be stressed out and unhealthy, and feel they don’t spend enough time with their families,” reports the Globe and Mail. Work doesn’t necessarily give them greater satisfaction, suggested Vishwanath Baba, a professor of Human Resources and Management at McMaster University. “These people turn to work to occupy their time and energy” — as compensation for what is lacking in their lives, much as the drug addict employs substances. At the core of every addiction is an emptiness based in abject fear. The addict dreads and abhors the present moment; she bends feverishly only towards the next time, the moment when her brain, infused with her drug of choice, will briefly experience itself as liberated from the burden of the past and the fear of the future — the two elements that make the present intolerable. Many of us resemble the drug addict in our ineffectual efforts to fill in the spiritual black hole, the void at the centre, where we have lost touch with our souls, our spirit, with those sources of meaning and value that are not contingent or fleeting. Our consumerist, acquisition-, action- and image-mad culture only serves to deepen the hole, leaving us emptier than before. The constant, intrusive and meaningless mind-whirl that characterizes the way so many of us experience our silent moments is, itself, a form of addiction— and it serves the same purpose. “One of the main tasks of the mind is to fight or remove the emotional pain, which is one of the reasons for its incessant activity, but all it can ever achieve is to cover it up temporarily. In fact, the harder the mind struggles to get rid of the pain, the greater the pain.” So writes Eckhart Tolle. Even our 24/7 self-exposure to noise, emails, cell phones, TV, Internet chats, media outlets, music downloads, videogames and non-stop internal and external chatter cannot succeed in drowning out the fearful voices within.

#25. Valuing Yourself and Your Needs (As a Parent): This is about taking care of your OWN needs as a parent because when you consistently put yourself last to be taken care of and habitually continue to sacrifice your basic necessities to make everyone else happy…Essentially, what you’re teaching your children is that they’re here to be of service to others, then themselves. In other words, you’re teaching them to take advantage of you and use you as they please, which in turn communicates to them that they’re most likely to be used. To prevent this from happening, you need to set consistent limits that protect you from demands that could be overbearing and unfair. That way, you’re communicating that your basic needs are just as important as theirs. It’s true…often times parents that are constantly sacrificing themselves are idealized and praised by other parents. You know… the ones that have no hobbies, no friends and no avenue of enjoyment. Is this really desirable? Parents constantly stressed about the needs of others in the family are usually irritable, and unmotivated to try anything new, fun or exciting. How can parents do this long term with no outlet? Instead, us parents need to enjoy ourselves and focus on being re-energized. When you take good care of yourself, you provide the means to take better care of your children. Going out to dinner or cocktails, trips to the gym 3 or 4 times a week, date night with your spouse or even some alone time reading or going for a walk allows you to be a more productive, interested and patient parent.

An extensive biomedical literature has established that individuals are more likely to activate a stress response and are more at risk for a stress-sensitive disease if they (a) feel as if they have minimal control over stressors, (b) feel as if they have no predictive information about the duration and intensity of the stressor, (c) have few outlets for the frustration caused by the stressor, (d) interpret the stressor as evidence of circumstances worsening, and (e) lack social support-for the duress caused by the stressors. Psychosocial stressors are not evenly distributed across society. Just as the poor have a disproportionate share of physical stressors (hunger, manual labor, chronic sleep deprivation with a second job, the bad mattress that can't be replaced), they have a disproportionate share of psychosocial ones. Numbing assembly-line work and an occupational lifetime spent taking orders erode workers' sense of control. Unreliable cars that may not start in the morning and paychecks that may not last the month inflict unpredictability. Poverty rarely allows stress-relieving options such as health club memberships, costly but relaxing hobbies, or sabbaticals for rethinking one's priorities. And despite the heartwarming stereotype of the "poor but loving community," the working poor typically have less social support than the middle and upper classes, thanks to the extra jobs, the long commutes on public transit, and other burdens. Marmot has shown that regardless of SES, the less autonomy one has at work, the worse one's cardiovascular health. Furthermore, low control in the workplace accounts for about half the SES gradient in cardiovascular disease in his Whitehall population.

Both low socioeconomic status and racial discrimination tap into the same corrosive elements of psychosocial stress, namely lack of control and predictability, lack of coping outlets, and a static system that allows little room for optimism.

Anyone who does not get enough rest and relaxation to enjoy life, who drives him/herself constantly, who is never satisfied or is a perfectionist, who is under constant pressure (especially with few outlets for emotional release), who feels trapped or helpless, who feels overwhelmed by repeated or continuous difficulties, or who has experienced severe or chronic emotional or physical trauma or illness is probably already suffering from some degree of adrenal fatigue.

There could be no greater stress than that generated by denying the authentic self. Because your life energy is being diverted and therefore depleted, you are compromised mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and physically. What about the long-term, cumulative effects of all this? I wasn’t just being dramatic when I said denying who you really are can kill you. In his book Real Age, Dr. Michael Roizen points out that for every year that you live with high stress, you shorten your life expectancy by three years. According to his research, if you don’t have an outlet for your true passion, it costs you another six years. If someone is draining your energy due to constant turmoil and conflict, you lose another eight years.

Release. Engage in rejuvenating activities like yoga and meditation to release stressful emotions and to relax and reset your body, especially if it is tense. Trauma tends to get trapped within the body. Yoga and meditation can be useful outlets to “detox” from the impact of negative situations.

HOW MBS DEVELOPS FROM THE PSYCHOLOGICAL POINT OF VIEW: Childhood and adult stressors trigger feelings of fear, anger, or resentment, which are stored in emotional memory (internal child). Personality traits learned in childhood create a strong sense of duty, self-blame, self-criticism, guilt, and excessive concern for others (internal parent). In situations where people feel trapped by stressful events that trigger emotions from childhood hurts, or feel a conflict between what they want for themselves and what they feel they need to do for others, MBS symptoms are likely to develop, especially if there is no outlet to express these feelings or the feelings are actively suppressed.

I'm not asking for forever, Hayden. Just a chance. You carry so much weight on your shoulders... Let me be an outlet for all that stress, beautiful. I could be your lighthouse if you let me.

Try to gain a different perspective of your negative thinking by looking at it from a new point of view. Use your anxiety and frustration as forces for good by channeling them towards creation. Painting, writing and composing music can act as outlets for your negative thoughts. Take frequent walks in serene environments to relax your mind whenever you feel bombarded by too much negative thinking. Recognize, focus on and be grateful for all the good things you have going for you in your life, no matter how insignificant they may seem. Spend some time in your favorite outdoor and indoor locations where you feel comfortable and relaxed. This can help calm your mind whenever you spiral into negative thinking and overthinking. Exercise in order to give your body an outlet for anxiety and stress. This will relax your body and mind when you feel assailed by negative thoughts. This can be as simple as jogging for a few minutes, climbing some stairs or performing some stretching exercises. Practice deep breathing exercises to release tension in your body and mind whenever you feel overwhelmed by negative thoughts. This helps you to attain some clarity of mind.

Jews still were objects of scorn for those who needed an outlet for their frustrations. However, the decline of the authority of the church, the growth of industry and trade with its stress upon the need for individual freedom, and the social philosophies of men like John Locke all contributed to a greater toleration of the Jews in England.

Professionals don’t know what gives some people a resilient personality,” Dr. Russ said, pacing the classroom. “You can have four people go through something exceptionally traumatic, and one of those people will have a higher resiliency to coping. They won’t turn to drugs or rebel against society, they’ll seek the positive in any given situation. Now the interesting thing is the argument whether resiliency is nature or nurture. Are we born with it, or is it taught to us?” I hung on his every word, half expecting Midge to bound through the door and tell me she had told the professor my life story. He rattled on. “These children usually have strong mentors from a young age that they can build their strength on, they have some kind of talent or outlet they use to channel their frustrations or stress, and they’re intelligent.” He tapped the side of his head. “Scientists and psychologists have been studying the phenomena for decades. Just what makes one child so susceptible to crumbling under situations another one simply rises above?

Moving your body, on the other hand, has been shown to lower inflammation, produce feel-good endorphins, and give your mind a physical outlet for any anxiety or stress you may be suffering. Studies also show that physical activity can cause the brain to grow new neurons and, over time, rewire neural pathways that help stabilize mood and emotions. There’s something else about exercise that often gets overlooked when we talk about physical activity and mental health. When you mix low activity levels with a high-sugar diet—a common combo for most people—the union is like kryptonite for our minds and mood, leading to poor sleep, low-grade panic attacks, and depression

there’s actually nothing wrong with experiencing negative thoughts, emotions, beliefs, and symptoms. I’d argue that it’s human to experience all of those at various times. It’s when those negative emotions get stuck—when they have no outlet—that your body can enter a state of imbalance that may contribute to dis-ease and prevent healing.

Some has been written about the reaction of our forces to the bombing of the “highway to death.” The criticism revolves around the lack of apparent remorse or guilt, and perhaps even bloodlust, at bombing the relatively easy targets. Everybody reacts to the stress of war and life and death decisions differently, and to narrow the image one would construct of an individual to his reaction immediately following the events of any battle is superficial and simplistic. Naval aviators are a strange mix of people—utterly homogeneous in certain respects, particularly to the casual observer, and radically different in their core and substance. Very few naval aviators show honest emotion easily; they’re not supposed to fracture the military bearing that has been instilled in them through years of training and detached experience under the stress of carrier aviation. Anger is the easiest emotion to display because it is the natural, instinctual outlet for stress and fear. But even expressions of anger might be as diverse in their reaction to a common event as physical violence or the mere raising of a voice. Most emotion comes out at the officers’ club, or on liberty in a foreign port, where the beer either softens or heightens aviators’ feelings to the edges of their flexibility, which often is not very far. Virtually all naval aviators are college graduates—some from state colleges, some from the Naval Academy, even a few Ivy Leaguers. This is their greatest obvious commonality—a college degree and mutual survival of the weeding-out process to get where they are in the navy. Many are religious, many are not, and the greatest of the values shared by the men is a trust in their comrades, a dedication to their country, and an absolute focus on their mission. It is exceedingly difficult most times for an outsider to register where a naval aviator is “coming from.” The uniform, the haircut, and the navy-speak contribute enormously to the building of a stereotype. So do the mannerisms of each individual; some express the control of emotion in reserved stoicism, others in an outburst of emotional release through inappropriate laughter or anger. Still others never express emotion at all. But the emotion is there, it has to be; despite years of training and desensitizing to hide the race of the heart and the sickening chill in the stomach, anyone who has landed on an aircraft carrier, never mind fought in a war, knows what fear and exhilarating intensity are.

Once randomly aggressive behavior gets started in an organization, it tends to be contagious, rapidly spreading itself because of a built-in mammalian device for relieving stress, called redirected aggression. Stanford physiologist Robert Sapolsky describes it this way:“Numerous psychoendocrine studies show that in a stressful or frustrating circumstance, the magnitude of the subsequent stress-response is decreased if the organism is provided with an outlet for frustration. For example, the [glucocorticoid] secretion triggered by electric shock in a rat is diminished if the rat is provided with a bar of wood to gnaw on, a running wheel, or, as one of the most effective outlets, access to another rat to bite.

As explained in the first chapter, human beings are physically hardwired to constantly move about and exercise. Every day, we build up a lot of stress, and physical exercise provides an outlet to get this out of our system so we can stay healthy. In the modern world, our stress is exacerbated by our incessant consumption of negative news and by rapid changes in our culture and norms. Negativity and confusion add stress to the body. Exercise will help manage this by releasing neurotransmitters, called endorphins, into our body to manage our response. Exercise temporarily mimics the fight-or-flight response that you may feel when you are stressed. But in the long run, it will help calm and de-stress you. Endorphins help calm your responses and ultimately result in removing the built-up stresses from our lives. Studies have shown that people experience positive changes after just one or two cardio sessions. Exercise will also help you sleep, which is directly correlated with lower stress and anxiety.3 Exercise