Stress isn't only coming from what's happening.
Yes, something happens.
A conversation doesn't go the way we hoped.
Someone disappoints us.
The future suddenly feels uncertain.
And almost immediately, our mind gets to work.
What am I going to do now?
What if this gets worse?
I can't handle this.
What does this mean about me?
The event is one thing.
Then there are all of our thoughts about the event.
And often, that's where so much of our stress lives.
No one likes feeling stressed. It's uncomfortable. We feel it in our bodies. And when it hits, it seems to know exactly where to go.
Naturally, we want relief.
And there are plenty of ways to find it. Some are helpful. Others, not so much.
But even when we find relief, it doesn't always last.
Because while we've learned ways to feel better, we haven't necessarily learned to understand what's happening within us.
And I think that's where the opportunity lies.
Life will continue to bring storms. That much we can't change.
But we can change our relationship with those storms.
And when we begin to understand what's happening within us, something shifts.
We become less consumed by the struggle and more capable of meeting it.
The goal isn't to stop the wind.
It's learning how to keep our feet planted when it blows.
Over the next few weeks, I'm going to be writing about stress. Why it grabs hold of us, the patterns we get caught in, and how we might learn to work with it differently.
You may even see a podcast episode or two!
You can check that out here: The Restless Achiever
I'll also explore something that might seem counterintuitive.
What if stress, rather than simply being something to overcome, could actually help us grow?