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Section: Being Well
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Toby Laping
Ph. D., C.S.W.,
Private Care Manager
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The Stress of Life
By Toby Laping, Ph. D., C.S.W.,
Private Care Manager
At last the holidays are over and the chaos and rush of that time of the year should be quieting down. I feel a sense of relief. The to-do list should get back to manageable size and the guilt that I feel for not doing enough should be packed up and put away for a bit. I can stop feeling that things are out of control. Stress levels can return to overwrought rather than being out of sight. I know that I’m not alone when I feel that life is chaotic enough without adding the seasonal obligations that it’s hard not to feel.
Our lives are endlessly stressful even though it’s probably worse around the holidays. We know perfectly well that stress is bad. It’s directly related to high blood pressure and heart disease, it has a bad impact on our digestive tract and on our sleep, and it even affects our ability to remember. Some stress may be good. It keeps us alert and motivated, but there’s a lot of distance between “some” and “overdone” and the latter is more typical of most of us.
Your life, like mine, is undoubtedly filled with too much to do in too little time. Why do we allow ourselves to get into this morass? I frequently feel that I have things reasonably well under control and that I’m doing okay with all that’s on my plate, but then I do something genuinely foolish and I know that it’s time I restructured my life and reconfigured my time.
My husband recently made a commitment for both of us, after we both put our calendars together and agreed on a date. Subsequently, I made an irrevocable commitment for me on the same evening. That gave me pause. I retraced my steps and know what I did wrong. After he and I spoke, I was in a big hurry so I didn’t take the time to find my date book and write it down. I just thought I’d remember, without acknowledging the fact that our obligation would undoubtedly slip my mind. I’ve told myself I’ll never let that happen again, although of course I know I will the next time I’m in a hurry.
Husband’s solution is for me to get a palm pilot so that it’ll always be with me and I can easily jot in it. The trouble is that the idea of learning how to use that feels like too much effort and energy when I haven’t any excess energy to spare. My solution is to cross my fingers and hope I’m more committed to remembering next time.
I had a conversation the other evening with a woman who has made a major change in her lifestyle. She decided that she would do what she wants to do and she would put away the other “shoulds” in her life. She considers whether potential obligations will fit into her schedule, whether they will serve her or others well if she follows through, and whether she has the energy to do the quality of work she expects of herself. And, she is very happy. Perhaps wisdom is knowing when to say “enough.” But I don’t have that kind of wisdom. Most of us probably don’t. We just keep on doing as we’re doing, stressing ourselves too much, and wishing we could convince ourselves to wind down a bit.
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