What's StressBusting and why Should I Care?

Speed Reading: stress vs laziness

By H. Bernard Wechsler

December 28 2005

How Stress Rules Your Life’s Span, And What You Must Do About it Who Are You? Do you consider yourself a skeptic, a doubter and a ‘contrarian’? Are you a ‘seeker’, focused on a quest for uncommon-knowledge? Dr. Hans Selye, (1907-1982), was the director of the Institute of Experimental Medicine and Surgery, at the University of Montreal. He was a skeptic, doubter and contrarian, and a seeker of scientific knowledge about our life-span. Stress theory or General Adaption Syndrome was his creation – he wrote 39 books, published 1,700 scientific articles, and was nominated for the Nobel Prize ten-times. “Man should not try to avoid ‘stress’ any more than he would shun food, love or exercise… the structural unit of life is the ‘cell’, and the functional unit of life is ‘reaction’….every living being looks-out for itself - first of all.” His research stands for recognizing the nature of the human-lifespan, and its connection with ‘stress-distress-eustress’. His research offers the theory that human life-span is determined by our inherited ADAPTION-ENERGY. Say What? Once-more – our lifespan is ‘primarily’ determined by the amount of our available ‘adaption energy’, and that is OEM – comes from the Original-Equipment Manufacturer – meaning ‘genetic’. Get this – all we know about Adaption-Energy (the decider of our lifespan), is that constant exposure to any ‘stressor’ - uses it up faster. When we lose the power to resist the stressors – disease wins and we cash-in our chips. Consider Adaptive Energy like gasoline in a car’s tank, the faster you drive – 90mph, the more gas is eaten-up. “Life, and all potential disease producers cause enter through distress. Yet stress can only be avoided by dying.” Dr. Selye did not produce a penicillin-cure for stress, nor a do-it-yourself kit to extend our lifespan, but he did write a road-map. What’s Old Millennia before Dr. Selye’s theory of Adaption Energy as the determinate of our lifespan - were Clotho-Lachesis-Atropos – the three mythological Greek goddesses of Fate (Moira). Clotho spins the thread-of-life, her sister, Lachesis – determines the ‘length’ of life, and finally, Atropos, carries the scissors to cut the ‘thread-of-life’. The three sisters of fate present our ‘destiny’. Maybe it is like DNA, the genetic program we enter this life with, and dole-out Adaption Energy a bit of fuel at a time. Today – a variant of Adaption Energy may explain why my fraternity brother, Marshall Altman, died at 23, and the rest of the crew are still kicking a half-century later. He was thin, exercised, and enjoyed life, yet stress depleted his Adaption Energy to exhaustion. But not without a good-fight. What’s Old - is New Again Scientists in Germany, associated with Fulda University, near Frankfurt, Dr. Peter Axt, and Dr. Michaela Axt-Gadermann, offer this theory to those on a quest for a longer-lifespan. See: ‘The Joy of Laziness: how to slow down and live longer.’ “Everyone has a limited amount of ‘life-energy’, and the speed in which it is consumed determines your lifespan.” Too much exercise is bad and being a lazy couch-potato lengthen your years. Really. Here the rationale: Laziness is also important for a healthy immune system because special immune-cells are stronger in times of relaxation (when our Parasympathetic Nervous System is active), than during the daily stress of career and relationships. Free Radicals And the Big Three Don’t quit on me yet – the more active your body the higher the production of the stress hormone - ‘cortisol’ - causing our body to produce a higher level of ‘free-radicals. Diseases are excited by free-radicals – heart disease – cancer and stroke – the Big Three, while during ‘down-time’, (laziness), our ‘metabolism is inhibited, and fewer free-rads are produced. This is science, not science-fiction. What is so debilitating about free-radicals? These unstable oxygen molecules speed up the aging-process, and weaken the immune-system, permitting disease to enter. Life is Choosing – And Laziness is a Legit Choice What so great about laziness? You smile, laugh and giggle more, which produces serotonin, dopamine and endorphins, the pleasure hormones. They excite the immune system, brain and heart, and slow-down the aging-process. For skeptics – please Google-up - the ‘ventral tagmental area’; the ‘nucleus accumbens’, and the production of the neurotransmitter - ‘dopamine’, for activating pleasure. My personal favorite, (I admit to a tendentious nature) – is Googling - the ‘Duchenne’s Smile’, and perusing the research on the positive-affects on our brain-body-emotions - of a ten-second echt – genuine, authentic change of facial expression - to a smile. Change your face, and your choose a new mood, state-of-mind, and attitude toward people, yourself, and circumstances. Prof Paul Ekman – UCSF And Facial Expressions Here’s the secret – when you smile – laugh and giggle with joy - our heat beat races and blood pressure is temporarily raised , but there is no activating of ‘metabolism’ (conversion of biochemical ‘energy’). No metabolism – no production of free- radicals. No free-rads, and there is no wastage of our Adaption Energy. The secret of a healthy, productive life is being “in-sync” between our emotions, brain and body. Stress causes a conflict and desynchronization between our feelings, cognition, and physiology. Consider that we have three (3) distinct, separately functioning brains – because we do! The ‘cranial-brain’ (skull), with its two hemispheres, next, our ‘enteric nervous system’, located in our intestines, and finally our ‘cardio-brain’, located throughout our heart-region. When all three-brains are integrated and entrained – ‘in-sync,’ we are using the optimal amount of gasoline in our physical-mental-emotional vehicle. The more we drive a ‘gas-guzzler’, the more we deplete our Adaption Entergy. Laziness Leads to Longevity Free-radicals come from the stress-of-life, the ‘wear-and-tear’ of functioning in our civilized society. Noise, traffic, conflict with others, and rejection causes our ‘fight- or-flight syndrome to kick-in and not shut-off. Like a dripping-faucet, or a hole-in-the-gas-tank, our Adaption-Energy is seeping-out, and our immune-system weakens, permitting debilitating diseases to enter. It is our ‘fight-or-flight’ reaction on-steroids, which causes stress to deplete our Adaption Energy before our time. Consider conserving energy, by exercising your ‘facial-expression’ by smiling on-purpose for ten-seconds (without-a-reason). This voluntary, conscious ritual affects your emotions, brain and body to relax and function optimally. Ask me about nasal-balancing, progressive-relaxation, and freeze-framing visualization. They take 10 seconds to a couple-of-minutes for healthy stressbusting strategies that permit you to laugh at the marathoners sweating their brains into oblivion, as you stop the aging-process in its tracks. Contrarian Strategies Okay, brisk-walking for a half-hour, three-times a week is nice too, and limiting carbohydrates and concentrating on protein produce a healthy digestion. An exciting-career, being useful, and ‘altruistic-egotism’ – produce more ‘pleasure’ hormones. Focus on increasing your pleasure-quotient and you will be around to celebrate ‘five-score’ years, instead of a lousy ‘three-score and ten’. You have a ‘choice’ between laziness, and letting the media commercials for exercise-machines and diet-pills lead you by the nose to a shorter life-span. This lazy-mutt chooses to visit the nearest couch with a channel-tuner in-my-fist. Check-back with us in ten-years. You-got-the-ball. copyright © 2005 H. Bernard Wechsler www.speedlearning.org hbw@speedlearning.org ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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