Mindset Monday - Path to Stress

This is episode 179 of the Empowered Team Podcast.

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Welcome to the Empowered Team Podcast, where we explore how to optimize your performance in career, sport and life. And now your host, executive coach and life strategist, Kari Schneider.

Welcome to my mindset Monday. This is going to be the topic is the path to stress. And the path to stress is so important. It isn't just the stress. I think of it as this line and then this kind of explosion in our lives of something that's become very stressful. And we all are going to have this as part of our lives. So stress, the thing about stress is that it is a state just like excitement, just like sleep. It is a physiological state that can be measured. And I love that about this because there's so much science around it that tells us so much. There's a beginning, a middle and end to stressful states, and we can learn so much about that when it's researched. So that's how this topic came to be is a neuroscientist was speaking about different things in regards to stress, but talked about the path to stress and how it matters. And, and it had me put into context a lot of things very differently. Instead of thinking of the stressful events, but rather thinking of what led up to that event, how the person was leading up to that event, and how that makes a difference for them. So when we look at chronic stress, the reason that this path before and after a stressful event is so important because if we're not able to deal with a stressful event, then chronic stress is really a massive problem for us as a society, for our healthcare system, because chronic stress leads to all sorts of things that are physically and mentally detrimental to our lives. So when we look at what a stressful event is, some of the top ones are loss of a loved one, moving been through that, been through, loss of a loved one, very, very stressful events, loss of a job, a work deadline within your job, the stressors that the job brings upon us, the deadlines, the stressors we put upon ourselves. If we're our own business owners. Those kind of deadlines, the launches, that kind of thing, unexpected change in our lives, those are all top stressors that people are dealing with day in and day out. So when this happens to the body, the body produces larger quantities of our hormones, these chemicals, these cortisol, epinephrine, norepinephrine. And they're triggering kind of these responses that look like increased blood pressure, heightened muscle tension, even that stress you feel in your neck and in your traps, this increased tonic muscle, this, this tone, this muscle tone that's going on for being prepared to be able to act in danger. That's why you've got this increased muscle tension, you've got sweating, you've got alertness. And it's all there for a reason. It's all there so that we could deal with the potential hazard that this stress is in our lives. Some challenging situation. It brings us faster heart rate, we've got the blood pressure that's up, but also our breathing speeds up, our digestive system slows down, our immune activity can increase, but then over prolonged stress will decrease. We have sleep, sleeplessness increases or sleepiness decreases because we have this heightened state of alertness. So I want you to consider something. There's these stressful events, but consider two people in the exact same stressful event. And I'm going to use this as an example, the example of caring for a loved one who is aging or elderly. The reason I'm using this example is because I've experienced some of this in our life, my husband and my lives. And also I've seen it in about.

Four different clients lives and loved ones lives very recently.

So consider that you've got two people, they're both caring for a sick or aging loved one and they each have extra challenges that are present because of it. Financial stressors, extra appointments, emotional strain, the uncertainty, all of that is coming on both of these people. Yet one of the people believes that it is part of their journey and has consciousness consciously chosen to take the care, take on the care to take that duty. While the other believes that this isn't fair and their life is really becoming miserable because of the extra demand. So the circumstance, the scenario for both people is very, very similar. And they're both in the stressful situation. And yet their beliefs leading up to what's culminated in a stressful situation makes a huge difference on their experience of life and their ability to handle the stress and their ability to get over the stress. It is night and day, if you think about it. Who will overcome the challenge of caring for this aging loved one, and who will become resentful and ultimately carry more stress over their lifetime. The person who believes that it's not fair, the person who believes that they're doing something they don't want to do, the person who believes that this is a miserable situation is going to take on more stress. And they likely had on the path to that stress, on the path to caring for that person, they likely had more stress or more challenges with their view of the world in the first place. So when I heard about when the path to stress matters, it caused me to ponder all sorts of scenarios instead of looking at the stress context, but instead looking at the context of life before the stress came about in order for that person to have the ability to manage every type of stress. So I want to back up for just a second and look back at those stressors, those stressors of a loss of a loved one, the stressors of looking at moving, the loss of a job. Consider that when someone has lost a family member or someone they care about, when that person has a view of the world or the path leading up to that event, they believe that every moment with their loved ones is a gift versus something that's owed to them. When they believe that, then the stressor of losing the loved one is still stressful, but it's not as pervasive and it's not going to become as chronic. When they have the ability to grieve and embrace the process and have this context or this path into this stressful event, this view of the world that has them believe that just the fact that they had this loved one was a gift in the first place. It was never something that was owed to them. Same thing when you look at moving, you look at that context leading into it, appreciating all of the parts that could be amazing about moving. I started to tell myself in moves that I couldn't wait for the setup. I couldn't wait to be able to set things up the way I wanted to. And it had me anticipating this thing that I thought was really fun, which was setting up after moving, setting up everything the way I wanted to. And that anticipation or that belief system, that context of a stressful event, allowed me to get through the parts that were really challenging, that were really hard, that would have really been major setbacks, but allowed me to get through it in a way of anticipating the part that I loved and focusing on the part I was looking forward to instead. So the path to stress matters. Same thing when you look at a loss of a job now, this can be something that is to many very problematic. Some would even term it as devastating. Some would call it horrible in their life or a life changing event. But what if it was a life changing event that opened up so many new opportunities? What if that was the view of the world before the stressful event happened? Or what if the view of the world was that change can be a good thing? Then the person who has the same stressful event as the person who believes that it's devastating is going to have a completely different experience of the stress. We're all dealing with the stressors. What about the work deadline? Even if it was self imposed, when you look at that deadline, even though there is going to be some stress around it, but you realize and embrace that every part of leaning into that deadline is still part of your life. So are we going to throw it down the toilet and be completely miserable leading into something that we find stressful? Or are we going to see it as part of the path? And yes, there's going to be these dots of stress along the way or the unexpected change that we're all going through, embracing the growth that is possible instead of seeing change as an awful thing. Yes, it's a stressor, but also what is possible. So here's the truth that I really want to impart part to you and that is that life isn't going to go the way we want it to. Sometimes it will, but it certainly won't all of the time. And life isn't always fair. We're not always going to get what we want in this big scenario called life. However, when we're viewing it along the way as this timeline that's going to have these dots of stressors and we know that they're going to come and we know that they're going to be there, then the path that we bring into it is going to be so important for our experience of that stress, for our ability to get over that stress, for our ability to not have chronic long term problematic stress in our future. And I like to put in front of you a tool, a tool that is the epitome of the path to stress and it's the tool of breathing and specifically WIM HOF breathwork. When we go into this type and you can look up what a whole rounds or sequence of a WIM HOF sequence looks like, look that up, try it out. But that is a challenge to stress the nervous system, to stress the body in a controlled manner and the path to that stress, that physiological stress that you experience in a wim hof scenario, that path getting there is so important because we're intentionally doing something that we know is going to be purposeful, that we know is going to bring us alertness and readiness and focus, and that we know is going to be good for us. So even though we physiologically put this stress upon our body, the path of getting there, that context, the view of it is so important because we realize that we are putting that stress upon ourselves, that we are then challenging our body to be able to tolerate a greater physiological stress so that we can handle those feelings. When we feel the same thing in other life stressors, when we feel the heart rate coming up, when we feel the breath rate coming up, or maybe even the blood pressure or the muscle tension or whatever it is because something has stressed us, then we can tolerate more and be able to use this mechanical thing, this breath work, to manage it instead of having it run rampant in our lives. Exercise is the same thing. Exercise is a physiological stressor that produces the same things that our unwanted stressors produce. Produce. And yet it's a good thing for us because the path to it is that we are doing something that we know has a beginning, a middle and an end. We know it's going to do certain things to our body and those things cause us to become more resilient to the outside world and the things that come our way in life, in aging, in stressors that come. So the path to stress really matters. All of that context is something that's within your control to view your view of the world. Your view of the situation is the path to stress. Your view of it is going to be the thing that dictates whether it's going to be manageable or something you can overcome or something that's going to be long term and miserable. So bring that into your world today. In this week. Take a look at how you're viewing things so that you can manage your path to stress, your context. So when the stressors come, because they will, then you can handle it, you can get over it, you can overcome it, because you've got the view of the world that's going to support that. So have a beautiful rest of your day. Try this on. Check out how you are viewing your context into these stressful events that are likely going to come or you might be experiencing right now so that you can handle them in a way that's taking on your personal power so that you're not feeling out of control or that it's not fair or that it's happening to you instead of you choosing your life. Have a beautiful rest of your week. If you're not already in our Empowered Team Coaching Group, I invite you in. It is a powerful excitement experience and it has you experiencing your life within your own power. Have a wonderful rest of your week, everyone. Happy Fall.

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