Stress - the biggest enemy of humanity
Most of us are stressed up and we may not be conscious of this!
A large part of humanity suffers from anxiety or stress
Start of the daily battle - The moment you get up, stress agents, like programmed robots or drones, enter into your mind and write at the central white or black board of your mind in dark colors - the things you left unfinished, the forthcoming tense meeting with a customer, the last day for filing tax returns or submitting a document is round the corner; the list is endless. You take a while to sip your morning coffee, slightly leisurely, then the wall clock gives that trigger to get up and get going into the daily battle. You just saw the children getting ready with a facial expression that they are small soldiers with a backpack filled with ammunition and going to their daily battle and the home maker just drops dead on the sofa and heaves a huge sigh of relief after her struggle is over, the eternal and daily, towards dispatching them. With this tension and anxiety filled atmosphere you cannot escape but breathe those extra anxiety through the air. Now you proceed to your own daily battle, you rush to your garage, holding laptop/other bags and fumbling with the keys.. You hit the road or take a public transport system packed with fellows like you. Very few people are fortunate to offload this part of anxiety to their chauffeurs.
Work Place battle -The work place is no peace center either. The assignments and jobs with all kind of challenges are waiting to pounce on you and they literally devour you till that bell chimes (Silently) that your work day is over. The other set of stress aggressors are waiting for this moment to make the first strike. You need to buy a particular book from a particular store or may be you need to discuss with one of the service providers who has not delivered the promised service so far. The list is long.
Back Home another battle -When you reach home something else is sitting in the darkness to give you a surprise. A guest from the wife side is going to arrive in a couple of hours and will be dining with you. Right at the end of the office hours you had planned to watch a favorite program which is no longer possible anymore. So a silent anger joins the stress inside you and they are on a rampage.
The daily cycle to weeks/months/years/decades -The next day is no different. What are we living for!Are we all a prey to this invisible adversary with no hope to overcoming this challenge? Can we change our lives or rather have we tried to make any conscious efforts to change or start exercising greater control on factors which have made our lives look like a daily battle and we are loosing the war, as a very small part of most of our lives are truly filled with peace and happiness. Can a change be made to many lives which are nothing but a pitiable case of existence. The answer is both, yes and no. Most of the people will go through this daily cycle till they fall, literally. But some may turn a new leaf in their lives free from stress. It is possible.
Wandering minds and stress/anxiety
Being unhappy or under anxiety invariably has a mirror - the wandering minds. Which came first, the anxiety or wandering mind? It is difficult to tell but one thing is true that both of them feed on each other. An interesting or wise article in NYT offers agreat insight into this aspect. When the Mind Wanders, Happiness Also Strays By JOHN TIERNEY Published: November 15, 2010
Power your concentration to tame the wandering mind
A vast majority of people in the world, especially belonging to the class of successful people, cannot say for sure that they are happy. The answer to the question, “How is life” is not an emphatic “Fine”. It may start or sound something like “Well, its OK”. It is increasingly being realized that most of the people are suffering from a kind of sickness which is various types of stress and anxiety syndromes. Some have spent or rather wasted decades of their lives suffering from this slow killing disease and the worst part is that they are not even conscious of this. It is especially true to developing world which are growing economically and people are subjected to the same kinds of goals and associated pressures as experienced in developed world. But developed world has a greater awareness on mental sickness and people promptly become conscious of the sickness.
When one starts reflecting on the aspects of anxiety and stress it becomes quite clear that people who are suffering from such syndromes invariably have a wandering mind and they are always into a time horizon which is definitely not the present times where they are in. While in a movie the mind goes back to office issues or while in office the wind escapes to some home issues or some problems of society or the world.
So essentially, over the years the mind has started leaving its desired space i.e. the work or situation it is in at that moment. It may be a result of gradual decline in the interest in life due to various reasons which include family, job or career or many other issues. The anxiety or stress is more likely due to the mind traveling in future situations which seem to be uncomfortable. If you have a tendency to get easily stressed up or get into anxiety try to be conscious as where is your mind. It is in the past or the future.
Bring Back your concentration - So bring back you mind where it belongs, to the present work or moment. How to do it? It is one of the toughest things to do but not impossible. Practice concentration; use your sensory perceptions to the maximum. While working, pay great attention to every thing about the work, the letters you type or write, the paper you handle; the files you sign and most importantly always keep tab on that wild monkey i.e. the mind. Meditations are another source of practice of concentration. Concentrate on movies or serials you watch, the news you read in the newspapers. Concentrate! Concentrate! Concentrate!
The anxiety and stress will start receding if not completely vanishing from your life!
Conclusion ! {It cannot be concluded]!
With my limited understanding of things as I am no authority on psychology or human behavior I have a strong feeling that the seeds of stress/unhappiness/anxiety are sown more often during the child hood period where a poor child gets every material things, at least in the cases of well to do and affluent families but is left hungry when it comes to another need i.e. emotions. Devoid of the right amount of emotions his mind start wandering in search of ways to meet his needs which he fails to get, most of the time. So we can look around and see that a majority of population looks stiff and worried. Happiness is not coming naturally to them. What can b e done. We can in the least try to put people under our influence zone to peace. We can tell them relax. We can rather be conscious of the stress generators for others if not for ourselves.
The biggest beneficiary will be our children when we become conscious of unnecessary stress. We need to prepare them and equip them to face the challenges of life without getting unduly stressed. How is it possible? A million dollar question! And I do not have much of the answer. But a lot depends on you and your stress free mind. Get rid of stressful or anxiety prone mind for the sake of these small bundles of joy, a cornerstone of your life.
We need to help each other
The prevalence of stress and anxiety being a part of character is so high. It is written on most of the faces you encounter at different places i.e. traffic, offices, markets and homes. Who are causing the stress? Most likely another human being demanding something extra or more than what you can do, or somebody's desires you have a responsibility to fulfill. We need to collectively take cognizance of this as a great threat to happiness of mankind. We need to deliberate as a community or race as how to be conscious of this invisible enemy and make efforts to reduce it. It is a herculean task but humans can combine to at least try to reduce the unnecessary stress of another human being in his or her influence zone.
Public Awareness
One can think of societies and groups waging a determined war against anxiety. It can start with bill boards, t-shirt captions, any other means to give the messages like
"Don't rob yourself of your happiness! Smile and energize the surrounding!". "Can you contribute to stress reduction of society? "Be gentle to your subordinates"!
Things like that ... and I should smile to myself and stop for the time being!