Dealing with Stress

Objectives

• To understand the biological basis of stress
• To derive a common notion of meditation
• To be able to apply meditative techniques
• To have realistic expectations of both stress and meditation

Common notions of Stress

• Unhealthy
• Destructive
• Signs of mental imbalance
• Sign of weakness

What biology tells us

• Stress is a physical, mental, or emotional factor
• That causes physical or mental tension
• Biologically it can be positive, negative or neutral
• Our success as a species depends on how we adapt to stress
• This is partially why we thrive in different climates.

Why is stress now seen as negative?

• Our bodies have adapted to physical stress
• This "fight or flight" response is poorly fitted to modern life
• We try to influence things with our minds
• But our wiring affects the body

Modern Society has turned an evolutionary technique that has been widely advantageous into a liability

Why does it say paper jam

This does not only happen to humans

• This is a Kakapo
• It lived for centuries without natural predators
• Had no sense of fear, gave up flight
• And reproduced rarely
• Then man came. There are 150 left

There may be an old solution to this problem

Adolph Bastian

• German ethnologist
• Introduced "elementary ideas"
• Introduced "folk ideas"
• These ideas were the basis of Jungian psychoanalysis
• Died in Port of Spain

The basic notion of meditation

• Is an elementary idea
• Expressed differently in different traditions
• But it is archetypal
• Shared by all societies
• And can be instrumental in dealing with stress

What exactly is meditation?

• With all the cultural trappings
• Ceremony, ritual and tradition
• It is hard to uncover the elementary idea
• From its cultural inflections
• Especially if it is not our own culture

Alan Watts

Untitled Slide

"The art of meditation is a way of getting into touch with reality, and the reason for it is that most civilized people are out of touch with reality because they confuse the world as it with the world as they think about it and talk about it and describe it."
-Alan Watts

How we think

• ..talk and describe the world
• Can provoke a response to stress
• That is not always appropriate
• Meditation weakens that provocation
• By widening the space between thoughts

Basic Meditative Techniques

Active listening

• Listen to the sounds around you
• Focus on the vibration hitting your ear
• If they provoke thoughts just observe them
• Ignore meaning and focus just on sound
• If your mind insists on meaning treat that as sound

Follow your breath

• Observe your breathing
• Do not try to actively change it
• Just focus on breathing
• If thoughts arise treat them as breath
• If you stray gently return to your breath

Use of sound

• Either mentally or physically...
• Repeat a sound
• The meaning is irrelevant
• Just focus on the sound
• Consider thought as just a mental sound

Getting started

• Find a quiet, comfortable spot
• Set aside one minute
• Sit in a comfortable but alert posture
• Try any of the previous techniques
• After the minute slowly reacquaint yourself to your surroundings

Contemplate the experience

• Keep a journal
• How do you feel?
• Tension? Nervous?
• This does not mean you're doing it wrong
• On the contrary you are bringing your stress into focus

What now?

• It is a practice
• There is really no ultimate goal
• All it does is focus your awareness
• Over time that undoes your automatic response
• To unexpressed stress

Conclusion

• Stress is natural and essential
• We have biological ways of dealing with it
• Ways that now are not always appropriate
• Meditation is a therapy that can help
• In dealing with unresolved stress responses