A client just asked
"I am wondering why I have good energy for work at the moment, but my body's resilience to stress if very low"
There are many answers to this question and one occurs.
We are built to cope with physical and mental challenge very well. We are great survivors as a species, able to travel vast distances and make good decisions for the sake of our selves and tribes/families.
In terms of health, it seems it is good for us to give ourselves these physical and mental challenges throughout life.
So work and energy for work - that which we find relatively familiar with maybe a few daily challenges -leaves us at our optimum for potential well being.
The unfamiliar or overwhelm - think our ancestors encountering a herd of lions, or having to travel one hundred uncounted for miles - is a different matter. In this case, the nervous system switches into sympathetic mode - fight or flight. The blood is redirected to the muscles and away from the vital organs so that we can run or fight, the body makes no differentiation between wild animals and uncontrollable mountains of paperwork or emails - we want to run! The switch to sympathetic (fight or flight) from parasympathetic (optimum well being)nervous systems is natural and we can usually do it smoothly. Too long is fight or flight and we start to function on less than optimum health.
The switch becomes less easy when the body and mind perceive that the state of 'fight or flight' is itself dangerous. This can happen when people have spent a long time in that state - through war, long periods of overwork, family trauma etc. - and have become ill through so doing. They may have developed fear around stress. Fear of being stressed and resistance to it adds another level of overwhelm. As indeed does fear of being ill - fear closes us down - including our immunity.
Acceptance of the stress state and of our resistance or fear - so that we may self-sooth or change a situation is always a good start and there are many paths to self-knowledge.
If a daily practice of Personal Qigong seems like something which would be helpful then please go to
www.qigongcoach.net
"I am wondering why I have good energy for work at the moment, but my body's resilience to stress if very low"
There are many answers to this question and one occurs.
We are built to cope with physical and mental challenge very well. We are great survivors as a species, able to travel vast distances and make good decisions for the sake of our selves and tribes/families.
In terms of health, it seems it is good for us to give ourselves these physical and mental challenges throughout life.
So work and energy for work - that which we find relatively familiar with maybe a few daily challenges -leaves us at our optimum for potential well being.
The unfamiliar or overwhelm - think our ancestors encountering a herd of lions, or having to travel one hundred uncounted for miles - is a different matter. In this case, the nervous system switches into sympathetic mode - fight or flight. The blood is redirected to the muscles and away from the vital organs so that we can run or fight, the body makes no differentiation between wild animals and uncontrollable mountains of paperwork or emails - we want to run! The switch to sympathetic (fight or flight) from parasympathetic (optimum well being)nervous systems is natural and we can usually do it smoothly. Too long is fight or flight and we start to function on less than optimum health.
The switch becomes less easy when the body and mind perceive that the state of 'fight or flight' is itself dangerous. This can happen when people have spent a long time in that state - through war, long periods of overwork, family trauma etc. - and have become ill through so doing. They may have developed fear around stress. Fear of being stressed and resistance to it adds another level of overwhelm. As indeed does fear of being ill - fear closes us down - including our immunity.
Acceptance of the stress state and of our resistance or fear - so that we may self-sooth or change a situation is always a good start and there are many paths to self-knowledge.
If a daily practice of Personal Qigong seems like something which would be helpful then please go to
www.qigongcoach.net
Comments
Post a Comment