What Is Stress?

How many times have you complained about stress in your life? What do you mean by the word? Is it the people in your life who drive you crazy—your tyrannical boss, your misbehaving children, your aging parents, your demanding spouse, your gossipy coworkers, or your noisy neighbors? Is it the situations and chaos that you can't seem to get a hold of—maxed-out credit cards, unrelenting housework, long commutes to and from work, or conflicting demands on your time? Or have you gotten to the point where you expect these to be constant factors in your life, and the only things that you label stressful are unexpected disasters: an exploding water heater, the sudden collapse of employer, a debilitating illness, or some other bolt from the blue?
Just click the link below for more information about stress itself.


Perhaps the external factors themselves are not stressful, but instead stress is a response that erupts inside you as you interact with your chaotic world. Stress is the pressure that life exerts on us, and it is also the way this pressure makes us feel. Stress refers to situations and experiences that cause you to feel anxious, frustrated, and angry because you’re pushed beyond your ability to successfully cope. You feel out of balance. It is essentially a state of arousal, involving both the body and the mind. Stress is a process that incorporates both cause and effect, and it has emotional, psychological, behavioral, biological, and physical aspects. No two people are alike. Our unique physical and personality traits and the individual circumstances of our lives ensure that our stressors and the ways that we experience them will be ours and ours alone.


Selye [Dr. Hans Selye, an Austrian scientist working at the University of Montreal in Canada] described stress as a "disease of adaptation" or, more formally "general adaptation syndrome," and he theorized that poor stress adaptation is the basis of many disease states. He explained this as the syndrome of "just being sick." When he exposed rats to various types of stress and then dissected them, he discovered that three physical changes are always present: (1) enlargement of the adrenal cortex (the site where adrenaline is produced); (2) atrophy of the thymus, the spleen, the lymph nodes, and all other lymphatic structures (which are fundamental components of the immune system); and (3) deep bleeding ulcers in the stomach and the duodenum. Selye described three strategies in the general adaptation syndrome: alarm, resistance and exhaustion.

The alarm reaction is characterized by surprise and anxiety and is considered to be a general call to arms (the fight-or-flight response). The adrenal glands secrete hormones, including epinephrine, norepinephrine, and hydrocortisone. This phase occurs quickly and accounts for a phenomenon such as a young and petite mother lifting a car to free her trapped child. Resistance represents the second phase of stress, when the body continues to adapt to and fight the stressor. The fight or flight response has ceased at this point. The adrenal glands are pushed to the edge of capacity, and possibly beyond, in this stage. An individual can respond to and meet the demands of the stress as long as this stage continues. If the adaptive stress is resolved, a rapid return to the resting state can be achieved. The third phase, exhaustion, occurs when an individual can no longer meet the demands placed on him or her due to the prolonged stress. According to Seyle, it is in the third phase where illness can occur.


Here are some concepts about definition of stress:

• Stress is the pressure that life exerts on us and the way this pressure makes us feel.
• Stress is a state of arousal that involves the body and the mind.
• The reflex response to stress evolved from our need as humans to protect ourselves from real physical dangers—the "lions and tigers and bears" of early human history.
• In modern society, our stressors are more likely connected to common events, daily hassles, technology, time constraints, deadlines, and interpersonal communication.
• Stress involves cause and effect. Demands, challenges, or changes cause a series of events that require adjustment. Our thoughts, actions, and behaviors can be considered the effects of these triggers.
• Triggers or causes can be external (the boss, the job, the bad news) or internal (your thoughts and unresolved conflicts).
• Triggers may produce different emotional, behavioral, and psychological responses in each of us.
• Being exposed to a stressor is not the same as being vulnerable to it.
• The stress process involves the mind and the body.
• Stress is in the eye of the beholder.

The stress process incorporates aspects of biology, psychology, coping, and behavior and has three main elements:

1. A stimulus or a stressor that serves as the trigger.
2. A reflex perception, which is unique to each of us and includes coping skills, personality traits, genetics, and so on.
3. A response, of which there are four types: biological, cognitive, behavioral, and emotional. The accumulation of responses determines our general experience of stress. In broad terms, that experience can reflect either healthy adaptation and adjustment or nonadaptive unhealthy responses and conditions.

(Source: Scott, C. J. Optimal Stress - living in your best stress zone. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2010.)

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