I’m sitting here at work feeling the stress of the day grow inside of me and I’m trying to decide wether to fight-or-flight, that is the question. I can not physically fight work and if I flee I will not get paid money which will eventually lead to a whole lot of other problems and stressors. So, what to do? With a completely different set of rules to stress in our modern day world, what does it mean to fight and when do we decide to take flight? With no apparent clear cut answers I wanted to examine this query under a magnifying glass to see if I can’t get some clarification.
fight-or-flight: relating to, being, or causing physiological changes in the body (such as an increase in heart rate or dilation of bronchi) in response to stress - Merriam-Webster Dictionary
stress: : a state of mental tension and worry caused by problems in your life, work, etc. : something that causes strong feelings of worry or anxiety. : physical force or pressure. - Merriam-Webster Dictionary
THE ORIGINAL LION
We have all heard of the analogy to fight-or-flight when facing a lion. You basically have two choices, either to fight the lion or to run as fast as you have ever run in your life away from the lion. This is an excellent example of what the fight-or-flight response was built for. Thinking of the response in this way is really simple. When faced with a dangerous situation the brain sends signals to the body to create the proper hormones to prepare yourself for survival, from there all you have to do is choose to fight-or-flight. This type of stress is natural and normal and meant to keep us safe, alive, and healthy for another day. When faced with the natural form of this stress it protects us and is usually short lived. Once the threat is over our bodies return to a un-stressed state so we can relax and heal. If the human body continues to create a stress response over a prolonged period of time it will begin to breakdown and eventually meet its demise. We simply can not maintain a high or an acute amount of stress over a long period of time. This is exactly what us modern day city dwellers face today, everyday. This is a new kind of lion.
THE MODERN DAY LION
I almost never see an actual lion while I’m drinking my morning coffee heading off to work in my electric car. Almost never. Okay, I never see an actual lion and I don’t own an electric car (yet) but I do encounter stress on an everyday basis. I live in Los Angeles so you can multiply the stress level times 1000… at least. That being said, most of our society today experiences some type of this modern day stress as well, no matter where you live. Wether you are sitting in traffic, working long hours, paying bills, waiting in long lines, you are most likely pulling out your hair or causing an increased amount of wrinkles in your forehead. Your brain is sending signals to your body to activate the stress response for fight-or-flight, but how do you fight or flee from these type of stressors?
FIGHT OR FLIGHT OR BOTH
If we choose to fight we’re going to be arrested by the local police department and thrown in jail, if we choose to flee we will have to build a cabin in the woods and live off the land and even then we might be building on private land, which is unlawful and we would be trespassing, then we would be arrested and thrown into jail. Either way jail is not an option for most of us, so what do we do? We can redefine the definition to fight-or-flight. We are fighting and fleeing from a different type of lion these days so we need to change the way we view this reality. We can still fight and we can still flee. The way I define this for myself is by choosing to refresh on a regular basis. By refreshing myself and clearing the energy of stress I am both fighting and fleeing from it at the same time, with a desired result of reduced stress and optimal healing and happiness.
REFRESH FROM STRESS
What makes you feel well? When do you feel well? Where do you feel well? With whom do you feel well? Then ask yourself, why? The answers to these questions will reveal the way you need to reduce acute stress in our modern world. It will most likely be pretty obvious but the most important thing to realize is that you are well, and when you are well, you will be stress free. You will be actively fighting and fleeing from this modern day lion that we all encounter on an every day basis. And now, you are a true modern day stress fighting warrior.