No pressure, no diamonds. No mud, no lotus.

“How do you bear the full weight? 

How does the long way feel?

Kneading your hands too tight against the wheel?” 

(From the song, Phoenix by Big Red Machine)

 “In short, emotions are tunnels. If you go all the way through them, you get to the light at the end. Exhaustion happens when we get stuck in an emotion.” (From the book, Burnout; The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Emily Nagoski and Amelia Nagoski.)

I think there is some collective burnout going on. (If I said this out loud someone would likely respond, no shit). 

The burnout that happens when stress is ongoing, lingering, or to use one of my favorite words, lurking, is different than acute stress which we are more adept at dealing with. Fight, flight, freeze or tend and befriend are all ways our body copes with stress.

The impact of the past two years is taking a toll on our collective psyche. I mean what is going on up in the air? I feel for flight attendants right now. I try my best to smile, not put my trash in the back seat pocket and hand it over in a gracious and timely manner - I don’t want to piss anyone off while I’m flying.

The good news is, that it’s not all bad. If we are taking the upheaval as time to reevaluate and reassess what is working in our lives and what isn’t, what we can change and what we can’t, then the challenge becomes an opportunity for growth.

It is helpful too to remember that we are made to encounter stress. Just like our bones need weight bearing exercise to stay strong, we need stress to stay resilient.

But how we handle and respond to the chronic, lingering, lurking kind of stress matters much more to our well being then the stress itself.

For one, we can prioritize our needs.

What do you need right now to feel secure, healthy, and strong? It’s most likely totally different than what the people next to you need.

And it doesn’t matter if it makes sense to them. 

For instance, I get overstimulated easily. I love art museums for 25 minutes and then I feel dizzy. I can’t be out all the time. I like my couch, candles, and blankies. The horn at the hockey game or a blower in the yard can send my nervous system into a complete tizzy. I need naps! I’m a highly sensitive person. You get the gist. 

What is your “horn” ? Can you limit those triggers?

What makes you feel rested, relaxed, and supported?

Where and how can you ask for help, what would lighten your load?

Is there anything you can remove from your plate so you have more time for what truly matters to you? 

We can also actively practice dealing with stress when things aren’t particularly stressful.

For instance, daily rituals like pausing and breathing, writing what you’re grateful for, stretching, praying, and labeling our emotions are help to build a resistance reserve. We can go to therapy, take our medicine if we need to, and be proactive about our mental and emotional health now. We learn to say no, to have boundaries, to rest.

When things are smoother is when we need to engage in these helpful practices so when things aren’t, we have strong muscles in place to help us do the heavy lifting. Imagine the pain and aggravation your back would feel if you one day just got up and tried to pick up a huge box when you haven’t moved much for weeks. Chances are you would feel it.

Adam Grant’s posted this recently about the holidays and burnout: “The holidays shouldn’t be a time to recharge. They should be a time to celebrate. If work is exhausting people to the point that they’re using their time off to recover, you might have a burnout culture. A healthy organization doesn’t leave people drained in the first place.” This struck a chord. 

Lastly, and maybe most importantly, remember that the stressor and the stress are two different beasts. This point is reiterated often in the book, Burnout, and it really has impacted how I look at stress these days.

We need to deal with both; the stressor and the stress. Even when we remove the stressor (No more walking on eggshells in front of you, Mr. So and So) we still have to process the accumulated stress in our bodies, minds, hearts and souls. Mr. So and So may be gone but the way he made us feel is very much alive in our bodies and we’re still ruminating about it.

Essentially, stress requires us to do something about it. 

We know ignoring a problem or brushing it under the rug does nothing other than cause more shit to clean up later. 

So we can move with it. We can take a walk, shake our arms and hands, have a dance party, maybe a romp in the hay should you be so lucky, run our bottoms off on the treadmill while listening to loud 80’s music. (Sound specific? I did this recently when having a bad day. After I wrote, cried while watching a shmaltzy movie, and then listened to Buffalo Stance at the gym – I felt purified and wrung out in a good way)! 

Talk about it if that feels right with someone you love and trust and won’t say annoying and trite things like the sun will come out tomorrow. 

The other night, for example, I was feeling down in the dumps. Blame it on my period arriving or the full moon, or some other heavy stuff in the universe which can feel like hailstones of spit hurtling from Voldemort’s mouth. I texted a friend asking if she could listen to me be sad for a minute. She agreed to pick up the phone when I called. I cried and she listened lovingly, said some very smart things and then, voila, I felt heard, understood, and able to go on with my night instead of staying stuck in the sadness like thick imposing quicksand.

And crying is such a completely sacred and healing release. Tears are a wonderful blessing. What an incredible mechanism in our bodies that allows us to relieve stress and so efficiently. I used to be embarrassed by tears, now I know better.

Try tapping! Use your fingertips to apply light pressure like little rain drops falling on your cheeks, jaw, forehead, chest. It feels great, relieves stress, and helps you focus. 

Writing about how I am feeling is one of my favorite ways to address and diminish the stress I feel. Just let it out. Stream of consciousness. Pen to paper, write, write, write, not letting my pen off the page. Don’t judge, just get it out. 

What would you say out loud if you could? What do you need to get off your chest? Write what you would like to say but can’t to the person that wronged you. 

We’ve all got stress. And we all have to deal with it. The only way to do this is to feel it all so you can heal it all. That sounds dumb and corny but it’s true. We can be honest with ourselves and others about how we are feeling and what we need because…

We must go through the tunnel so we can get to the light.