Meditation in many traditions (specially in Buddhist and Daoist) were supposed to be the extremely difficult, demanding paths to enlightenment that wasn't considered realistic for most people to pursue...now we are told to practice it just to cope with reality. 😐
enlightenment is far from coping with reality. it's an arduous practice that demands hours of daily practice. (well not actually, enligtenment should not be sought or youll never find it )
@@transsexual_computer_faeryenlightenment is near the start of the process for the monks. That we in the West tend to think it's the endgame says a lot.
Nah meditation was common in household life in even before the time Buddhism began just enlightenment is sped up by a more specialized lifestyle aka living like a monk but you can still get a lot of benefit just meditating as a householder layperson. Also it is to help with sharpening the mind so you could attack what is causing you suffering at the root well at least by Buddhism standards.
@@CubesAndPortalsI like the way you put this. I've been studying advaita vedanta and it's been really helpful in managing expectations, stress, knowing why a certain things is either stressing me out or making me want to indulge in it, etc. Enlightenment is a goal, sure, but at least for the texts and teachers I've been learning from, it is important not to focus so much on it that we spiritually bypass life
HR is their for you if you are uncomfortable because of someone else, not if you're stressed from your job. HR handbook: "We are the type to smile at you, while also firing you." They just there to keep the company from being sued by tricking people, into thinking they're there to listen to other's problems.
+1! The Holistic psychologist talks a lot about fawn in her book “How to Be the Love You Seek.” People pleasing is fawning and a response to nervous system activation
It was bothering the hell out of me when he said that that couldn't remember the answer as an ASD person who was a people pleaser (fawner) all the way up til the very late ASD diagnosis. Thanks
At first I thought, "This vid is timely," because I'm really stressed right now. But then I realized, "This vid is timeless," because the stress never flippin' stops.
I work essentially as a social worker. And it’s getting increasingly difficult to convince myself that the buckets i’m using to take water out of the sinking Titanic are worth investing my time into. Every now and then I have a youth whose life i’ve saved, but it’s usually at my own expense or before a worse problem rears its ugly head. The dystopian nightmare never ends, but we rather hold on to hope than to face the futility of our daily routine. It reminds me of the book Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. The horror of what we’ve done as a society is so normalized that we can’t even see it as such.
Saw public space vanish significantly from my Uni campus as it expanded. We used to have fire pits, and a volleyball court, an arcade. As the campus grew, all those spaces were crushed for more lecture hall space, lockers, and offices. Over my time at the campus, it tripled in student size, but you'd only be able to tell between classes in cramped hallways because all the gathering spaces were effectively eliminated.
I feel that with my town, it's filled with packed housing areas, and 15 min business sections. With no loitering everywhere. So unless ya got money to spend. They're really nothing to do outside. So just spending all my time inside like a good citizen.
I remember being kind of shocked from reading The Upside of Stress over how many of the studies on stress that are touted in the news were based on animals being forced to the edge of death.
Literally everything about surviving in this society is stressful. Even the most mundane tasks have become complicated. The future becomes less certain with every day that passes and no meaningful/needed societal change occurs.
According to a guest on the You Are Not So Smart podcast, there is no good amount of stress. He made a pretty good point: Have you ever seen an expert, someone at the top of their field, performing at their best? They're not stressed. They're in flow.
@cadesmandela1935 I don't understand what you mean by "broken." All five of these responses are natural, evolutionarily rational, and common throughout the animal kingdom. "Fight or flight" was a limited and overly simplistic conception of what is actually a wide range of survival instincts. Would you care to elaborate what makes any of the other Fs inferior to Fight and Flight?
I would like to submit "Fart" to the list of survival responses. Consider the skunk, the squid, or the bombardier beetle releasing a noxious substance as a predator deterrent, and compare this to the human tendency to release the bowels under extreme acute stress.
Yeah the last 3 years of my work life were so stressful for no reason, I had basically a break down and had to quit working. Therapy helped and spent a year volunteering but now I'm looking for a new job and I'm very worried about going through another abusive situation
I went through the same. The breakdown caused issues that got me fired from 4 jobs in the span of a year. I'm in therapy and on a host of meds now, but living with my parents is also stressful. They don't understand me when I talk about it. They're actively looking to push me back out of the nest and become self-sufficient again. I'm not sure I can be anymore, not just due to my isues, but the economy as well. I can't afford a one bedroom apartment in the city I live in, and all of my friends live hours away. It's all contributing to me feeling trapped, which is stressful.
Good luck! But the only sure way to avoid being fucked over by the top is becoming the top yourself. Or at least being a part of a group with a flat hierarchy!
I 100% agree with the final statement about stress. Companies tend to ignore humans and see that they can use their stress, sadness, or depression as a way of income for their pockets. It sickens me; I wish there were systems in line to take down corporations that take advantage of people and their depression and anxiety.
I have CPTSD and severe chronic anxiety/depression issues. It got so bad that I essentially bailed on normal society and took a job working waaay out in the mountains in the middle of nowhere. I live and work on a remote property, alone for over 6 months a year with the boss here for a few months at a time once in awhile. My job is extremely labor intensive and dangerous. I'm out here alone working with the kinds of tool that will maim you if you look away for a second too long. I also operate heavy machinery. If I get injured, there's no cell service and the closest hospital is two hours away. I'm in the most danger I've ever been in my entire working life. And, I couldn't be happier! My stress is way lower and my mental and physical health is the best it's ever been. Regardless of the risks, which also include bears and mountain lions, I'm actually happy for the first time I can recall. Society has gotten so bad and stressful and uncertain that I'm happier being completely away from everything even though I could possibly die out here and be eaten by the property dogs long before anyone even realizes somethings amiss! I live in a freaking fifth wheel in the middle of nowhere and I'm happier than I think I'd be in a mansion in a city. I actually like the person I am out here. Never thought being a literal mountain hermit was my path to contentedness, but here we are. Also if everything explodes I'm up here with my garden and a river I can pull fish out of and a ton of deer to hunt!
The fourth F is Fawn; where you look to appease the trigger almost like a dog presenting its stomach as a show of submission. It can look like the other 3 sometimes but it essentially boils down to appeasement.
11:23 Mexico, 37, stressed out of my mind, panic attacks from time to time, diagnosed with dysthymia, and my head's background music is intrusive thoughts about unaliving myself... so, yeah, there's the data for your study. Sorry if I overshared.
You're not alone. I'm turning 30 tomorrow and am still dealing with childhood trauma and chronic stress (for 10isch years). There is always someone out there who needs YOU. Please don't off yourself. You have a bigger impact than you know. It's a fact for everyone unless you've been in the gulag for 20 years and everyone already thinks you're dead.
31, some people call me jeffrey dahmer, and make jokes how I'm not in prison yet. All I wanna do is not feel so stressed all the time, but nothing to do. Lol. I remember I went to a bar last year and meet up with a bunch of dudes from H.S. They thought I was dead, even though I posted on facebook a bunch. I don't think anyone NEED'S me, besides work but they even wanna get me fired. So. Been wishing I was never born since 5. Nothing to do about it, besides work, and work, and save, and work more, and maybe not end up homeless.
I had this strange foot rash a few summers ago from my socks having gotten contaminated during laundry. It was right round the monkeypox scare so I was lowkey freaking out that it wasn't improving even though i had tried burn/rash cream, then fungal cream and nothing was working. 2 weeks in I decided to go to the emergency room and my BP was something like 17/12 or something and the intern was kinda worried and I was a few seconds away from AES but the resident nurse just said regular check up. The nurse that saw me literally looked at my feet for 10 minutes, told me to use hydrocortisone cream which I brought in myself, was the last thing i bought to try but hadn't used yet and she said try it for a week and come back for a checkup in 60 days. The $7 dollar cortisone cream fixed my foot as directed and I went in for my check up with no further issues. 1300 dollar medical bills for two visits where i was given no prescription nor medicine and instructed to use the cream I had purchased BEFORE coming to the hospital. That's enough to raise anyone's blood pressure man.
Call them and say you don’t have the money and get an itemized bill. Watch how much stuff disappears. It’s wrong that we have to say hey you’re overcharging me for them to not do it.
Doctors in America are painfully useless and won't even do most tests unless they feel it's necessary. Want to get checked for cancer? No you don't apparently
I'm 52. I have been constantly stressed since I started to give a shit about my education. That was about 3 years into my 5 years of college. Constant stress isn't new. It may be different, but I don't think it is new. Though my anxiety about and the rush to arrive at Dr appointments only raises my BP to pre-medication concerns. So, I might be wrong. Oh, and I went to a private college and still paid off all of my student loans within 6 months of graduating. Working for minimum wage (4.25/hour) in a restaurant. So, yeah, I didn't have that stress. I never imagined thinking I'd rather be 50 than 20, but yeah... you people have it hard. Really hard.
To reduce immediate stress: ● Do a Deep Breathing Exercise (ex: Box Breathing, Cyclic Sighing) ● Do Progressive Muscle Relaxation To reduce baseline stress, do the following or above daily: ● Do Mindfulness Meditation ● Exercise (Daily or Regularly) Ideally, you'd see a therapist, but that's not always possible. So you can also try Cognitive Behavioral Therapy techniques online on your own, it just might not be as effective compared to having someone walk you through it. We're in a flawed system, but it doesn't mean we should keep suffering from it.
sounds like a lot of work to maintain. which honestly? would stress me out more trying to keep up with that, much less paying for someone to pretend to care about my issues.
@@SuperKeegster As little as 5 minutes of meditation or deep breathing a day can provide benefits to stress levels. You don't need to do it all at once. And you don't need to do all of it if you're not that stressed to begin with. If you wish to get less stress, what I listed are some of the options. You say that it would stress you out to maintain/do all of this, but it sounds like you're so stressed that you can't afford not to do all of it. Or that your life management system is bad (where you're trying to keep all your commitments in your head, rather than in your productivity system). Exercising x3 a week is standard for health, let's say 30-60m each; not doing that will increase your default stress levels. Weekly or monthly therapist sessions is at most 30-60m each; not doing that would increase stress levels if you don't have the tools/skills to effectively address your stressors on your own. Relaxation techniques are at minimum 5m a day, but you can also do them to reduce immediate stress; not doing them would make you more stressed that you need to me (if it's good enough for the military/war, it's good enough for you). You say that it'd stress you out to keep it up, but what's stressful about having "workouts" on your calendar x3 a week, therapist sessions weekly/monthly on your calendar, and adding 5 minutes of relaxation techniques to your morning routine? Therapists are there to give you tools to deal with your problems on your own, and to help if you're having difficulty using/implementing said tools. Whether they emotionally care or not isn't relevant, they're trying to help someone suffer less, which I'd say is the only care that matters as it's the only one with impact in the world.
Enjoy this but lets take it a step further. Reduce influences in your life, enjoy acceptance and lose the sense of control you operate with subconciously. Learn to fill your cup more than life is able to take out- prioritize this. STOP CONSUMING STRESSFUL CONTENT AND CONSUME FOR A SAKE OF ENJOYMENT. If you feel like your consuming too much take a break and just flow with existence. Find deeper meaning, than explore interests that your not familiar with. Operate life with a sense of openness- even to saddness and disappointment. Observe more- take a step out of engaging and just watch. Learn to be comfortable just being.
I’ll never forget that awesome feeling of being rewarded a few days PTO annually after the whole crew made the Chick-Fil-A location I worked at over a million dollars one year. It was so great to know the store owner was getting even richer while I hoping for at least a 75¢ raise some time soon. What good feelings. I remember it made feel like I wanted to work so bad.
I would like to submit "Fart" to the list of survival responses. Consider the skunk, the squid, or the bombardier beetle releasing a noxious substance as a predator deterrent, and compare this to the human tendency to release the bowels under extreme acute stress.
I’m a 911 operator, and in our classes about stress and crisis management there’s 5 F’s: fight, flight, freeze, faint, and faun. Faint is self explanatory, and faun is the “oh my gosh I’m so sorry I didn’t mean it” kind of reaction.
I seriously had to ask my wife to change the notification sound on her navigation app on her watch because it was the same sound as my mobile slack notification. Nothing triggers my anxiety like hearing slack outside of business hours. I hate that sound so much I want to dig up Pavlov and have a chat about this bullshit. And if you guessed I'm in the US, you'd be correct.
Also all this talk about alienation angst and the workplace reminds me of your old 8bit Philosophy segment on Weber. I get the production on those must not have justified the resources spent, but I enjoyed them a lot and am more than a little sad we'll never see a new one :/ Between those and the stuff Alain de Botton were putting out, it was nice to have a bunch of digestible philosophy lectures on RU-vid. Then it felt like it just all disappeared.
American lawyer here. Frequently stressed. But I’ve improved my blood pressure in the last few months lol. I can definitely tell when my stress passes the optimal level.
I remember a TikTok hot take about how they where stressed and angry all the time. When they meet someone who isn’t they can’t trust them. Because if they don’t feel that way then they have no idea what’s going on, they’re extremely privileged, and they can’t help in the fight against ANY form of oppression.
This might be true on the surface level, but you can't just take for granted that a person is ignorant just because they are composed. This hot take has strong signs of being adolescent.
Kind of whack, I'm poor as shit and wanted to die for many years. Now I've reached a sort of "living under late stage capitalism nirvana". I hate the way things are but I have found a way to live happily and be satisfied from the small things. No matter what system I live under I can enjoy making music, creating video games, being with family, etc.
When i was in the military, we were given an Hour and a Half PT (fitness) time 3 days a week on a 4/10 schedule. I believe for any 40hr work week in the United States, that should be a mandatory given. That would flip the country on its HEAD! At least an Hour or 40 mins or something
PT was the most stressful time for me, unfortunately. idk wtf the Army did to me, but going to a gym fills me with anxiety that wasn't there before I enlisted. If I had to wager a psychological guess it's the association of exercise with punishment.
@@TrepidDestiny Thats unfortunate. That and gym culture are the kind of things that discourage people from finding an exercise they can truly enjoy. I do believe everybody can find a form of exercise that helps even it its not in the gym
he told me to watch this video during wisecrack live, so here i am! im watching! Also the 4th F in Fight Flight Freeze is "Fawn", abuse victims will fawn over their abusers to hopefully mitigate future abuse. people are posting joke answers, but thats the actual answer
Protests are just like parties in France. A spectacle for emotion, unity & awareness. In Nova Scotia, we agree to unite in Aquatic Centre pool Mon-Thurs 10am-12pm. A fun interactive symbol of monern-capitalist resistence
I have plenty of stressors, but I live in one of the US states where you can buy weed gummies at the gas station....sooooo....what was I stressed about again?
Stress these days is also the result of the amount of information/foresight we have nowadays. what kind of stress would an peasant in the middle ages experience, knowing about all the events around him and seeing the plague coming... there are plenty more things were knowledge might cause stress
The Doctor who did my colonoscopy was Dr. Slaughter. Happy to report my five hole is fine, and my colon is squeaky clean. 😂 I have mostly perfected the fine art of not giving a f@#%, so my stress level is pretty low. Great video as always. ❤
Germany, 36 and stressed like all the time. Started therapy three years ago and we really have an excellent health system where I don't pay anything but still not great. I have talk therapy on Mondays, a pill to have the energy to work hard starting 6 in the morning and a pill to sleep well in the evening. All that bs to work more for my boss and to cope with the results of that stress, it is infuriating the more I think about it.
A lot of my stress disappeared when I finally realized how I felt about my life and the world is a completely normal response to living under capitalism. They say we're broken and need help for not thriving with a smile while giving away a majority of our waking hours to make another man richer, while we stay poor. But only a broken, abused, defeated, or empty person would be able to perform like those in charge want us to while maintaining happiness. The world isn't working to make us happy, so why would we be?? The world just wants us to shut up and work, stop stirring the pot, stop pointing things out. As bleak as that is, accepting it and that you don't have to hold yourself to impossible, toxic standards is very freeing. Life hasn't changed, but my happiness has gone up and my stress has gone down. If you understand the monster becomes less scary, even if it's still a monster at the end of the day.
I am from America. I was a service center rep for a while, and that was the most stress I have ever had to deal with. A few times, I wanted to cry, and my hands would shake. I was at my breaking point, though. I made it through. I am not stressed from work now I do a easy job now most of the time I just watch youtube to kill time.
As a med student, I would consistently get high blood pressure readings even when I would exercise and eat healthier. Hard to get it down when you need to learn so much
I don’t know but being with a crowd of people is probably the most stressful thing I experience, I am sooo less stressed when sitting in my garden and reading a good book while listening to some classical music.
🇨🇦🇮🇪 MON-THURS, Zatsman Sportsplex Indoor pool to exercise, unite, etc.To resist essentially Capitalism-Modernity’s “Book burnings” of philosophy, culture & more.
I've been doing this study on myself and I find a direct correlation between my state of contentment and my time on social media platforms or the internet. You can guess what the outcome is...
Ever since I lost my job (due to wrongful termination) and then descended into suicidal depression - and managed to work my way back to sanity with the help of peer support, I have never been better. I am working on myself at my own pace and have no stress. I'm back in school and have a 4.0 GPA and just taking life easy. But with that said, I don't have money to support you on Patreon.
If you want a tangible political issue, look at the number of vacation days we get compared to our European counterparts. Europeans get 20 days of vacation, the US gets 11. We need more mandatory time off.
i've had high blood pressure ever since i was 7 years old. i was born in a country where stress is a non-stop event. lol, i don't really expect to live to see 50 years of age... ugh.
USA I absolutely feel stress during the work day. During days off, I can end up feeling stressed from feeling like I should be doing more or having more fun. This is all before detailing my social anxiety or specific tasks.
The 4th F is 'fawn,' sometimes labeled as 'appease' which we see a lot in abusive situations, in people pleaser, and those with other-directed maladaptive schemas.
This is literally the focal point of my next decade. I've worked stress inducing roles since I was 16. Roles that inherently operated in stressful situations. Im 30 and already feel the creep of high blood pressure. Fuck that the social contract is not in my favor. I truely believe people need to look at business practices through a social-emotional lense. If a business was a person and operated in your life they way people do- how soon would you cut them out. Keep your mind and health as much as you possibly can. It wont be the perfect life but it will absolutely be a better one.
One thing I'd love to see more of is advocating for 'incidental meeting spaces' in architecture and city planning. Spaces where the private space flows naturally into the public space. I spent a summer in a small town in Europe where everything was walk-able and everyone went out at night, and suddenly the front porch made sense to me. This can look like front doors that open up onto parks, putting nice seating areas in condo hallways or allowing mixed use zoning that prioritizes meeting spaces. When you get a chance to meet your neighbors and maybe make friends you have an opportunity to find ways to share the load of stressors, at least on the home end.
As an autistic and ADHD person with various disabilities, I hate this mindset of stress. It makes so much work inaccessible because I can't handle the same kind or levels of stress. It turns an already outside my comfort zone thing into something that causes more trauma. I also have chronic illnesses, and PTSD (and possible C-PTSD) so it's not like I have much energy to fight off too much stress anyways. I'm not even in my 30's.
Not to mention healthcare and other costs that can come out of nowhere requiring thousands and thousands of dollars more in resources that can't be paid/ must be paid and so there has to be a way of getting more money and where is that coming from?
Bosses intentionally pushing people to the breaking point and then telling them to medidate is an awful lot like breaking someone's legs and then offering crutches.
I like your suggestion for walking, mostly because I actually do that (most days). I work as an accountant and my work is very cyclical - certain days of the month are very busy, others not so much. I know that if I go on walks most days, then I can be okay with the few days when it just really is not practical. I feel like there is something therapeutic about being a part of something larger than myself, but it is not healthy to give too much of myself to it. Thus, having this balance between being a productive member of the workforce, while still allowing some “me time” during the day, has done wonders for my psyche. I recognize not everyone has an employer who will accommodate this, but if they value you as a person (not just as an employee) they should be able to work around 30-60 minutes of “me time” per day. If your employer does not value you as a person, then you might want to consider looking for another employer. Just my $0.02.
Sooooo... I'm not going to pretend that I don't have a fast-paced, stressful and demanding job but that was the bill from the start. It could be far worse but it is satisfying and pays well... What I will contribute to this is that I'm pretty sure that the stress of sustained psychological abuse directed at me by family (an sibling is a psychiatrist and our father is a surgeon and they used their influence to lie with the aim to control and interfere with my psychiatric treatment for their own ends) literally triggered epilepsy... I wish I were kidding... I went from being a mildly depressed but fairly active, busy, friend-seeing, gymming-six-times-per-week, late 20 something male to now taking all the pills because my attention is shot and I get weird fits... Stress is real people. Take it seriously, no matter the source. You get one body.
1000% agree, my other Just quit her job at a corporate insurance company because they were definitely with the understanding that stress is just part of the job that even provide with 12 free therapy sessions because they know they're gonna be intentionally stressed out. you took time off of claims you could have larger work done
man it must be so nice when something like tylenol pm works, my nervous system would laugh itself stupid if I tried to use it over the trazadone I take.
At my last job I was so burnt out and stressed that I developed this numbness on the left side of my body, and it didn't go away until after I resigned. While I agree stress is unavoidable (and needed to a degree) the employer has an obligation to mitigate it. I recently took an OSHA related course and what struck me was that when it came the the physical on-the-job hazards the training emphasized shared responsibilities for both the employer and employee, as it should. But when it came to occupational stress the training presented it as something that only the employee has to manage 😒
I feel stressed on every workday. Just that compulsion to complete the task within a said timeframe or risk being taken as lazy or a bad employee compels me to stay on my toes all the time. From India, working for a US tech company.
Tech worker in the united states. We get stressed having to make sure we're not seen as lazy or overpaid, lest our employers outsource our jobs to India. Crazy how they keep us both choking down stress.
I remember a "Wellness" session in a company. Management felt that some of us were a "little" bit stressed. It's easy to be stressed as a computer programmer when the FPOS of your management don't have a clue of what they are doing, don't provide the information you need to complete the job, have no skills to organize even the simplest kind of task and set non-realistic deadlines. If the world was a fair place all that FPOS should have been fired, but in the real world they are promoted.
I live in Brazil and yes, I’m very stressed all the time, except when I take my beautiful guitar and train some scales. Music theory and practice can be a powerful tool to calm down
As a fellow spectrum member, got anything cool from it? Like, "I'm a child," and I call them "powers" even when they aren't totally beneficial, like X-Men etc. I suppose low blood pressure as a logical response to accepting defeat as the default could... Count... But there has to be something that you have beyond the N.T.s, like seeing additional colors (that would make you feel "like you're taking crazy pills") being able to identify bird calls to the meaning and species, or always knowing when the microwave is about to finish it's timer somehow. For example
You're awesome, thank you! Also, Gabor Mate is an excellent reference - his knowledge of trauma and just general functioning (or lack thereof) of humans in current society is fascinating!
Labor in America/Western countries has shifted over time from being physical labor to being mental labor (which is a huge generalization, but you get the point). But where we as a society saw the need to introduce physical labor safety protocols and regulations, there are none such safety protocols or regulations for mental labor. If someone falls off an improperly maintained work ladder - there’s worker’s comp for the injury and OSHA to prevent it from happening again. But if someone has mental exhaustion or even a mental breakdown because they are overwhelmed by the mental workload required - companies see it as a personal problem for each employee to solve. Even though the reason it happened in the first place is entirely BECAUSE of workplace mental health hazards. Not saying everything with physical safety standards is 100% up to par, or that you can’t have both physical and mental safety dangers simultaneously. But the point is that employers don’t see their employees’ mental safety as their problem; they see it as the employees’ problems. And that doesn’t even begin to touch stress outside of work…
