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What Is Stress?

Stress is something that most everybody feels at one point or another in their lives, but yet nobody can quite define it. The first thing you may think of when you hear the word stress is “feeling” overloaded and nervous. But stress also is a force which creates upset stomachs, gnawing fear, migraine headaches, severe grief, excessive drinking, and violent rages. Our memories are dulled by the stress in our lives, our thinking ability diminished, and our efficiency is retarded.

On the other hand, there are some very good positives that stem from the feeling of stress that comes into our life. It motivates us to study, encourages us to keep going when life gets difficult, spurs us to action in the midst of crises, helps us to mature, and at times makes life very exciting.

The word “stress” was actually first used in the world of physics and engineering. It referred to the heavy forces that may be put on a building or a bridge. It is the kind of stress that would contribute to a building or bridge collapsing due to heavy ice formation or the power of extreme winds. In time after, the term “stress” was taken over by medicine, physiology, sociology, economics, and other fields of science, but for most people the world has come to have a distinctly psychological meaning.

Over the years there have been many scholarly attempts to define psychological stress, but the most commonly known and most down-to-earth definition of stress came several years ago from a biologist named Hans Selye who said that “stress is essentially the wear and tear of living. Stress for one person may differ from that experienced by someone else, but every day each of us experiences physical and emotional wear and tear resulting from the pressures of life.

According to Hans Selye, stress is not simply nervous tension, nor is stress a negative feeling that should be avoided, or is something that is always unpleasant. For example, riding a roller coaster is extremely fun in a “stressful” kind of way. All of those exciting feelings you get within your stomach and your mind is due to stress. Playing sports is another fun and healthy way of being involved with an activity and the joy that you feel is the direct result from different forms of stress, which are all pleasant. Have you ever watched an emotional television show or seen a movie that had you on the edge of your seat, in tears, or laughing all of the way to the end? This is all a form of different stresses and they are ones in which we seek out and enjoy.