By Savannah O’Berry on May 1, 2021

Stress plays a part in the basic functions of human life. It propels us forward in times of distress, allows us to act quickly during an emergency, and can help us meet deadlines. Cortisol is known as the stress hormone and is produced when you feel overwhelmed or stress-out.

Cortisol functions as a signal to the brain that something is causing us harm or danger is near. It is linked to the fight or flight response that we feel during a panic situation. In the days of cavemen this served the purpose of keeping us from being eaten by predators or being unprepared for near-death situations.

Fight or flight response is the way that we handle difficult situations. It is the idea that in the face of distress we will either meet the challenge and fight our way through it or take flight by running away to avoid it.

Eustress Versus Distress

An article in Social Behavior and Personality International Journal does an excellent job of explaining the differences between distress and eustress:

Stress that you feel when you are not prepared to handle challenges in life is called distress. This is the classic idea of being so overwhelmed that your mind is spinning while you are pacing and sweating with your heart beating out of your chest.

Stress from good things happening in life is also known as Eustress. It is the kind of stress that comes from getting married, having a child, being promoted, or buying a house when you feel that you are equipped to handle these life changing events. Eustress allows you to harness the drive of stress into accomplishing goals.

The same situation may cause distress or eustress in an individual. When faced with a big life change, if you are unprepared you might have difficulty handling it and working through it. On the other hand, you might face the change with positivity and self-care while making a good plan and sticking to it to adjust to the challenge.

A great point made by Shen et al. (2020) is the idea of one situation causing a person to feel both distress and eustress simultaneously. As you get adjusted to a big change you might shift between moments of feeling that you are very well prepared and moments where you feel like you’re struggling to come up for air. I believe this can be described in stages like the format of the stages of grief.

A pattern of distress can negatively impact the way we handle even small changes like when you have to make adjustments due to things not going how you planned when getting ready for work. This situation can leave you feeling angry or even lead to negative self-talk like thinking or telling yourself “I am a failure” or “I can never do anything right”. These responses are disproportionate to simply having to adjust your morning routine, but can add up to a bad day, week, month, or year if changes aren’t made to improve how you handle the little things life throws at you.

Instead of letting a change affect you with a negative impact and outlook, it is important to learn ways to let these small difficulties go and practice healthy stress management in the small every day difficulties so that when a bigger issue comes up you have had plenty of practice and can overcome the bigger stressors.

Increasing Eustress is a way to have an overall shift in negativity to positivity that should be worked on every chance you get. Changing your mindset and outlook will take practice, but doing this consistently over time will lead to an overall healthier, happier, and more resilient self. Being resilient means that you see stressors as opportunities for growth and lean into these issues with a level head not letting them get you down.

Stress management is an important skill that anyone can work on and master. In the increasingly demanding world today, stress is inevitable and needs to be handled appropriately. That being said it is okay to feel your feelings and take a mental, verbal, or written inventory of what triggers negativity when faced with stressors. All the feelings that come up should be acknowledged as present, but it is important not to let them take control of your life.

My Interpretation of the River Metaphor: Leaves on a Creek

I like to use the metaphor of a creek as an exercise to help with anxiety based on Acceptanceand Commitment Therapy (ACT). This therapeutic modality is a new wave of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy that focuses on accepting that negative thought happen while not letting these change your overall perspective in a negative way. I was taught this metaphor as an intern, and it has allowed me to help people through imagery many times.

Think about a flowing creek. It’s clear water, the bubbling and rush sounds as it goes past. Think about leaves on the surface of this creek: some are large and some are small, some are gold, some are brown, some are a vibrant green. As you see the leaves float by, following the current, take your stressors and negative thoughts and place them each on their own lily pad. Place anger on one, hurt on another, failure on a third, anxiety on a fourth and so on. Watch them float off on their leaves and accept that they were there. Acknowledge and accept that you felt those feelings and had those thoughts. Now let them go down the river. While doing this notice how you feel. Do you feel lighter, calmer, did this trigger more negativity or give you good vibes?

Taking inventory of feelings before and after an imagery exercise is a good way to determine if it worked or if this coping skill is one that doesn’t work well for you. The use of coping skills for anything negative or stressful is a very individualized experience. Some will work great for you and not for your best friend. Some will work well in one situation but not in the next.

This is why we all need to have a long list of different coping skills to tap into as various situations arise and to lean on social support through the people in our lives to keep us on the right track. When you are lost in the depths of distress it is easy to become avoidant and isolate yourself, but this will only get you more lost. Breaking the cycle is the only way to get better at managing anxiety, stress, and negativity, while learning to truly thrive.

Simply,

Soberry

Reference

Shen, Y., Wang, S., Chen, J., & Wu, J. (2020). Development and validation of a Chinese version of the Eustress–Distress psychological response scale. Social Behavior & Personality: An International Journal, 48(8), 1-10. Retrieved from https://lopes.idm.oclc.org/login?url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=s3h&AN=145106725&site=eds-live&scope=site