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Ryan Niese

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We have become such conscious beings that we now over complicate stress which used to be a simple subconscious survival mechanism.

We are not teaching our bodies to react with our mind, we are retraining ourselves to not over think our physical coping mechanisms to life.

Two things in Kelly's talk got me thinking about the roots of this:
1. Stress is the body's way of overcoming the stressor.
2. Human interaction is a natural desire that helps stress.
First off, why would we think of stress as bad when it's purpose is to help us? Kelley McGonigal has stated it and biology states it, stress is the body's way to react to a challenge. Who would want to compete with this natural reaction? By saying our mind has the power to create a positive affect from stress is to say that stress is a negative reaction. But as stated, it has been a positive response and we have to rediscover how to work with that response.
Regarding our desire for human interaction; it seems like a very animal like response. When we look at the response to stress in animals such as monkeys (that's very broad because I'm speculating) I have a feeling very few of them break down and start pulling their hair out. The natural response as Kelly mentioned is to seek help. In an animal pack that is exactly what will happen while in the human world social interaction has become so much more complex that reaching out for help could show signs of weakness and cause embarrassment.
So why do we compete with stress? I believe this is because humans have been trained out of it; we've brushed our natural response to stress aside as we've become more dominant as a race and as we've made more and more technological advances.


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  • Sep 9 2013: It is true that perhaps in the past, people were not so stressed out as they are now. This could either be an exaggeration of what they really are feeling, or, it could just be that the "stress" and pressure we are facing now is greater than those faced by people in the past as well as animals. I'm sure that two centuries ago, people would not have had to worry about their company's sales going down. Monkeys surely do not need to tear their hair out because they failed to get the marks they expected, etc. I think that we ourselves have complicated our lives to the extent that stress, which used to be a normal survival mechanism (a life saver!), is now very often the cause of death (depression and suicidal). I hope my comments and ideas were valuable, thank you.

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