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Stress produces many types of mental and physical illness in western society and so deserves your attention. Some of the symptoms of prolonged exposure to stress are headache, brain tissue damage, high blood pressure, weakening of the bones, general immune deficiency, muscle tension, menstrual disorders, miscarriage, depression, anger, fear, nervousness. If the bodies immune system is allowed to deteriorate because of stress it may lead to other serious medical condition such as asthma, ulcers, hypertension and heart failure, eating disorders, as well as the abuse of drugs or alcohol which are used as common coping mechanisms with chronic stress. The list of stress related ailments is truly staggering and an added problem is that the body tends to show signs of chronic stress very gradually, so the onset of stress may actually go unnoticed in its early stages. Stress may show up in these early stages as some innocuous nervous mannerisms such as foot tapping, nail biting, pencil tapping, or some other useless repetitive action such as constant hand washing. Symptoms of stress may appear so gradually that some people are unaware of the severity of their stress condition until they suffer a general nervous breakdown. Let's examine what stress really is all about and what exactly it can do to you. Scientists have found that when you are experiencing stress, your brain produces high levels of two specific hormones, adrenalin and cortisol, these two hormones are made by your hypothalamus. These hormones are manufactured by your body in response to any perception of an impending threat or danger to either your body or your mind. Scientist call this response the Fight or Flight Syndrome. Your body prepares itself for a fight or escape from a fight by releasing these two hormones which gives your body a temporary increase of strength and energy. This hormonal response mechanism is then considered to be the general stress response syndrome The hormone cortisol increases your blood sugar levels which provides you with fuel for quick and vigorous physical action,it gives you needed extra energy to face or run from the circumstances which is an imminent threat, a danger, or any impending emergency. Adrenalin also makes you stronger and more resilient for the short term, so the bodies chemical stress response is entirely appropriate for the short term. Our bodies have evolved the Stress Response to protect us from immediate harm or potential destruction. With these hormones you are made able to respond more efficiently both physically and mentally to the hazards in your environment. These hormones are not normally dangerous to you in the short term, it is only when they are allowed to accumulate over longer periods of time that they can become a hazard to both your body and your mind. The most insidious quality about the stress response is that your body is really behaving quite normally during stress. Your mind is reacting normally to the messages of an emergency which has been perceived by the senses of your body.

Your problem only begin to arises when these messages of danger or emergency continue to be broadcast from your psyche over long periods of time. In addition to this, it is also when you do not feel that you have the option of either confronting the stressful situation directly, or escaping from it in any way, this is when you begin to run into alot of psychological difficulty. You start to feel trapped by your circumstances, you mind responds to the permanent warnings of impending emergency by manufacturing more and more of theses hormones. Then these hormones have no physical or mental outlet and the energy just implodes, collapse in on itself, you thus confound the energy of your mind and body synergy, and produce a chaos of energy. This happens so typically in modern culture because of the architecture of our western social system. Let me clarify that there are of course many normal emergency situations which may arise in your life time, and these will naturally trigger the stress response. Circumstances such as births, deaths, marriages and divorces. Yet these circumstances do not explain why chronic stress is so pervasive and at critical high in modern society. To help us to further understand the origins of chronic stress lets take into consideration the concept of control. Control has been found to be a key factor in the psychology of chronic stress. It has been observed in clinical studies that the extent to which you feel that you are in control of your environment, is the extent to which you will, or will not, experience the hormonal stress response. Those of you who feel most powerless or unable to control your circumstances tend to exhibit the highest levels of stress. On the other hand, those of you who feel you have great personal control and power over yourself and your environment, will be much less likely to experience the hormonal stress response, and this is regardless of the potential seriousness of the threat. If you are able to release your stress through confrontation which is the choice of the fight response, or are able to find ways to avoid the stress, which is the flight response, then you will be able to handle stress. if You feel trapped and vulnerable by your stress you end up feeling vulnerable to life. Your feelings of powerlessness and lack of self control are what create blocks in your psyche so what happens is that your stress energy just accumulates. If you don't eventually provide some valid outlet for your accumulated stress energy your mind and body will begin to breakdown from the strain. Knowing this, it is not hard now to deduce why stress has become so epidemic in the modern world. Our societies very organization unwittingly conspires against a healthy psychology of personal power and personal control. To run the enormous engine of modern society tremendous amounts of mental energy are required from its citizens leaving many completely drained and tired. Our highly regimented, fast moving, competitive work environments can also lead to unresolved feelings of alienation, inadequacy, and personal powerlessness. Many face constant insecurity and worry about their own basic survival and ability to measure up. People may become afraid of one another when living in tight proximity such as in cities or badly planned suburban environments. Society is haunted by a vast unspoken loneliness and vulnerability which is destroying mans health and vitality. Even your home, where once you could go to find refuge and comfort from the travails of the outside world, now too often is emotionally broken and may instead be the source of your stress. Add to this the human condition itself, where you may become overwhelmed and made to feel insignificant by the sheer magnitude and complexity of modern life.

Then when and if you seek help in overcoming some of your natural feelings of social vulnerability and powerlessness or if your just looking for a little relief from the physical tension of stress you may run into more problems. Medicine has proved to be inadequate in dealing with the original causes of stress nor can it eliminate all of its symptoms. Medicine may be necessary for a person in the most critical stages of chronic stress, but medicine alone may not be enough to achieve a cure for all the symptoms of the stress. Science is not always an alie in the battle of stress you trust it because science in general creates a better world for you materially and it may even prolong your life, science can create a better and happier life for you. You then usually trust its judgment and value it's advise. Science may in the case of stress be its cause and not its cure. Stress in its chronic stages seems to be more of an an emotional and psychological problem than a strictly physical one, and so needs to be addressed on deeper levels, on levels of meaning and value. The various branches of science are not yet able to tackle deeper questions about the ultimate nature of mans soul because they have yet admit that there is a soul or a spirit. Psychology mostly studies abhorrent behavior and the remedies of those behaviors, but it does not deal directly with the deep questions about the purpose or meaning of life. The shared tenet of all the sciences is that life is a but a random accident of a blind organic process which is without any ultimate purpose or meaning. So science your oracle for the future the elixir for your happiness is unwittingly creating a heavier psychological burden for you because of its outright intellectual denial of your spirit, of your purpose, and of your meaning. Its philosophy serves to deepen any of your feeling of isolation, vulnerability and powerlessness. Religion can provide a hospice from the torments of a heartless universe but most religions suffer from one great fault and that is they devote all their emotional and intellectual energy to their own particular godhead while ignoring the tremendous potential divinity in you. Most Religions teach you that it is God alone who possesses all the power and control over your life, and that if you want access to any of his power you must ask God through your prayers for some of it. But Gods help you are also told comes with certain preconditions.You are ceremoniously informed that only if you follow all these rules of conduct will God then grant you a portion of his power a part of his favor, but those rules of conduct are often either not well defined or rife with self contradiction. So if you are honest with yourself you become more confused, more uncertain, feeling even more powerlessness, but only now with the additional feeling of quilt. You will end up feeling more vulnerable and unable to navigate your lifes course effectively. Your self image and self worth is defined and shaped by all these subtle and not so subtle social and religious conditions. After all if your an average person you will feel that you really cant fight the great social machine on which you depend for your survival, and at the same time you can not see a valid means by which to escape from it. You can easily feel trapped by the same thing that gives you nourishment and existence. This is how western cultures breed stress. Neither its Religion nor its Science is able to really help the average man or woman with what is causing their anxiety and suffering and so the disease of chronic stress grows epidemic. You are all left to cope with your stress the best you can, and so everyone passes each other daily in quiet desperation. This is the reason why chronic stress has become epidemic, it is because we in the west are all suffering from the same social paradigm.

On the other side of the coin not everyone in our modern society suffers from chronic stress though they may live under the same types of social pressures. Some among us are able to manage stress quite well, and they even thrive on the pressures and dangers of modern living. The question is, why are some able to cope with stress, and also avoid all of its disabling effects ? To answer this question correctly it is key that your understanding the stress syndrome to remember that it is merely the perception of a threat, not the threat itself which triggers the stress response, in other words, two people can have entirely different reactions to the same stress evoking situation. One person will thrive on the necessary stimulation of an any emergency while another may feel fear, anxiety and trepidation. It seems that the stress response is not created by any particular type of event or situation but rather by the the way that that event is perceived. It turns out then that Stress Response is a matter of perception, or awareness. The stress reaction is activated by your neural perceptions or by what amounts to your world view. Your world view can be described as the prism of ideas and beliefs through which you perceive and judge the world. Now because the stress response is triggered by your perceptions of the world, or world view, then your world view becomes central to the way you will handle any stressful circumstance. This is where yoga comes in, yoga can have a profound effect on chronic stress. Yoga offers you many techniques which are designed to release the tension of accumulated stress energy ie. The use of hatha yoga postures, specific yogic stretches, as well as the breathing exercises can relief the symptoms of stress. Yoga also provides the psychological means for releasing your accumulated stress with the use of techniques in Pranayama and Meditation. Most important to the cure of chronic stress is the philosophy of Yoga. When Yoga philosophy is truly fathomed it can dramatically alter your world view and thereby restore your feelings of self worth and personal meaning, giving you a feeling of deep power and control. Meditation can also have a soothing effect on your psyche offering it a sweet respite from the cruel onslaught of negative thoughts and negative emotions. Stress is a physical and a psychological response to a state of mind, and that state of mind can be gradually changed with the use of meditation and breathing exercises as well as the specific stretches which are designed to release body stress and tension. Stress can often be healed just through meditation alone. With meditation your attention or conscious awareness is intentionally directed away from the sources of stress and refocused onto the inner order and natural ease of the soul from where you are healed. With Yoga you are empowered by a deeper self understanding and awareness and personal value, with this new attitude you will find that you are able to cope with stress effectively. Mental control, intellectual acuity , stress free psychological health, physical health, vitality, plus emotional healing and balance, are all the wonderful by-products of Yoga practice. Yoga does all this marvelous work not by any imposition of rigid dogma or mythological intimidation but by teaching you to simply rely on your own mind and body for health and power by bring your attention back onto the natural wonder of your own being. Yoga should therefore be the primary component in your stress management program. Yoga may also be used to prevent the onset of stress, if you start to incorporate some simple yoga stress relief stretches, breathing exercises and some simple meditations into daily routine you could prevent stress from building up. Start living stress free. Practice Yoga Everyday. Written by AVANANDA

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