# Stress and happiness

All unhappiness comes from prolonged stress over something:

- Stress and happiness only exist in our minds.
- Depression is past-tense stress mixed with hopelessness.

Unlike stress, stressors exist in the world around us:

- Most stressors are outside our direct control.
- Stressors create stress only when:
  1. We feel we must take action
  2. We fear losing something

While finding stress simply requires [meditation](awareness.md), changing it requires [changing our stressors](mind-feelings-happiness-stress.md).

- Approaching this change needs [the right attitude](success-2_attitude.md) because you must sacrifice many, *many* old ways of thinking.

Not all stress is bad:

- Eustress keeps us active and happy (e.g., stress from an alarm clock).
  - Lowers the risk of many fatal diseases
  - Increases [social skills and general sociability](people-3_respect.md)
  - [Learning](mind-memory.md) and [focusing](success-4_routine.md) are easier
  - Increases [awareness](awareness.md) of our instincts
- Distress, by contrast, inspires [fear](mind-feelings-fear.md) and [uncertainty](unknown.md):
  - Causes waste in resources, time, and energy
  - Linked to many health problems like heart attack and stroke
  - Any action driven by distress usually ends in mental illness

## A. Find your stressors

Are you suffering severe physical or emotional pain?

- You may have a medical condition causing pain, or may have [just had a breakup or divorce](relationships-3_dating.md), or could simply be in extreme solitude.
- Whatever the case is, acknowledge that it's [real](reality.md), but that it's okay to feel terrified or sad.
- Avoid making any [large-scale goals](success-3_goals.md) during the darkest times, and [reach out to people who will support and encourage you](people-4_friends.md).
- Often, if the problem persists long enough, it'll become more bearable, but don't let it ever become your "normal".

Do you have chronic long-term problems?

- You might have [money issues](money-1_why.md), [relationship](relationships-why.md)/[family](parenting-children.md) problems, or are constantly pushing up against [deadlines](success-4_routine.md).
- You usually can't fix most issues with others, but can often minimize their effects.
- You *can*, however, usually fix or minimize most personal issues like money or time management as far as your willpower can persist.
- Whatever your situation, you'll only succeed if you submit it all to [a power greater than yourself](jesus-gospel.md).

Have you experienced any major life changes?

- You could be [moving](home-moving.md) or [changing jobs](jobs-6_negotiating.md), someone could be moving in with you or moving out, you might be getting engaged or [newly married](relationships-weddings.md), or [having a baby](parenting-babies.md).
- Major life changes naturally cause stress and [incapacitate us](hardship.md), and that's perfectly okay.

Are you happy with your job?

- Accept that your current life situation could always be worse.
- [Explore other options](jobs-1_why.md) or accept your situation.

Are you happy with your living situation?

- Consider [moving](home-moving.md) or [giving away possessions](organization.md).
- Ask why you live where you are and ways to change it.

Are you happy with your social network?

- Poor [social skills](people-3_respect.md) cause tremendous anxiety with others.
- Take time to get to know other people more and [make more friends](people-4_friends.md).
- Sometimes you need a new social group, and sometimes you're the reason you don't have friends.

Are you satisfied with the past, present, and future?

- Unhappiness from the past and present come from ingratitude
- Unease of the future is focusing on something you can't control.
- We often find tremendous dissatisfaction through arbitrary comparisons of the past, present, and future.
- It's not uncommon for people to overthink their most recent experiences and imagine negative long-term consequences, which typically don't happen.
- We can also find dissatisfaction over things we have literally no control over (e.g., [politics](politics-conservativeliberal.md), [weather](science-earth-weather.md), [rejection](people-5_conflicts.md)).

Have you recently suffered a loss?

- Grieving goes beyond [death](hardship-death.md) to cover [a vast variety of people and things](hardship.md).

Use the Holmes-Rahe Stress Inventory to track your longer-term stressors:

1. First, add together *everything* on the following list, good and bad, that you've experienced:
   - Your spouse [died](hardship-death.md) - 100
   - You've divorced - 73
   - You're separated from your spouse - 65
   - You've spent time incarcerated - 63
   - A close family member has died - 63
   - You've had a major personal injury or illness - 53
   - You've gotten married - 50
   - You've been fired from work - 47
   - You've reconciled your marriage - 45
   - You've retired from work - 45
   - A close family member has had a major change in their health or behavior - 44
   - You have had a pregnancy - 40
   - You're having sex difficulties - 39
   - You've gained a new family member - 39
   - You've had a major workplace readjustment - 39
   - You've had a change in your financial state, either better or worse - 38
   - A close friend has died - 37
   - You've changed to a different line of work - 36
   - There's been a change in the number of arguments with your spouse - 35
   - You've taken on a [large debt](money-2_debt.md) - 31
   - You've foreclosed or defaulted on a mortgage or loan - 30
   - You've had a change in responsibilities at work - 29
   - Your son or daughter [has left home](parenting-3_teenagers.md) - 29
   - You're having [trouble](people-5_conflicts.md) with your in-laws - 29
   - You've had an outstanding [personal achievement](success-1_why.md) - 28
   - Your spouse has begun or stopped working - 26
   - You've begun or finished school - 26
   - Your living conditions have changed - 25
   - You've revised your [habits](habits.md) - 24
   - You're having trouble with boss - 23
   - Your job has changed its hours or conditions - 20
   - You've changed your residence - 20
   - You've changed your school - 20
   - You've changed your amount or type of recreation - 19
   - Your church activities have changed - 19
   - Your social activities have changed - 18
   - You've taken on a moderately-sized loan - 17
   - Your [sleeping habits](sleep.md) have changed - 16
   - The number of family get-togethers has changed - 15
   - Your eating habits have changed - 15
   - You've had a [vacation](fun-vacations.md) - 13
   - You've celebrated a major holiday - 12
   - You've experienced a minor violation of the law - 11
2. The total will give a statistical chance of a major health issue associated with the stress:
   - 150 or less means you have a relatively low chance.
   - 150 to 300 points means ~50% chance of a stress-related health breakdown in the next 2 years.
   - 300 points or more raises it to ~80%.

- While it's not perfect, it tracks everything that has affected your stress levels over the past year.
- It's worth noting that this measurement doesn't account for whether something was 11 months ago or just happened, and also doesn't count how you may emotionally process it (i.e., prior experience makes it less traumatic).

Resolving distress requires understanding your stressors:

1. [Meditate](awareness-meditation.md) on your thoughts to find overwhelming feelings.
   - Try to track the feelings as they occur.
2. Recognize the line between what you can and can't control.
   - Focus on the facts behind your feelings.
3. Release anything uncontrollable and focus on managing what you *can* change.
4. Releasing becomes exponentially important *and* difficult as we experience more [hardship](hardship.md)

## B. Find what causes your stressors

### Misery Source #1: Unmet Needs

We possess many needs.

- Everyone requires the same things, but not the same quantities.
- We're usually unaware of our needs until we start feeling pain from not having them.
- Reacting to unmet needs often sabotages other needs.
- If we catch our needs beforehand, we can detect future issues before they arise.

To be fulfilled, we require [positive emotion, focus on the present, relationships, meaning, and observable accomplishments](mind-feelings-happiness-perma.md).

Physical needs keep us alive:

- [Food](cooking.md): sometimes caloric energy, sometimes a specific nutritional need
- Water
- Shelter: protection from weather and other living beings attacking
- [Sleep](sleep.md)
- Sex (which usually includes [physical attractiveness](people-2_image.md))
- Other things like breathing, going to the bathroom, and getting enough sunlight
- The two most common causes of misery are dehydration and not enough sunlight

Psychological needs relate to how we see ourselves in the world:

- The need to feel [responsible and in control](meaning.md)
- The need to feel [safe, at peace or comfortable](safety.md)
- The need to [love and be loved](people-love.md)
- The need to [attempt risks](unknown.md), [have fun](fun.md), and [learn](mind-memory.md)
- The need to [emotionally release](mind-feelings.md) through crying, venting, or [creating](mind-creativity.md)
- The need to see [evidence of growth or improvement](results.md)
- The need for to [be certain about something](understanding-certainty.md)
- The need for [something to work toward](meaning.md) or [be a part of](groups-small.md), as well as [evidence of success](success-1_why.md)
- The need to help other people do the same, often via [parenting](parenting-babies.md) or [management](mgmt-1_why.md)

Frequently, most things we do meet multiple physical/psychological needs at once.

Without self-correction, we will imagine the future will happen *exactly* how we see it right now:

- A bad day can, in theory, become the start of a bad year or a bad life.
- It's a waste of time to obsess about it, and we should simply become [aware](awareness.md) of the risks so that we can do something about them.
- If we don't know *what* to prepare for, we get stuck into a locked state of hyper-prepared misery, which brings many psychological [hardships](hardship.md) with it.
- The best solution is to simply pick something and random and [work on it](success-3_goals.md).

We tend to have a "center" that satisfies many of our needs:

- Over our lives, our center becomes the perceived source of those needs.
- Because of how many things it affects, we focus our efforts on this center.
- To grow, we must center our minds on [values and principles](values.md) (the *true* value of [religion](religion-answers.md)), but that requires shifting focus away from everything else in the world around us.

Unmet needs will eventually ferment into an existential crisis:

- Familiar and common things will feel bizarre.
- Personal [choice](people-decisions.md) will feel severely limited.
- We begin overemphasizing [death and mortality](hardship-death.md).
- We become aware that we can't reliably plan major life decisions.
- Further, once we realize we can't anticipate *anything*, we'll develop an anxiety and terror from that [uncertainty](understanding-certainty.md).

### Misery Source #2: Unchangeable Stressors

Accepting reality is the humbling task of admitting we're often weak, incapable, and incorrect:

- We often prefer what's familiar over what's correct.
- Be brutally honest with yourself about what you're afraid of, what may harm you, and what you can't know.
- Note how much you spend thinking about political matters or others' feelings:
  - You have every right to [feel what you feel](mind-feelings.md), but so does everyone else.
  - Instead, focus on [things you *can* do](success-4_routine.md).

We frequently think we can control things we can't, especially [as the situation changes](mind-feelings-happiness-stress.md).

It's sometimes okay to be unhappy.

- Sometimes, [life is hard](hardship.md), and there's nothing you can do about it.
- At those critical times, your ability to persevere may require simply tuning out from the severity of the things around you.
- Do what you can to [succeed](success-1_why.md), and move on with your life.

### Misery Source #3: Unmet Expectations

Typically, we're *completely* unaware of our expectations.

High expectations make us unhappy:

- We often try many things with *very* high, unreasonable expectations.
- Many of the happiest people in the world have the fewest possessions or accomplishments.
- Many of the most miserable people have near-unlimited resources at their disposal.
- Low standards for ourselves, things, and others make us happier, even when we're not necessarily [successful](success-1_why.md).

But, we also frequently believe bad things will stay the same.

Social media sets false standards for our expectations about pretty much everything:

- Social media shows people who appear happier, funnier, more attractive, and interesting than *anyone* we know, including ourselves.
- This is especially dangerous for [teenagers](people-3_respect.md) with limited experience with how people typically behave.
- To realign to reality, take a break from social media and replace it with time in nature.

More choices create more dissatisfaction:

- More options mean you invest more energy into the [decision](people-decisions.md), meaning you expect the thing to give better results.
- Remove possibilities to get more satisfaction from your decisions:

Control your expectations:

- If you're resentful, you're either immature or someone is misusing you.
- Ignore any decisions you can't make right now.
  - Focus less on a "best" option and more on "acceptable" ones.
  - Learn gratitude for horrible decisions you never have to make and the blessing that you even *have* your current decisions.

Learn to love constraints:

- Premeditate your choice for when and where you want to choose.
- Remind yourself that every moment of indecision is wasting time and energy.
- Make final, irreversible decisions.
- Learn to find comfort when alone, bored, or exhausted.

Actively choose instead of merely "picking":

- Weigh out the pros and cons based on what you desire more than fear.
- Avoid thinking about your decision afterward to foster regret.
- Avoid comparing your decision to others' choices.

### Misery Source #4: Unresolved Trauma

We often hold onto [trauma](hardship-ptsd.md) long after the events have transpired, and [we must release them](hardship-ptsd-release.md).

### Misery Source #5: Substance Abuse

Absolutely [any addiction](addiction.md) will rob us of any legitimate satisfaction.

## C. Release your stress

Develop a sense of humor:

- Consume [humor](humor.md) more often.
- Nothing in life is ever as severe as it feels.
- We heal through laughing at both ourselves and our situation.

Keep a journal or diary:

- Write down daily accomplishments and things you're grateful for.
- End the diary with questions about the future to inspire more journal entries.
- Reread your diary later to see how much you've changed and how far you've come.
- Next January, start filling an empty jar with notes about good things that happen, then empty it and read them all back on New Year's Eve.

Develop yourself spiritually:

- Trust that [God is in control](god-will.md).
- Learn [meditation](awareness-meditation.md).
- Connect with other people of faith.

Create a savoring album:

- A savoring album is creating and savoring memories of your positive experiences.
- Use a camera as a savoring tool to take photos of happy events.
- Stay mindful of how everything will eventually come to an end, which will provoke you to enjoy the present more.