Stress and Crafting the Good Life by Dr. Jim Manganiello

Stress and Crafting the Good Life

By Dr. Jim Manganiello

© all rights reserved-2003

Whoever lives the longest doesn't win any prize. But preserving our health and well-being are important parts of what I call Crafting the Good Life— a life lived with love, courage, wisdom and passion. We harvest the greatest treasures of a well-lived, loved, and understood life in the last third of our journey here. To be around for the harvest, we need to know how to safeguard our health and well-being and if we’re serious about doing that—then understanding and controlling stress needs to be at the top of our “things to do” list.

Most people are hungry to connect to who they deeply are, a connection often made difficult and even impossible by our family and cultural; conditioning. Conditioning sets limits that can keep us trapped in an identity that often swims in a sea of stress hormones because it’s too small for who we truly are.

Stress related illnesses cause more deaths yearly than deaths resulting from all other causes combined. Our health care system is really a disease care system, so it doesn’t work to prevent stress related illnesses before they occur–it treats them only after they arise. Stress is a biochemical event that involves powerful hormones: cortisol, epinephrine and norepinephrine. When our inner pharmacy releases these stress hormones into our body too often or for too long, they become toxic poisons that can compromise our health and even kill us.

The World Health Organization now recognizes stress as the number one health problem in industrialized nations. And as Dr. Paul Rosch, president of the nonprofit American Institute of Stress, noted, in America stress is "...taking a terrible toll on the nation's health and economy. It is a heavy contributor to heart disease, cancer, respiratory distress, lupus and many other life threatening illnesses."

Two-thirds of the visits to primary care medical physicians in this country are for symptoms resulting from stress. More than 100 million people are taking weekly medication to manage stress, medication which is for most people unnecessary and which can cause serious side effects and addiction.

What causes stress? Many things, including, real or perceived, job, family and financial pressures. Our mind and body are an interdependent unit: the mindbody. If we worry too much about financial catastrophe, for example, the primitive part of our brain can misinterpret our worry as actual financial failure and then stress hormones will be released as part of an “emergency alert” reaction.

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BIO:

Dr. Jim Manganiello is an award winning depth psychologist, Master coach, and meditation instructor. He works with people who want to craft their life into a work of art. Jim created the amazing, 5 part, Crafting the Good Life Course, now available at www.craftingthegoodlife.com. The Course features a powerful life enhancement practice, The Good Life Process™ Sign up for the Jim’s Newsletter and get Part One, Step 1 of the Process FREE.

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