MELDING MIND AND BODY: STRESS SEEKERS ARE LOOKING FOR TROUBLE
If you’re a stress seeker, it doesn’t take much to trigger your stress response. An angry thought, a glance at a clock, a look at the freeway traffic and the chemical fireworks begin. Highly charged chemicals get your heart beating faster and more vigorously, raise your blood pressure and increase the number of circulating blood cells. Muscle tension and strength increase; pupils dilate for better vision. Blood sugar rises, making more energy available.
These changes occur almost instantaneously as the stress seeker prepares to fight off threats to his or her life. But how do you fight off traffic? You can’t punch your boss when you’re told that your work is unsatisfactory. You can’t smash your watch because you’re late for an appointment. Are you going to take an ax to the car that backfired and woke you up?
So the high-voltage chemicals flooding your body are useless— worse than useless, in fact. With no outlet for their energy, they turn on you, jolting various parts of your “doctor within.” If that keeps up, you will eventually blow a fuse.
*131\80\8*
