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Stressed out is frequently referred to as a negative experience. However, stress can actually have a positive effect. Positive stress is called "eustress" while negative stress is called "distress." When taken to the extremes, either of these stressors can affect the human body.
Example: I am a mother without biological children. I love kids and kids love me. Teaching children became my vocation and my service. To see a child accomplish a task or to make a connection in their brain provides great joy. Unfortunately, there was a period of time when my cup "runeth" over and drained out the bottom at the same time. I found my eustress replaced with distress. What gave me joy started making me sick. In an effort to provide the best experience for my students, I slow lost the passion for teaching others and caring about myself.
I am not an expert on stress. My goal with this blog is to plant a seed about the way we refer to stress—that not all stress is bad or good, but that there are two kinds. I want readers to look at their circumstances and find ways of balancing stress in their lives.
Stress (Leading in the Wildland Fire Service, p. 47)
Representing a significant risk to safety and operational effectiveness, stress can bring about reactions such as tunnel vision or confusion that substantially degrade situation awareness—in ourselves and in our people.
- To mitigate this risk, leaders act to alleviate the effects of stress by:
- Understanding our own stress reactions—the triggers that set them off, the symptoms, the mitigations to put into place to reduce them.
- Monitoring and preventing stress buildup in their teams—openly discussing the causes of stress and the potential mitigations.
- Encouraging team members to watch out for each other by monitoring one another’s stress reactions.
- In her TED video "How to Make Stress Your Friend," Kelly McGonigal shares how the belief that stress may be as bad for you as the stress itself. McGonigal presents research on the subject and a few ways to change how you think about stress to make you healthier.
- Read Kelly McGonigal's book The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You, and How to Get Good at It.
- Additional information about stress research can be found on TED Blog.
About the Author: Pam McDonald is a writer/editor for BLM Wildland Fire Training and Workforce Development and member of the NWCG Leadership Subcommittee. The expressions are those of the author.
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