We’re all running after time and we’re all really stressed out about it!

I think it’s safe to say that most of us have experienced stress in 2008 in a way that had been unforeseen in our lives. If you are lucky enough to have great-grandparents or grandparents who were alive during the 1929-1930 depression and who are able to recount their sad memories of those dreadful years, then maybe the events of this past October and November 2008 might not seem so foreign to you.

For most of us, it’s been a very shaky and bumpy ride filled with a lot of drama. Many people have been dealing with a deluge of bad-luck – losing their homes, losing their jobs, seeing their retirement money vanish into thin air, dealing with crisis at a level that is so elevated that it has left them in permanent state of constant stress.

Most of us were running after time and we were stretched thin because of the recent stock market and real estate bubbles, but now most people can spell stress in every possible language without batting an eyelash because it’s almost impossible to get away from it these days.

To cope with the uncertainty of the current situation many people have stepped up the expediency of their lives just to try to juggle everything without dropping a ball.

I’ve already talked to a number of health experts who have seen a huge increase in the number of new clients because of the recent events – people are stressed out and it’s showing up in every area of their lives.

So what is stress and how does it manifest in our body?

For the past one hundred years there has been much debate and theory offered about what stress is and what stress is not.  We each know intuitively what stress is to us because we all experience stress symptoms.  Defining stress and managing stress, however, is not so easy.

Hans Selye is one of the founding fathers in stress research. In 1956, Mr. Selye argued that:

“Stress is not necessarily something bad – it all depends on how you take it. The stress of exhilarating, creative successful work is beneficial, while that of failure, humiliation or infection is detrimental.”

Selye’s position was that the biochemical effects of stress would be experienced irrespective of whether the situation was positive or negative.

Since that time, much more research has been conducted, and new ideas have evolved. Stress is now widely perceived as a “negative,” producing a range of harmful biochemical and long-term effects. These same effects have rarely been observed in positive situations.

Richard S Lazarus (an American psychologist well renowned for his theory of cognitive-mediational theory within emotion) is attributed with our most commonly accepted definition of stress:

“Stress is a condition or feeling experienced when a person perceives that demands exceed the personal and social resources the individual is able to mobilize.”

Everyone responds differently to stressful events.  That stress response is part instinct and part to do with how we think.  We can train our minds how to best respond to the stressors in our lives.  Stress does not need to be all bad.  Some stress in our daily lives is good and challenges us to reach even higher heights.

Here are some startling statistics about just how stressed out our lives are:

None of these stats below take into account the recent economical debacle, but I have a feeling that everything you see below has been heighten by the fact to so many people have so much more now to think about, manage, worry about and face than ever before.

* 35 per cent of BlackBerry users would choose their PDA/Smartphone over their spouse (Source: The Economist).

* The vast majority of people (84 per cent) say they check their PDAs/Smartphones just before going to bed and as soon as they wake up, 85 per cent say they sneak a peek at their PDA/Smartphone in the middle of the night, and 80 per cent say they check their email before morning coffee. (Source: The Economist).

* A staggering 87 per cent of professionals bring their PDA/Smartphone into the bedroom. (Source: The Economist).

* Americans are critically under-vacationed. That’s both by choice and circumstance, at least according to the results of Expedia’s annual Vacation Deprivation Survey. Americans had only 14 days off in 2007. Yet 35 per cent of Americans won’t take all the time off they earn, leaving upward of 438 million days of vacation untaken. (Source: Expedia.)

* 70 per cent of Americans 16 years and older say they don’t have enough time to do all the things they need to do. Half of US consumers now say that a lack of time is a bigger problem in their lives than a lack of money. (Source: Yankelovich.)

* 43 per cent of Americans, 39 per cent of British, 60 per cent of Dutch and 47 per cent of Australians rate themselves as “time poor”, meaning they feel short of time. (Source: Jay Walker Thompson.)

Do you feel like you’re constantly running after time? I’d love to know who else among my readers who is dealing with this feeling of rush-rush-rush.

Photo by Vaidy Krishnan