Our Stress Spills Over Onto Our Children

We’ve all witness how stress corrodes the feeling of well being right out of people’s lives.  Just how much stress do you have in your own life?

We all incur stress in our daily lives.  It eats away at our countenance and makes us unpleasant to be around.  We may not talk about it, and we certainly don’t usually discuss our stress with our kids.  But they feel it just the same.  They take on our energy, whether we realize it or not, and become fearful of this state of being that is obviously wreaking havoc on their parents, who in their eyes, are supposed to be  pinnacles of strength.

So how to we minimize the effect that the stress in our lives has on our kids?

First of all, it’s important to understand that stress and tension are not entirely the same things.   It is important to distinguish the difference in an attempt to unglue the association all together and examine each component in its own right. Speaking from a completely objective point of view, both inanimate and living things undergo stress.  Sooner or later the physical world exerts, in all its swirling energy, stress on everything.  Stress is a currency flowing through the balance of life itself.  Our attempts to avoid it are vain, at best. In the natural world, these stressors are simple matters that provide opportunity for adaptation.  In the human world, our civilization has created such a myriad of different frequencies that screech and scream at us every waking hour of our lives.  It is within this confusion and angst that negative tension is born.

Within the unpleasantness, we tend put things on autopilot and grind through life trying to avoid any additional stress.  We do have another choice. We could also choose to train our minds or discipline our bodies in order to strengthen our defenses.  Certainly, this is a more positive way to disperse the tension.  Either way, as long as we continue to employ a state of resistance to the inevitably of stress, we will continue to struggle against the tension rather than working with it..

Modern life demands the need for intricate decision making and consequently, grave mistakes are inevitably made.  In order to truly rise above this, it is integral to first learn to hone those frequencies and channel that energy to our own best end.

Tension; in equal objective measure, can be seen simply as a living things’ reaction to a particular stressor.   Force is exerted, and the physiological response is issued accordingly.  The wild world imposes its brutality, and organisms react to these conditions by way of adaptability or working through its fight or flight reflex.  We as a society, have muddled our pure relationship once shared with this world.  It has given rise to an intrinsic system of push and pull.  So when that formidable force pushes in on us, we become overwhelmed.  We attempt to cover our ears and shut out the noise, recoiling into a state of total passivity.  To push back with equal force is not necessarily the answer either.  This feeds in to the fight or flight instinct that doesn’t necessarily serve us in the end.

Whether the reaction is passive or active is of no consequence.  Either reaction causes our bodies to physically rebel; knotting our necks, wrenching our stomachs, and wreaking all manner of havoc on our already weakened state.  The key really is to release ourselves from the confines of our own mind.  It is there that resistance lives.  To eliminate tension, we must first realize that just as the natural order of our physical world cannot be changed, the stress of being part of it is futile to resist.  It is only in accepting what is that we can begin to take action from an equal position of reciprocation, thereby reacquainting ourselves with the symbiosis that will reestablish the balance necessary to live our lives in peace.

This can be achieved in many different ways.  To quiet the confusion, we can choose to exercise certain principles on a regular basis.  They act as a steady conduit for the unstable energy.  Meditation, physical exercise, making love and spiritual practice are all excellent ways to marry the physical world with our primordial knowing, transforming unstable energy into positive energy.  Making these practices a consistent part of our lives allows the mind to focus and the body to engage.  The process of weeding out what serves your relaxation best is an individual one.   This very process can lend positive energy to our state of mind, fortifying our resolve to continue to explore the full range of options that are available to us.  It also opens the door to a much more pleasant and conscious presence for our kids.

When we do find the practice that joins the hands of our yin and our yang, we can breathe a proverbial sigh of relief.  The stressors may be the same, but we have found a way to gently urge the reaction toward a symbiotic end.  Simply put, we begin to gain control over what we can, slowly replacing the screeching and screaming with our own clear voice.  We can now teach ourselves how to manipulate our physical lives into matter that compliments peace and joy.  New receptors are built that now have the power to channel the stressful energy and actually use it to intelligently adapt and adopt coping mechanisms, which we then can model for our children.

When we open the door to our inner well of strength through practices that honor the spirit, it is only a matter of time before we became more sentient beings.  The external chaos of this world no longer lords over our state of being, and we instinctively seek out situations that create greater levels of peace and joy.  Once we have achieved the ability to accept the stress, quiet the confusion, and channel the energy – we have not only found a way to temporarily relieve the stress; we have risen above it, soaring above physical matter and into the state of our own making.  This not only sets us free, but provides the necessary illustration for our kids so they can develop their own coping mechanisms later, as they need to deal with the increasing level of stress that growing up inevitably issues.