On Stress and Schedules

I think it is interesting how quickly my feelings about certain situations can change. It's also interesting to me just how much small stressers can affect a person's overall health. Yesterday I encountered a VERY small form of distress, but it had enough strength to change how I saw events in my day. Though the distress I encountered had nothing to do with my personal competence or intelligence, the stresser made me doubt my abilities. The stresser made me afraid. I felt sick, and did not sleep as well as I normally do.

Or at least I thought it was the stresser. But I was thinking about the psychology class I took last year, and recalled Ellis' ABC Model of Emotional Reactions. To briefly describe this model, imagine that an activating event, "A," produces stress. The stressor could be big or small, trivial or substantial. In general, the consequence of stressful event "A" is some kind of emotional turmoil - feeling angry, anxious, agitated, dejected, etc. These consequential feelings are what Ellis refers to as "C." The common sense view of stress would state that stressful events, "A," cause our emotional turmoil, "C." However, Ellis states that it is our belief system, "B," that determines our emotional response to a stresser. I think Ellis is correct about this - an event can only be stressful if I appraise it to be stressful. I can experience either emotional turmoil or emotional calm as a function of my belief system about a stressful experience.

One of my favourite high school teachers used to tell me that "feelings are real, but they are not always true." Clearly feelings are part of our conscious experience and can drastically effect how we see the world. But our feelings really do take root in the appraisals we form in response to stress and change in our lives. So I guess this week I am working on learning to appraise my situations differently. Yesterday I was so scared to the point of nausea, and today I feel really good simply because I changed my appraisal. In fact, I felt so good that I took a break tonight and didn't do any work (and that's a big deal for me).

On schedules: mine is filling up, fast. Projects, exams, labs, meetings, work...and hopefully some fun, too. Stress is inevitable when you are a university student so I am going to commit to reminding myself to check out my belief systems to be sure they are logical and realistic so I can minimize my negative emotions. I was also reminded of an important verse in Psalm 118:8 today that has to do with all this:

"It is better to trust in the Lord than to take refuge in man."

And in my own personal translation, I think that verse should read "It is better to trust in the Lord than to take refuge in [Erika]." God's ways are so much higher than mine...I am learning to trust Him more in all things.

On September and Staying Up Late

I know spring is supposed to be the "time of new beginnings," but for me it is September. It has always been September. I look forward to learning new things, seeing a blank page in the front of my notebook, and figuring out how to balance my school/work life. I look forward to beginning my journey in a professional college at the U of S and all the challenges and triumphs it will bring. I even look forward to riding a Saskatoon city bus for the first time ever!

I am feeling the need to see something foreign--I want to travel but now is not the time so I will just travel in my mind...through biomolecules and red blood cells or something like that.

I look forward to riding my bicycle in the cool, crisp air of fall instead of the scorching winds of summer. I embrace September with open arms.

Despite all plans to go to bed early tonight, I ended up having no motivation to do so. I find it hard to sleep when I have lots on my mind so I try to do various tasks instead. The late night extravaganza began with assisting my brothers with a writing assignment that they put off to the last minute. And then it turned to learning a couple new songs. And then it turned to a few mindless games of Minesweeper. And now I have math equations and formulas and graphs running around my psyche because I have a math test in 11 days even though school hasn't even started yet.

And now I am thinking that having really cozy pajamas is really great. My pajamas are a privilige and I am grateful to have them. They even have a pocket built into the shirt. You may not know this, but having a pocket in your pajamas is a really great feature. Really! I love my pajama pocket and I use it often.

Anyway - this post clearly does not really have a point. I love September and I don't like staying up late.