Click on image to enlarge.

eBook Category: Health/Fitness/Self Improvement
eBook Description: Stress is something that affects everyone, usually by making them snappy and ill, and even causing death. For the rare few that properly 'use' stress, the world becomes an Aladdin's cave of potential. This book teaches you the secrets of controlling and using stress to your advantage. What causes stress--Who is prone to stress--Understanding the enemy--Understanding others--Why we always hurt the ones we Love--Our immediate reactions to stress--Symptoms of short term and long term stress--Learning coping mechanisms to deal with stress--How to use stress as an energy force--Relief from stress This book will transform your life.

eBook Publisher: Summersdale Publishers Ltd/Summersdale - Geoff Thompson, Published: 2004
Fictionwise Release Date: August 2005

1 Reader Ratings:

Great	Good	OK	Poor

"A wide-ranging book and a reassuring read for anyone feeling stressed. Guaranteed to make you take a fresh look at your approach to life."--M2 Best Books

"A superb book ... a very good commonsense look at stress ... the secret ways to harness the beast called stress are shared with the reader in an easy to read and understanding way. This book will seriously transform your life!"--Scottish Health News

Understanding the enemy is predominantly what this book is all about. They say that knowledge is power: in this case it certainly is.

We need, at the very least, a basic understanding of our own bodies if we are going to get through this life in one piece. Unfortunately people seem to know more about the engines in their cars than they do the internal workings of their own bodies. Most of us go through a whole lifetime without ever understanding ourselves, or others for that matter. The good thing about understanding yourself is that, once you do, you automatically have a very good understanding of others because biologically we are all made of the same stuff.

Understanding myself had a profound influence on the way I handled potentially violent situations in my capacity as a nightclub doorman. As a young bouncer I didn't know the first thing about myself. What I knew didn't extend far beyond what I saw in the shaving mirror every morning. The real me, the one hiding on the inside, was almost a complete stranger.

Before the doors--and whenever a violent situation reared its ugly head--my instinct was always to run away from confrontation. With the benefit of hindsight I understand this to be a natural and expected feeling. Without retrospect I felt like a coward. I felt completely alone, the only one in the world who felt this scared. My ignorance created a lot of self-doubt. I equated wanting to run away with weakness. As a beginner I allowed these very strong emotions to overwhelm me and I ran away from most of life's confrontational moments. I was the running man! And each time I ran I made it harder for myself to make a stand the next time fear came calling. With a history of defeat behind me failure became my norm. To overcome this lack I set about confronting my fears. I developed my will until it was strong enough to override the inclination to leg it every time I sensed fear. However, I still struggled with the discomfort of adrenalin and subsequently, as a fledgling doorman, I would attack my antagonists as soon as I could, usually too soon, just to get it over and done with. Customers who just wanted to vent a bit of aggression in my direction got a punch in the eye (or worse) for their troubles. I became feared very quickly, and at the time I thought this was a good thing. Now I can see how awful and also how stupid I was to think that people fearing me led to people respecting me. In a reciprocal world such as ours, fear attracts nothing but more fear and its ugly handmaiden violence. Basically, every time I felt fear I hit someone. I was the proverbial caveman, with an ugly club as my means of communication. Because of this I acquired a reputation as a hair trigger, a man who hit first and asked questions later.

As I became more familiar with adrenalin I developed a profound understanding of its mechanics. I learned how to handle anticipation for longer and longer periods. Sometimes, in the case of threats of reprisal, for months at a time.

I also realised, from talking to the other doormen, that we all feel the same, to varying degrees, some just hide it better than others. So I no longer associated the release of adrenalin and the subsequent feelings with cowardice, or even with fear. It was simply a biological preparation for what my brain thought was a life or death battle with the elements. It was natural, as natural as wanting to go to the bathroom, or feeling hungry or thirsty...