When faced with problems, I tend to sleep in. My finger is drawn to the snooze button on my alarm clock, and sometimes that urge will not be denied. When stress and consciousness wake up together, I often let my mind rock back and forth between the sounds of morning radio and the warm blanket of sleep. I tell myself it’s a way to ease into the day, but it’s really just a way to stall it for another nine, 18, 27 minutes.

Others avoid their problems in different ways. Writing for the art and faith magazine Ruminate (article not available online), Christine Jeske writes about her addiction to the shower as a way to delay the inevitable stresses of the day. It’s not an addiction to hard drugs or booze, but it’s an addiction nonetheless. Jeske writes about the “Happy-Place” where her brain floats after 30 minutes of bathing—a half hour without her job, her husband, her children, her problems. She understands her responsibility to her children, to the environment, and eventually tries to take control of her day and her shower time. “Today I have the strength to get out,” she writes. “That’s where mercy starts for me.”

Image by Mayr, licensed under Creative Commons.

Waiting for the subway, an appointment, or a boyfriend or girlfriend can be a frustrating experience. It can also be an opportunity for meditation and reflection. Writing for Tricycle, Martha Henry writes about her experience trying to find some inner quiet among the inevitable delays in life. The technique doesn’t always work, and Henry admits that she sometimes loses her cool, but it does help her find a little relaxation among daily stresses. “I’m clearly not meditating for the benefit of all beings,” Henry writes. “Rather, I’m mediating so that I won’t be bitchy when my boyfriend arrives.”

—Bennett Gordon

Image by The B's, licensed under Creative Commons.

Relax. Now. All that stress Americans carry around could be lethal. Chronic stress can lead to heart disease, gum disease, erectile dysfunction, adult-onset diabetes, and even cancer according to Eric Wargo in Observer, the magazine of the Association for Psychological Science. To make matters worse, stress appears to be cumulative. The more stress you feel, the more susceptible you are to stress. Wargo writes, “Think of it this way: Too much stress and you forget not to be stressed out.”

The problem is that there’s so much to be stressed out about. A foundering economy, terrorism, bird flu, peak oil, nuclear war, and a giant volcano under Yellowstone National Park all threaten human existence as we know it. It’s difficult to read the paper and not get stressed out.

“Nothing stresses me out more than someone telling me I need to relax,” Andrew Santella writes for Notre Dame magazine. Santella, who previously tackled the psychology of anger in an article reprinted in Utne Reader, now turns his attention to the chronic stress that may be inherent in the American character. Once dubbed “Americanitis” by psychologist and philosopher William James, chronic stress drives a world-wide industry of yoga studios, behavior tips, and pharmaceutical helpers. Santella writes that “everyone from the National Institutes of Health to the corner yoga studio wants me to do something about all that stress, all that worry, before it kills me.”

—Bennett Gordon

Image by  Michael Sandoval , licensed under  Creative Commons .