Book Tip No. 26 (2018): The Upside of Stress. Why Stress is good for you (and how to get good at it).
London 2015.
How do you think about stress? And what do the media report about everyday stress and stress at work? You will probably come to the conclusion, like many of us, that we are exposed to stress too often, which is anything but good for us.
Kelly McGonigal thoroughly clears up this attitude towards stress, which is also due to many media reports. She is a psychologist and presents the latest scientific findings on this topic. Highly exciting result: Stress mainly harms those who are convinced of its negative effect.
The author shows in detail why the historical stress research (working with laboratory rats) has misled us and why we should change our attitude towards it for the better. Stress activates our organism, so that our performance is increased especially when it is particularly necessary. Less relevant for everyday life, but still surprising: scientific research has found that in certain extreme situations it can even be useful to artificially administer stress hormones to people so that they can better process experiences such as a disaster and avoid trauma.
So let’s not wish for less stress, but a more positive attitude towards its effects, which we observe in ourselves. Only when stress is really long-lasting and when we have no chance of escaping it, then we have to worry seriously – or rather bring about a radical change in the stress situation.
Dr. Hans-Christian Riekhof