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After reading all of the Sapolsky books, I'm fascinated and saddened by how much impact long-term psychological stress can have on Human health. It seriously wr
by afpx 9y ago
After reading all of the Sapolsky books, I'm fascinated and saddened by how much impact long-term psychological stress can have on Human health. It seriously wrecks havoc and can subtlety restructure the brain in ways that can be difficult to reverse.
But, yet, Humans also seem to relish in displaying how much stress they can withstand while acting like it doesn't effect them at all. It's a sick badge of honor. I've seen people tolerate and even feign enjoyment of high-stress lifestyles for decades before finally succumbing to it.
Nowadays, when I even feel the slightest bit of stress response continuing for longer than a day, I try to completely remove myself from the environment that could be causing it.
- jfoutz 9y agoCulture relishes how much stress one can handle. Not humans. It's a learned behavior.
- chippy 9y agoDepends on definitions. One could see that a human can relish dealing with the challenge of a freely entered stressful situation. For example, giving birth.
- cpncrunch 9y ago>Culture relishes how much stress one can handle. Not humans. It's a learned behavior. It might define how much stress people try to handle. But it certainly doesn't define the limit of what you can handle (which is completely out of your control).
- ngold 9y agoAs a bit of a person that enjoys quit times. Jump into a crowd every now and again. Just to keep the blood running.
- chrismealy 9y agoSapolsky writes about a certain amount of stress being good for you. IIRC he cites a study about people in retirement homes do better if they are made to do chores.
- manmal 9y agoPerhaps they don't feel better because of the stress, but in spite of it; finishing chores means that you are useful to your community, and this certainly feels better than feeling useless and waiting for death to come.
- fernly 9y agoThere's a fairly well-known study (I could find a ref if wasn't too lazy) showing that people in retirement homes who were made responsible for the care of a potted plant, lived longer on average than a control group who were given a potted plant but told the staff would take care of it. Just having a responsibility keeps people alive.