February Topic: Dealing With Stress

Updated: May 27, 2019

You might have heard of the recent celebrity suicides. We all mourned Kate Spade, and as for the chef who hung himself in his hotel suite, so tragedy was appalling. But why? They both had successful lives, entrepreneurships done right, they seemed to be the perfect people for the glossy cover of magazines like Vanity Fair. We don’t know much about what happened. Details aren’t usually released to the public. But what was almost certain about both deaths, was the fact that they had been caused by some kind of stress. For Kate Spade’s part, marital problems seem key; she wrote a note for her daughter, telling her she loved her, and that she should ask her father. For Anthony Bourdain, it’s more vague, less obvious, without a suicide note to pick apart.

But then, it’s not just celebrities that have this issue. There are always spates and spates of promising college students, who got that one F on a test and decided that it was too hard to face their parents. People who look so happy, so optimistic on the outside, have been known to kill themselves. But while I empathise with these tragic individuals, I’m sure we’ve all gone through stressful moments in life. The next big test, a forgotten assignment, maybe even a forgotten worksheet, these are all known reasons that are found commonly throughout school life. Perhaps finals, or maybe a musical audition that hasn’t been practiced quite as thoroughly as can be are the reasons for the anxiety pounding through your head. You could be worried about a math test gone wrong, or perhaps, it’s that one teacher who doesn’t understand anything. It might even be family trouble that’s causing all the anxiety. But whatever it is, everyone, every single human being on this planet has had to deal with stress. We’ve all had screwed up due dates, early deadlines, and impossible tasks that we just had to do right now. Our lives are hectic as they are, and it’s easy to get swept into the flow of worry and anxiety.

After all, anxiety and crippling depression are natural parts of the human cycle, right? Wrong; We can’t deal with stress so that it all goes away, but the ways that people are trying now only seem to amplify the problem. Our society seems to have the belief that not worrying out over something shows that you don’t care and that you are slacking off. Because people don’t usually want to be perceived this way, they try to cause the most amount of mental deterioration possible leading up to something large in their life. Sometimes, of course, this causes death, which usually comes in the strange form of suicide. You might not understand the reasoning behind this, so I’ll explain. People have the misconception that stress shows that you care. While this is true, stressing out too much is never a good thing.

Stressing out can cause depression, anxiety, and other disorders that completely screw up everyday life. It puts unnecessary pressure on our brains, which can sometimes cause them to collapse. There have been instances where someone has completely forgotten their entire life, just because they were under too much stress, for too long. And besides the mental consequences caused by stress, there are always the physical ones. See the baggy, purplish grey half circles underneath your eyes? And the acne, whiteheads and pimples on your chin? Those are all signs that you aren’t getting enough sleep, which is usually caused by stressing out over something in the night. Wrinkles and dark spots also show signs of stressage. People who worry over many things usually furrow their brows more often, which lead to wrinkles and creases that look unsightly.

However much these things are inevitable, we can help ourselves cope using calming strategies and looking at life from a farther viewpoint. Will it really matter in 20 years that you got this once B? Will your entire life be affected by a late project? If it really will, try hard to fix your mistakes and make the future as bright as it could possibly be. If it won’t, don’t stress.

Feb 1, 2019