Want to reduce stress? Find a purpose in life
On the way to work this past Monday morning, I was listening to NPR for lack of an audiobook I haven’t heard a million times, and listened to an interesting story.
A group of psychologists in Chicago asked student volunteers of different ethnicities and races to take a subway ride and gauge how they felt in surveys at each stop. The idea was to gauge their stress levels and test a specific idea: if those who feel as if they have a goal to work toward in life feel the same stress as people who don’t. (See http://n.pr/1nQ6JJl for the whole story.) Predictably, the results showed no stress in the volunteer group who felt they have a purpose in life over those who don’t. The reason? People who have a goal they are working toward don’t focus on situations the same way those without a goal do.
An interesting study, to be sure, but its not the study that got my attention. It’s the idea that stress is better dealt with if one feels they are doing something worthwhile for themselves.
The notion seems counterintuitive. People who want to reach lofty positions and goals – think of kids who want to grow up to be politicians, or a doctors – should be much more stressed because of the work required to reach a particular goal.
Instead, they feel less stress. In fact, they typically live longer than those who feel more stress in their lives without a purpose, according to another study mentioned in the NPR report.
What I find interesting about this particular news report is that it doesn’t take into account people like me, who strive off of stress and do their best when it comes down to the wire. What, if anything, are scientists supposed to make of that?
Stress, after all, is something of a strange beast. It’s great for situations where the fight or flight instinct in humans and animals alike kick in, but it doesn’t help the body much for the kinds of pressures put on people today in a civilized world. All the adrenaline essentially is wasted inside our minds, causing us to make mistakes when we are trying to finish the paper, land a big account or simply survive in today’s economy.
I have somehow been able to live without letting too much stress effect me since I graduated from Auburn, even without having a grand design figured out for my life. During situations where I find myself frustrated, furious or full of fear, I typically try counting to 20 in my head and remind myself of every mother’s famous dictum: “If you don’t have anything nice to say, Kevin, then don’t say anything at all.”
Having a purpose in life is a fantastic way to stay sane. It doesn’t have to be much of a goal either.
My goals have always been to work for a great newspaper (check), go to Auburn University (check) and eventually write a best selling novel. (Unchecked.)
Not much of a list, is it? Sure, there’s other stuff too. Marriage, family, the whole nine yards. Those are all common goals to strive for overall.
I’ve never read Rick Warren’s “A Purpose Driven Life,” but I bet it has similar advice in it: the best thing you can do for yourself is to not just set a goal for you, but a goal that will benefit other people.
See what’s wrong with my goals? All of them focus on the self, an not on how it will effect other people.
The best kind of purpose to find, in my opinion, is to find a dream that will do something good for the community, or the nation, or heck, even the world.
Purpose isn’t just limited to ourselves, but the country as a whole. America has shown its best when the people who make up our great country are united with by a common cause. Be it war, a space race or even flaunting prohibition, when Americans get together and put their minds to something, they can achieve anything.
I believe more than anything a lack of purpose is the cause of greatest sorrows for this country over the past few generations. Some will say it started with Vietnam and Civil Rights in the 1960s, when America’s dividing lines politically started to truly spread deep roots into all areas of life. Some say it was later, when Americans went through turbulent times in the 1970s and 1980s.
Regardless, I feel as if America is wandering aimlessly without an overall purpose. All we do now is bicker about partisan issues that don’t do much other than allow cable news networks to sell more advertising.
For a country that used its might to help win a world war, and its brains to send men to the moon, we can be doing so much better than we have in the past.
We need a purpose people, not just for ourselves but also for our whole nation. It would, I believe, take out a lot of stress. What our national purpose might be will be for all of us to decide together.