We have all experienced stress.  We know we don't like the way it feels.  We know we wish whatever triggered it would go away or hadn't happened in the first place.  Stress is just plain yucky, right?

 

Well, here's something that might surprise you:  you are actually attracted to stress.  It sounds insane, doesn't it?  But it's true. 

 

When humans first showed up on the planet, we had nothing: no immunity, no weapons, no natural armor.  Human skin is pretty easily pierced.  And we walked the land with beasts who thought we looked yummy.

 

Because we were so vulnerable, we had to be constantly on guard.  We had to scan the horizon incessantly looking for anything that might be a threat to our continued well-being.  We didn't know what it might be.  We didn't know where it might come from.  We had no idea what chance we had against it.

 

Since you developed this instinct first thing, it became a part of you.  At the deepest part of your subconscious mind, you're still scanning the horizon all day every day for whatever might be a threat to you, certain that something bad is out there.  Pretty stressful, right? 

 

Ergo, when you know what it is you're stressed about, there's actually some relief in that.  You still know you don't like the feeling of stress.  You still wish whatever triggered the stress hadn't happened or that it would go away.  But at least you know that you survived it.  It didn't kill you, which is what your subconscious mind was most afraid of it doing.

 

Now that you know this annoying little tidbit, begin to become aware of how much more attention you give to negative things than positive things.  Good things are fine, and you're glad they happen.  But you rarely spend as much emotional time on them as you do with the negative things. 

 

Becoming aware of this fact on a conscious level changes the whole experience of stress.  The triggering of stress is a subconscious, automatic experience over which you have no control.  Acknowledging how it developed and that you're more likely to focus on the negative than the positive makes it conscious and puts you back in control.  You can decide from that position how you want to handle it and find the relief you seek.