The Cause Of All Stress

June 1, 2010

Interview with Andrew Bernstein, author of the book The Myth of Stress: Where Stress Really Comes From and How to Live a Happier and Healthier Life

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Mike Carruthers:
When you get stressed out what’s really going on in your mind is that you’re thinking…

Andrew Bernstein:
Life should be different than it is - and as a result of that belief we experience a negative emotional charge.

Andrew Bernstein, author of the book The Myth of Stress, says for instance when you’re stuck in traffic you think that that experience is causing stress.

But if you look around in traffic you’ll see that we’re not all stressed out to the same degree. To me that is a big clue that what’s going on is not an externally produced process – that there’s something inside us that creates our response.

It’s fascinating to realize that when you get stressed out all that’s going on is that you wish that life were different than it actually is. And the reaction of getting stressed out seldom helps.

As an example; I was in an airport a few weeks ago and I was on the same canceled flight as everyone else, but while people were getting all worked up about it I just walked up to the person at the desk and asked if there was anything I could do to get on the next flight. And she actually took care of it very quickly and probably appreciated that I wasn’t screaming at her.

Andy says, people ask him all of the time how is it that he doesn’t get so upset over things.

People tend to think that a person who stays calm when other people are worked up that that person is doing something. But in my experience that person is actually not doing something that everybody else is doing - which is believing certain thoughts. I call it “counterfactual” thinking – we think that life should be different than it is.

To hear the complete unedited interview, click here