Recovery from Stress and Burnout- Seeing through the Eye of the Tiger

Changing Stress into Satisfaction

 THE EYE OF THE TIGER.  It is said the eye is the window into the soul. In this web-log article I look at a stressful case history and show how looking into the eye and the soul of a stressful situation, answers and solutions are found.

OK. Many of my web-log articles about stress, overwhelming stress and burnout are about what is happening and why.  The following is a real live case that illustrates how we all can easily fall into certain types of stress because of past programming or conditioning.

 

The root cause of this stressful case came from the fact that my client’s wife told her mother personal and sensitive details of her husbands personal financial gains. This was highly sensitive because the husband had been through a six month long mega financial stress crisis of his own as a result of the world financial crisis. The stress arose from fearing that his improved financial situation could melt away so easily. He felt his financial situation was far from stable and certainly did not want anyone thinking he was wealthy again.

 

The stress trigger occurred during a convivial lunch with all the family. The client’s wife mentioned that on holiday she had bought a dress and her husband had made a present of a hat to complete the ensemble.

 

The mother and mother-in-law said to the husband sarcastically “well that didn’t melt much of your money.” Immediately the cat was out of the bag. The client knew his wife had been gossiping again, sharing his personal sensitive information. The wife immediately realised that her husband knew she had been gossiping again. The wife said, “Mother, that was rude.” The mother took her daughter’s rebuke as a personal attack on her authority as the head of the family. From that one careless gossip 3 people suddenly notchup a load more stress and more was about to errupt.

 

The mother (90 years old) retired to her bedroom and summoned her two daughters and niece to her room and immediately charged her eldest daughter (70 years old) with having the audacity to challenge her and daring to place her husband before her mother. This eldest daughter stood her ground and a violent argument ensued.

 

The upshot was that the two daughters and the niece left the room and the mother stayed in bed and refused to move or accept anything to eat or drink for two days. That is until the husband fed up with the trauma and stress the mother was causing knocked on her door, entered the room and ordered his mother-in-law to stop behaving like a child, stop the nonsense and get out of bed. As expected this caused an incomprehensible shock that broke the silence. Within a few minutes the mother was protesting and giving orders, which largely everyone ignored.

 

During the following days my client’s mother-in-law had dug up a 70 year old festering emotional hurt and accused her daughter of rejecting her all her life. A few more associated and similarly unresolved emotional issues also came to the surface. The mother then denounced her daughter as no longer her daughter and therefore a non person in her life. The daughter now felt mortally wounded as her stress levels soared.

 

A little research showed none of the mother’s accusations were true save for the daughter not being able to digest milk from birth. Therefore, her inability to suckle the mother became a twisted emotional perception of rejection. Although the 90 year old mother is fully lucid and is well acquainted with the science of genetic programming and genetic imprinting, she chooses to support her perception of rejection by ignoring known medical facts.

 

The mother has now mostly isolated herself refusing most help from her second daughter or niece and has stopped taking important medication. This had caused additional stress to circulate the entire family and a real nightmare for my lient. Now he had to live with the daily crying, grieving emotional shock of his wife as well as her fears of what happens if her mother were to die while hating and rejecting her.

 

The entire family has been touched and is in someway experiencing increased stress to certain levels. The four major sufferers are the mother the two daughters and the niece. The two husbands have lost any respect for their mother-in-law as this recent affair has confirmed all their observations of manipulating behaviours and emotional game playing. They do not much care about the argument but are experiencing increased stress as a result of the effect on their wives. Other members of the family are influenced but not really over stressed by these events.

 

Further research found that the mother controlled her family and held overall power very much in the style of a puppeteer. The mother held power by game playing and threats. These were largely emotional blackmailing. Clearly the mother was still using game playing in an attempt to hold power.

 

Though not realising the fact the balance of power had changed. This was because the mother had never happened to comment on any sensitive issue that challenged the sleeping tiger. Now a new leader has been jerked out of his neutral position, he is managing the situation from a completely different perspective. Being an observer he explained the nature of the mother’s game and attempt to regain power. Although difficult to persuade at first, the main players are now thinking with a different mind strategy thus changing their behaviour as well as gradually deleting old beliefs. All but the mother are at this stage sitting on the sideline watching and observing. This means that the mother is exhausting herself punching at shadows. It also means that the stress felt by everyone but the mother has largely melted away simply because all have understood the fear and now have a better message. 

 

The remaining and most difficult change is for the mother to understand, accept and integrate herself into a new role and behaviour. Her behaviour has activated a new leader, there is no way back. Clearly, the mother is playing the hurt game for sympathy and will take a stab at exerting the feeling of her old power. This will happen in any way she feels capable of doing and at the slightest sense of an opportunity.

 

When breaking down the elements of this case it is clearly a common scenario that can occur in any family. With a few minor modifications, the same situation happens in work environments particularly where there are longer term employees who regard their presence as invaluable or indispensable. There are a veritable army of techniques of game playing to gain and hold power. Largely speaking the domestic victims like senior management knows about most situations. Unwillingly they play into the hands of manipulators because they do not want to rock the boat. Invariably the upper management falls into the trap of fearing the damage or fallout of intervening.

 

Those responsible for playing these power games mostly know how far they can go. Invariable they eventually become overconfident or simply careless. At that time they force their own removal and there is rarely any of the perceived fallout.

 

Unfortunately the fallout has already happened in the form of considerable stress for one or more people involved, (the victims) which can so often reach epic proportions.

 

For those used to raising or coping with children, who recognises from the above case, typical child tactics to control their parents. Just as weak management chooses to overlook certain issues, is for the same reason that parents fear to deal with their child’s behaviour. The answer  to why.  Because of the perceived consequences.

 

So here is the big question. When it all goes wrong who is to blame?

 

Is it the middle or senior management for not dealing with the situation appropriately as soon as it was detected? Is it the person or others responsible for the power games with associated manipulative strategies or is it the unsuspecting victim, the person who hits the overwhelming stress? In the above case history, is it the mother or the daughters at fault.

 

Well clearly all involved carry responsibility for a share of the damage. Then there is the shock that it is the over stressed victim who carries the greatest responsibility. In this case it is the daughters who are most responsible for their own stress and unhappiness. That’s unfair surely.

 

Well, the way stress works is that fear is the key. Somewhere there is a fear that the victim turns into an insurmountable mountain. Fear changes perceptions and fear stops someone from achieving there full potential. Fear focuses one’s attention on avoiding any danger. When this happens it cuts creative thinking or experiencing new things. Fear causes unaccountable behaviour patterns usually against the victim’s best interests. Fear also takes away self confidence, self leadership and self responsibility. The mother used the ultimate fear strategy at her disposal; she stopped taking her prescribed medicines. The immediate fear this was designed to create was – oh my God what if she dies?

 

Each one of us is responsible for accepting, mastering or resolving our personal fears. No one else can do that for us. Each one of us is responsible for how we perceive, understand and deal with the emotion of fear. In failing to be self accountable we invariably cede our personal power and leadership to others. That is usually to our own considerable disadvantage. The consequences are more and more forever mounting stress.

 

Fear also causes people to corrupt their beliefs and values in the name of a quiet life and that puts additional power in the hands of the unscrupulous and the game players. The creates two stressors. Working against personal beliefs is like driving your car with the hand blake on. Considerable stress is caused somewhere inside and something will likely be damaged or break. Secondly, knowing one is being manipulated develops anotherstress in the form of feeling powerless.

 

In this case history the mother was the Queen bee because she controlled by fear. The daughters and the niece relinquished their self leadership because they could not see how they had been conditioned for all their lives.  Finally a 70 year dominance and stressor was broken because the daughters and niece were persuaded to take responsibility for themselves. They were persuaded to take back the control of their own emotions. They were shown how to stop allowing their emotions to be hijacked by game playing and well practiced strategies. They were shown how to step back from the fear of what could happen but probably will not. That meant they were no longer focusing on perceiving the worst. They were shown the difference between caring for their mother while not being made responsible for their mother’s happiness or her life. 

 

The thing that really broke the mothers control and the super stressor was when the two daughters and the niece accepted that if the Queen bee chooses to cause her own death by not taking her medication then she alone has to take responsibility for that. Once the fear had been understood it disappeared. Once the fear had disappeared the stress simply drained away, there was nothing to hold it there any longer.

 

Although the three women did not like the concept of stepping back from their aged mother, once the seed had been sown they eventually realised it was essential to their own peace. As it was, it turned out that to stop the mothers medication was not life threatening but only meant the mother would suffer more pain and discomfort. Thus, another fear and stress base guided assumption faded into non existence. The mothers false reality veils were beginning to crumble and fall.

 

This case history and short explanation illustrates that we are all responsible for our own future happiness also for what we choose to be believable truths. As one law judge once said, “The truth is a mere perception and can rarely be found.”

 

So much stress is all about false perceptions and associated fears. When one learns how to manage feelings of fear in order to find a solution life takes on a whole new dimension of possibility. It is so much easier to master stressful situations by looking for the fear factors that underpin the stress driven belief. Facing the music whether emotional or based on other issues is usually far less painful than perceived. Most people are said to dislike change and will do anything to avoid a scene or cause problems. One should always keep in mind how overwhelming stress or worse, burnout, is a terrible price to pay for a false appearance of peace.

 

What is the learning?

 

1. In any state of stress find the underpinning fear or fears.
2. Look for any long established beliefs, values or behaviours that underpin the fear aspect of the stressful situation.
3. If used correctly fear becomes a personal guidance system. GPS is to guide you to where you want to go on the ground by providing information you do not have. Fear can be described as a guidance system to understand there is some important information you are missing or ignoring concerning the situation.
4. Where at all possible obtain a clear, pragmatic, third party view of the situation that is devoid of recommendations or advice.
5. Find the message of the fear emotion. That is, the missing information.
6. Take back whatever self control you may have let go of in the past.
7. Take back your own leadership.
8. Move forward to an agreeable lower stress future.

 

Certainly it is always important to consult your doctor. The above eight points do not come easily as a rule, therefore, you may well also find considerable help in hiring a life coach specialising in stress management who will guide you through the process.

Would you like to have my personal support to guide you out of your high stress situation FREE of charge.

 

I want to publish as many case histories as possible to demonstrate how to find the deep stressors also how to take back control. 

Names, gender, places and dates are changed so there is no possible chance of recognition.

 

If you are in a high stress situation and cannot find a way out, all you have to do is ask for help. Contact me Robert Denton at robertdenton@rdcoaching-power.com with a brief description of your stressful situation.

 

Robert P. Denton

Power-mind trainer and coach