After just one phone call or e-mail from our boss or a family member that elicits a strong emotional reaction such as anger, frustration, fear, anxiety, sadness, guilt, suffering, or shame, we turn on the primitive fight-or-flight nervous system, causing us to react as if we were being chased by a predator. The same chemistry automatically stays switched on because the external threat never seems to go away. The truth is that many of us spend the majority of our time in this state of heightened arousal. It’s become chronic. It’s as though the predator is not out there in the wild, making an
...more
