The Art of Taking It Easy: How to Cope with Bears, Traffic, and the Rest of Life's Stressors

by Brian King

My daughter hated me for the first six months of her life because as much as I tried, I simply could not lactate. Whenever I was home alone with her, I was a constant source of disappointment.

The cars on that road were not out to get you or attack you in any way. At no point that morning did hundreds of random strangers organize for a meeting and say, “OK, today we are going to make Judy late for work and drive her crazy at the same time! Here’s the plan: half of us are going to get in front of her and drive real slow. The other half are going to follow behind her and honk our horns. Now let’s do this!”

This is me, pretending to be sitting in traffic: Oh man, this traffic is driving me crazy! I am getting so frustrated! But wait, is this traffic actually threatening? Well, I guess not. Everyone is moving well and nobody is being particularly aggressive, it is just slow. Maybe I should relax and keep my mind off things until it loosens up.

But if there is nothing you can do about it, what is the point of allowing yourself to get stressed? Now, not only are you going to be late but you have got yourself all worked up with no action to take. You are sitting there just marinating in your own stress. Try not to get any on the seats.

Remember, stress is not our reaction to threat, it is our reaction to the perception of threat.

Earlier I discussed stress in simple terms using my usual “Bears and Traffic” hypothetical examples. I will let you in on a little secret, for a while I was actually considering “Bears and Traffic” as the title of this book (it sure beats “Untitled Funny Book About How to Cope with Stress”), but I decided against it because I thought it might be misleading for all those readers out there hoping to learn about animals and the cars they drive.

And another thing, Judy, you really should get your life together.

I mostly worry about my daughter, like how am I going to provide for her future, am I helping her to grow into a happy and healthy woman, and will she be attacked by bears? Definitely the bear thing.