Stress Humour
Quick Reference
How To Stay Stressed
Although the De Anza Health Office long been an advocate of stress
management, stress, tension, and burnout are still common complaints of
students, faculty, and staff alike. On account of this, we have come to
the following conclusion: YOU ALL WANT TO STAY STRESSED! The following
provides you with a few reasons why.
- STRESS HELPS YOU SEEM IMPORTANT.
- Anyone as stressed as you must be
working very hard and, therefore,
is probably doing something very
crucial.
- IT HELPS YOU TO MAINTAIN PERSONAL
DISTANCE AND AVOID INTIMACY.
- Anyone as busy as you are certainly
can't be expected to form emotional
attachments to anyone. And let's
face it, you're not much fun to be
around anyway.
- IT HELPS YOU AVOID RESPONSIBILITIES.
- Obviously you're too stressed to be
given any more work. This gets you
off the hook for all the mundane
chores; let someone else take care
of them.
- IT GIVES YOU A CHEMICAL RUSH.
- Stress might be considered a cheap
thrill, and you can give yourself a
"hit" anytime you choose. But be
careful, you might get addicted to
your own adrenaline.
- IT HELPS YOU AVOID SUCCESS.
- Why risk being "successful" when by
simply staying stressed you can
avoid all of that? Stress can keep
your performance level low enough
that success won't ever be a threat.
- STRESS ALSO LETS YOU KEEP YOUR
AUTHORITARIAN MANAGEMENT STYLE.
- The authoritarian style of "Just do
what I say!" is generally permissible under crisis conditions. If
you maintain a permanently stressed
crisis atmosphere, you can justify
an authoritarian style all the time.
Are you worried now about how to stay stressed? You'll have no trouble
if you practice the following clinically proven methods:
- NEVER EXERCISE.
- Exercise wastes a lot of time that
could be spent worrying.
- EAT ANYTHING YOU WANT.
- Hey, if cigarette smoke can't
cleanse your system, a balanced
diet isn't likely to.
- GAIN WEIGHT.
- Work hard at staying at least 25
pounds over your recommended
weight.
- TAKE PLENTY OF STIMULANTS.
- The old standards of caffeine,
nicotine, sugar, and cola will
continue to do the job just fine.
- AVOID "WOO-WOO" PRACTICES.
- Ignore the evidence suggesting
that meditation, yoga, deep
breathing, and/or mental imaging
help to reduce stress. The
Protestant work ethic is good for
everyone, Protestant or not.
- GET RID OF YOUR SOCIAL
SUPPORT SYSTEM.
- Let the few friends who are
willing to tolerate you know that
concern yourself with friendships
only if you have time, and you
never have time. If a few people
persist in trying to be your
friend, avoid them.
- PERSONALIZE ALL CRITICISM.
- Anyone who criticizes any aspect
of your work, family, dog, house,
or car is mounting a personal
attack. Don't take time to
listen, be offended, then return
the attack!
- THROW OUT YOUR SENSE OF HUMOUR.
- Staying stressed is no laughing
matter, and it shouldn't be
treated as one.
- MALES AND FEMALES ALIKE - BE MACHO.
- Never ever ask for help, and if
you want it done right, do it
yourself!
- BECOME A WORKAHOLIC.
- Put work before everything else,
and be sure to take work home
evenings and weekends. Keep
reminding yourself that vacations
are for sissies.
- DISCARD GOOD TIME MANAGEMENT SKILLS.
- Schedule in more activities every
day than you can possibly get done
and then worry about it all
whenever you get a chance.
- PROCRASTINATE.
- Putting things off to the last
second always produces a marvelous
amount of stress.
- WORRY ABOUT THINGS YOU CAN'T
CONTROL.
- Worry about the stock market,
earthquakes, the approching Ice
Age, you know, all the big issues.
- BECOME NOT ONLY A PERFECTIONIST BUT
SET IMPOSSIBLY HIGH STANDARDS...
- ...and either beat yourself up, or
feel guilty, depressed, discour-
aged, and/or inadequate when you
don't meet them.
Family Stress Test
From: tmorris@scofflaw.convex.com (Terry Morris)
As part of a seminar I recently attended on stress in the workplace,
I was given a packet which included a family stress test. Our family found
that all of the questions fell into what we considered the "wuss" category,
and generated our own family stress test:
Score 0 if the statement is never true, 1 if it is rarely true, 2 if
it is sometimes true, and 3 if it is always true.
- Conversations often begin with "Put the gun down, and then we can
talk".
- The school principal has your number on speed-dial.
- The cat is on Valium.
- People have trouble understanding your kids, because they learned to
speak through clenched teeth.
- You are trying to get your four-year-old to switch to decaf.
- The number of jobs held down by family members exceeds the number
of people in the family.
- No one has time to wait for microwave TV dinners.
- "Family meetings" are often mediated by law enforcement officials.
- You have to check your kid's day-timer to see if he can take out
the trash.
- Maxwell House gives you industrial rates.
Scoring:
- 30 - a perfect score. Welcome to the neighborhood!
- 20-29 - You are doing reasonably well, but still have too little
going on in your life. Crank it up.
- 10-19 - You have mastered some of the aspects of the stress-filled
life, but still have a long way to go. Have you considered
a parallel career path?
- 0-9 - Enjoying all that extra time? What do you do anyway?
Terry Morris tmorris@scofflaw.convex.com
How To Relax
- Indecision is the key to flexibility.
- You can't tell which way the train went by looking at the tracks.
- There is absolutely no substitute for genuine lack of preparation.
- Happiness is merely the remission of pain.
- Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.
- Sometimes too much to drink isn't enough.
- The facts, although interesting, are irrelevant.
- The careful application of terror is also a form of communication.
- Someone who thinks logically is a nice contrast to the real world.
- Things are more like they are today than they ever were before.
- Anything worth fighting for is worth fighting dirty for.
- Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.
- Friends may come and go, but enemies accumulate.
- I have seen the truth and it makes no sense.
- Suicide is the most sincere form of self-criticism.
- If you think that there is good in everybody, you haven't met everybody.
- All things being equal, fat people use more soap.
- If you can smile when things go wrong, then you know someone to blame.
- One-seventh of your life is spent on Monday.
- By the time you make ends meet, they move the ends.
- Not one shred of evidence supports the notion that life is serious.
- There is always one more imbecile than you counted on.
- This is as bad as it can get, but don't bet on it.
- Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty and the pig likes it.
- The trouble with life is that you're half way through it before you
realize that it's NOT a "do-it-yourself" thing.