Stress is real. Its’ impacts on our health is real. “Desserts” is stressed backwards. Well, racecar is racecar backwards. So what?

We can give ourselves some easy on/off stressors to create the stress “response” in the body so that we’re more resilient for oncoming issues…but sometimes it’s like thinking that cold showers every day will protect us from being lost out in a blizzard. Those cold showers aren’t going to do shit when it’s 30 below and you’re waist deep in snow. Your sprint workouts aren’t going to help you when the cougar is 20 feet behind you either. There are circumstances that we can do our best to prepare for, but not always are we going to come out unscathed. Your hours of meditation practice is exactly that – practice. You don’t always know what you’re going to encounter, or how to handle it, until “it” actually happens.

Stress can wear on your mind. It can make you think things that are not even remotely true. While thinking those things, those bad bad naughty things that aren’t even remotely true, you’re beating yourself up, both physically and mentally. Before you know it, the beating that you’ve put on yourself is going to make you more susceptible to anything negative around you…including that pesky “common cold.” Gaaaaaaaaaaaahd damnit.

Last night, I felt great. With a surplus of exercise under my belt, multiple cold showers, healthy eating, and meditation by the late PM hours…the body felt pretty good. With a distraction of martial arts and friends later in the evening, the mind felt good too. On the drive home, the mind starts to wander, but is still quite content from all the productivity the soul went through. Upon arrive home and reaching some comfort food of SOUP (SOUP of all things?!), the body snapped. The congestion began, sneezing, runny nose, lethargy…all the signs of that motherfucking common cold. Knowing that all the ducks had been put in line for optimal health… there was only one thing that could be the culprit – STRESS.

Now, obviously it’s just the common cold. There’s no COVID, there’s no flu, nothing too severe… just a mild annoyance. In order to fully enjoy your total health, you have to have it taken away from you. At least just a little bit, anyways. If you’re always feeling amazing, do you even know what “amazing” feels like? If I’m always hot, how would I know what “cold” feels like? You probably get where this is headed, right? Right.

This could have been avoided. With so many people around me getting sick, I could have isolated myself in a room away from every and any living being. Let’s do one better…we could have lived in a big inflatable bubble so that way no one could even come in contact with me. Or we could live a life where we’re pampered and the only stress we ever endure is when Jeeves is too slow to get my caviar when I ask for it. I guess he’s due for a lashing. I feel bad when I have to beat my butler. How could you make me do this, Jeeves?

Now, we cannot avoid stress. In fact, stress is necessary for growth, for change, for development. Without stress, we’re going to be the same boring fucks we always have been. “It builds character,” I think my dad said all of once to me, but the stereotypical father said it daily overtime he made you do chores. Stress turns coal into diamonds. Stress makes muscle fibers stronger. Stress teaches you how to perform. Stress is necessary. Why it can drain us and beat our immune system is way too scientific for me to explain, but it does. Then you leak out of your face, blow air explosively and yell really loudly at the same time, while almost falling asleep 5 times in a single day. I’d rather have large diamond muscles, but instead here we are…. surrounded by crumpled tissues and drinking gallons of tea. Paradise.

To never endure stress is to live a life not worth living. It’s our job to manage it better, most definitely. But to know how to win, you must first know how to handle loss. This, my friends, is a loss. To allow stress to defeat me, well.. that’s on me. Knowing that I was under mental duress should have been an indicator for me to meditate more, to do some breathing exercises, to drink another gallon of tea. There should have been elderberry, zinc, and quercin in an IV bag waiting for me. There were precautionary actions that should have been taken in that state of awareness. Oddly enough, I’m still mystified that EATING SOUP is what set off this sad state of affairs. “Tom ka” why you do dis to me?

But like it says on my board behind this monitor – “Everything is opportunity.” This is my opportunity to take an evening to rest. This is the evening to work on regaining my health. This is the evening where we take some time to enjoy a hobby while wrapping myself up in 8 blankets. This is the evening where we can have tacos as we didn’t get to celebrate our Taco Tuesday. This is the evening where we can watch the Patriots game, sans the alcohol (womp womp). This is the evening where we can write down all the things we would have done, had we felt better.

The lesson we can take from today’s loss is that we need to prepare better when we sense the internal adversity. When undergoing an onslaught of stressors and you’re aware of it, it’s your job to nip it in the bud. Distractions are fun, but they’re not going to rebuild your energy. Harvard did a study and actually found that not only does the “wei-chi” field exists, but that on that outer shell of the field will be a layer of bacteria. The wei-chi field is really just the energetic “personal space.” So when you feel people enter your field, they’re bringing in both their germs and their energy. We can fight off their bacteria, but in Chinese medicine they would say to build up the strength of your field so that you’re able to handle others’ energy.

Yup. Take it how you will, but coming from someone that RARELY falls ill to anything, you’re gay. Sorry.