The Three Stresses: Relation, Location & Vocation
This Polar Bear certainly looks like he's chillin'...and not just because he resides in the Arctic. I used to envy my cat Barnabas. I would come home from work and I'd see him sleeping in the windowsill taking in the late afternoon sun. He would have to nap, it seems, to recover from a nap. Generally, when we are under stress, it can be from three sources: Relation (with God and Man), Location (where one lives), and Vocation (what one does for meaning and money). When all three mount an attack simultaneously, people's stress levels go into the danger zone. Kind of being assaulted from the air, land, and sea. Nowhere to run and hide. So an individual has negative relationships--or no relationships, lives in bad environment--dangerous, abusive, or just plain boring, and has a crappy job--or no job. We can envision a person experiencing all three at once. What's the remedy? A pill? The bottle? Suicide? No, God is our source of help in times of trouble. If a perso...