Examples of life stresses

Typically, many daily stressful events and hassles are minor but frequent (e.g., someone in front of you is driving 45km per hour in a 60km zone; you have misplaced your car keys and you are in a rush, you overcooked tonight’s dinner, you feel scared for no real reason, you tell yourself you are ‘not terribly competent’ because you didn’t do something as well as you would have liked, etc).

However some daily stressful events can be moderately challenging but less frequent (e.g., having an argument with a good friend/partner, your washing machine breaks down, you worry that you are a complete failure, etc).

While others, are usually far less frequent, but are highly challenging (losing your job, having a car accident, splitting up with your partner, etc).

Optimum stress levels

Some level of stress is necessary for optimal performance, but we need to keep stress balanced or at the right level. That is – not too little and not too much – as the picture below demonstrates.

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