Why You Need Stress In Your Life (14 min)
Excerpt from the Stress Prescription:
What has been the most popular class at Yale? Happiness
Berkley? Happiness
Harvard? Happiness
Topic masquerades in different names and variations, but they are all focused on the components of happiness.
At Michigan, it’s purpose.
What about at Stanford? The most popular class historically has been on stress. The actual title is behavioral biology, and it has been taught by the stress researcher and pioneer Robert Sapolsky.
This is a class that turned into seeking a life of inquiry, to better understand suffering and love and how to live well.
Too much of anything is not beneficial for our health, even happiness. Living through tough times and enduring suffering makes us more resilient and allows us to appreciate various moments in our life. If we woke up at Disneyland every single day, the rides and the tasty churros would lose their appeal after a short time, and in order to continue feeling ‘happy’, our experiences would have to continue to escalate in order for our dopamine and serotonin levels to give us the happiness feeling. This is not realistic.
The Trap of Chasing Happiness
Many of us fall into the trap of believing that happiness is a state we can permanently achieve—if only we work hard enough, accumulate enough, or perfect our circumstances. But happiness, by its nature, is fleeting. When we base our lives on chasing it, we condition ourselves to constantly seek something new, something “better” than what we already have. This pursuit turns happiness into a moving target. As a result, even when we achieve certain goals, our desire for more takes over, leaving us dissatisfied and wanting.
This state of perpetual wanting also leaves us ill-prepared for life's inevitable challenges. The focus on happiness blinds us to the deeper emotional currents of life—grief, uncertainty, and stress. These are not obstacles to be avoided but realities that must be understood and integrated into our existence.
Understanding Suffering and Love
One of the key messages in The Stress Prescription is that we must seek to understand suffering. Suffering, in all its forms, is a shared human experience. By recognizing this, we can develop greater compassion for ourselves and others. The book suggests that instead of resisting or fearing suffering, we should approach it with curiosity and openness. Doing so allows us to grow through our difficulties rather than feel victimized by them.
Love, in this context, is also crucial. Love is not only an antidote to suffering but a force that helps us navigate life with more grace. Love allows us to embrace others and ourselves in the midst of challenges, offering a space for connection and healing. When we build relationships based on empathy and compassion, we are more resilient and better equipped to face whatever comes our way.
Living Well: Beyond the Pursuit of Happiness
Living well, according to The Stress Prescription, means accepting that life encompasses the full spectrum of human emotions. Instead of fixating on happiness, we should focus on living in a way that honors all aspects of life, including the hard ones. Living well involves cultivating emotional resilience, learning how to sit with discomfort, and fostering meaningful connections with others. It is about understanding that joy and sadness, love and loss, peace and anxiety, all belong to the human experience.
By learning how to embrace life in its entirety, we can break free from the cycle of constant wanting and be more present in our lives. This perspective shifts us from chasing fleeting happiness to building a life of deeper fulfillment and well-being.
The Power of Acceptance
At the heart of this approach is acceptance. Acceptance does not mean resignation or defeat, but rather a willingness to see life as it is. When we can accept both the joys and the sorrows, we become more grounded. This groundedness is what allows us to face difficult times without being overwhelmed or broken by them. In fact, acceptance allows us to learn from suffering, to deepen our empathy, and to grow in ways that endless happiness never could.
The Stress Prescription reminds us that chasing happiness is a losing game. True well-being lies in understanding suffering, embracing love, and learning how to live well amidst the full range of life’s experiences. By doing so, we cultivate resilience, wisdom, and a more profound sense of fulfillment that transcends momentary happiness.
Get After It!!
-Austin
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