Fight or Flight

About the Book

A number of books have been published explaining how we can manage stress. But how can we truly manage our own stress effectively unless we begin to understand what is happening inside us and what the factors are that initiate our personal stress response? If we understand stress more thoroughly including our own levels of stress…meaning when stress is actually motivating and helpful versus when it is debilitating and destructive…then we can more specifically learn to manage our own stress. This book initially explains stress, what happens within us, the relationship between stress and emotional intelligence, the four conditions that cause stress, how the brain works under stress, and the relationship between stress and mindset and automatic thinking. In the second half of the book we discuss managing stress based on what was discussed in the first half of the book. Rather than throwing out general ideas for stress management the book presents physical strategies for managing stress, mental strategies for managing stress, emotional strategies for managing stress, and spiritual strategies for managing stress. Spiritual strategies include looking at our values, beliefs, traditions, and how we evaluate success in addition to any religious views we might hold. Stress is natural. How we manage it does not have to be a mystery.

About the Author

Gary R. Plaford, M.S.W., L.C.S.W., served as director of Social Services for the Monroe County Community School Corporation for over twenty years, has taught at Indiana University for a decade, lectures at multiple conferences, and is the author of two previous books Bullying and the Brain, and Sleep and Learning.