The Cure to Stress: Be a Good Christian

The title may sound trite and trivial, but it is in fact a tome of immense profundity and one that makes the daily grind so much more rewarding and self-satisfying.

It was not produced as a religious book but, in my opinion, should be in every repository. Indeed, it would be an excellent gift for parish priests, who would find it a fount of ideas for homilies.

The author is Dr Richard Carlson, a stress management consultant. There is nothing in the book to indicate whether he is a practising Christian, or whether he is religious at all.

What I find absolutely fascinating is the conclusion that one can easily draw from this book the very methods he employs to help modern humanity rid itself of the stress of daily life is completely founded on Christian principle.

This international bestseller is a collection of 136 short essays, none of which take more than a couple of minutes to read. As the author explains, it “shows you how to stop letting the little things in life drive you crazy.”

I am a fairly intense person who likes to have all his ducks in a row, a painful perfectionist who believes that life should be perfect at all times. I was given this book as a gift by my wife about a year ago, and have found it an absolute boon in helping put things in perspective and to stop sweating the small stuff.

Most helpful of all was the chapter headed “Choose being kind over being right”. It would be an understatement to suggest that these few words could be life-changing for me. All Dr Carlson suggests here is that there are many instances when one does not need to get on one’s high horse when thinking that someone else is patently wrong about a trivial matter.

If it is not going to hurt anyone, contribute to ignorance or cause any other form of harm, it can be incredibly therapeutic to just let someone have their say without leaping down their throats and correcting them.

It is being kind to the other person, but it is even kinder to yourself because it completely eliminates the stress of feeling that one always has to correct wrongs.

Another most helpful chapter is the one about breathing before you speak. How many of us can’t wait for someone else to stop talking so we can leap in with what we have to say? I am terrible when it comes to that but just taking a breath before responding is enormously calming and it is fascinating to find how in that split second of time, one can marshal ones thoughts into something a lot more rational and a lot less knee-jerk.

The other wonderful piece of advice from this book concerns the issue of listening. I have often heard people talk about the art of listening, but I have never had it put quite into the perspective that Dr Carlson offers.

Before reading his book I thought the whole question of listening more and talking less was quite simply about being polite and getting someone elses point of view and not being dogmatic.

But, it is actually about calming stress. Dr Carlson suggests and I must say, it works a treat that listening can also be extremely therapeutic. Especially, he says, when you are going into an environment where you really don’t want to be, say at a family gathering or a cocktail party where you are surrounded by strangers.

The experience becomes a lot more tolerable when, before you arrive, you consciously decide to just listen to what everyone has to say and not feel the overwhelming need or obligation to talk.

“Making peace with imperfection”; “Gentle, relaxed people can be super-achievers”; “Developing compassion”; “Doing something nice and don’t tell anyone about it”; “Let others have the glory”; “Live in the present”; “Surrender to the fact that life isn’t fair”; and “Remember that everything has Gods fingerprint on it” these are just a few of the chapter headings.

Stress management or plain and simple Christianity? Both, actually.

Don’t Sweat The Small Stuff by Richard Carlson is published by Hodder & Stoughton, and it’s one of the best gifts I have ever been given.