About stress and death

Heidi writes

Women Matters Oct.23: About Stress and Death

Is stress normal in life or is it something to avoid by all means? The question is somehow useless because stress is something we cannot avoid and which seems to be even necessary to some degree to get along in life, if we don’t want to end up in endless inactivity and boredom – which then would cause stress in another way than hyperactivity or challenges do.

When we talk about stress we normally mean our perception of anxiety and overwhelm connected with certain tasks or mental states. How do we handle it? How do we digest horrible pictures or news of disgusting events like violence, crimes, wars, disasters of all kind? How much stress can our organism handle? Can we learn to become more resilient? How did we manage these moments in our lives? And how are we facing the stress creating events and news in our own lives or what we get to know about what happens in the world out there?

Many questions to which the women of „Women Matters“ try to find an answer in their last meeting in October. A new war has started, the challenges in personal life are ever present, memories of past stress experiences came up and took us to consider death. 

How do we face death? The stress is evident when we accompany a loved one in their struggle for life and their journey to death. How does it manifest? What does it do to us and with us? Isn’t it true that a high level of stress can also enable us to previously unknown resources and capacities?

The women talk about their respective experiences. Heidi reports about the months when Mark, her husband and co-founder of “The Wisdom Factory” faced death by lung cancer and finally died in a short attack of breathlessness. The other women contributed with their experiences, with their thoughts on the topic and with their confirmation of our common belief in the GOODNESS OF LIFE.

In the next meeting of November 6th, the topic “death” was still present, this time in connection with “time”. The video will be posted below.

GEtting older, the thoughts arise: How much time do I still have? What project can I reasonably still start in order to bring it to a completion? How do we percieve time? Is it accellerating or not? How can we create “more time”? And first of all: mortality tells us that we need to be mindful how we spend our time. There ius no time to waste in the last decades of life, which easily can reduce to a few years, months or even days.

It is time to think about this questions especially for people over 60! And it would be useful if also young people every now and then would ask themselves similar questions, especially: How can I use my time to create something deeply meaningful for me, my family and friends, my country and the whole world.

OUR PRESENT TEAM