Stress Control:
Willpower

Stress control is a matter of a do or die attitude of hope and willpower.

Hope is Key

The way I think about hope is that it’s not really optimism, per se. Optimism means that everything is going to work out for the best—it’s sort of a character trait, and often stressful things don’t work out for the best. Hope differs from optimism. Think of the way we use “hope”: we find hope, we grasp hope. It’s an active process, and it’s clear-eyed. It doesn’t assume that things work out for the best. In fact, it very much assesses all of the obstacles, all of the problems, all the potential for failure. And through all of that terrain of threats and difficulties, it sees a path to the future. And I think that without hope you’re nowhere. You can’t proceed. With hope, you have a chance.
Excerpted from The New Yorker Magazine interview with Jerome Groopman M.D. – 03 November 2003

Dr. Robert Eliot of Toronto’s Canadian Stress Institute and Dr. Ichiro Kawachi of Harvard say that adrenaline's stress is also powerful enough to “scare you to death” in a crisis. Even a healthy heart can be overwhelmed and simply stop beating. However, they believe that death from fright happens only when a person believes there’s no hope for survival. The spirit of hope is what will make or break you. Giving up can literally kill you. Adrenaline needs an outlet for its energy through fight or flight. Hope – the belief that you have a fighting chance – channels your adrenaline’s superhuman strength into saving your life. A crisis is hopeless only if you give up hope.

An ordinary human can overcome crisis stress and be superhuman through sheer willpower, as was Tracy Deel, an x-ray technician abducted late one night outside her apartment by two armed robbers and taken to a field. They ordered her to her knees. She refused.

"If they were going to shoot me I was not going to bow to them," she said. "I figured if I'm going to get shot, I'm going to get shot." At that point, the gunman pulled the trigger. ... "The first one hit me in the eye," Deel said. "I thought my head had blown up. It felt like a light switch had been turned off. The second bullet hit me in the mouth and I felt like I was drinking gallons of warm blood." ... Deel doesn't remember the other shots, in the head, mouth, hand, abdomen and chest. She passed out. Awakening a short time later, alone, she looked around, saw a light and began walking toward it. ... She could have just lain there and died, surrendering to the 15 gunshot wounds that riddled her body. Instead, choking on blood, one eye blown out, she picked herself up and stumbled 950 feet to find help. ... "I know it sounds bizarre, but I talked to myself as I was walking, falling down," said Deel, 32. "I would just say to myself, `Get up, bitch!' I was like, `What are you doing? You're not going to go out this way.' "I guess I was tough. Somebody was with me that night." ... "I fell down several times, but I was not going to quit," she said. "If I couldn't walk, that would have been one thing. But I didn't want to die there alone. I wasn't going to die without somebody there."
Excerpted from The Houston Chronicle – 01 June 2000

What to Expect
Not all severe injuries are overwhelmingly stressful or inevitably fatal. Oftentimes, your hope, belief, and willpower make the difference between life and death. Expect to be afraid, expect to be hurt, but expect to survive nevertheless.

"When a crime goes down, you are going to get hurt," TV’s "America's Most Wanted" correspondent and retired San Diego police SWAT instructor Sanford Strong said. "It is worth having the injuries if you are able to escape." Strong, an expert on self-defense, said some of the best advice he can give people is don't be afraid to be injured. "You cannot feel the pain when you're fighting back," he said. "I force reality. If you are a victim of a violent crime, you are going to get hurt. People freeze up unless if they face the facts."
Excerpted from The Jackson Citizen-Patriot (MI) – 16 April 2007

"Her Will To Live Was Stronger Than His"

He came to her house wearing a ski mask and carrying a shotgun. He beat the woman and raped her. But when the woman's attacker threatened to rape her 6-year-old daughter, the woman went for a butcher knife. ... That prompted a violent back-and-forth struggle. She stabbed him. He stabbed her [28 times]. They fought for perhaps as long as 20 minutes, rolling around on the kitchen floor of the woman's home. When it was over, the rapist lay dead in the yard. Police found the woman badly injured. Her daughter, though, was safe. ... "It's amazing," police said. "I suppose her will to live was stronger than his."
Excerpted from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution – 07 November 2006

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