What Is Our Biggest Barrier To Eliminating Stress?

Dr. Mort Orman here and today I want to focus on our biggest barrier to eliminating stress.

Now there are actually many barriers.

One is that we don’t really believe that eliminating most of our stress is realistically possible.

Another is that we think only a few, very special people could ever accomplish such a “superhuman” feat.

A third is that we don’t know many people who have successfully learned to eliminate stress, which further reinforces mistaken belief #1.

There’s Something Even Deeper

As formidable as these negative belief barriers are, there I still something even deeper that is our biggest barrier of all.

This is our reluctance to admit how very wrong we are—so much of the time.

In order to learn how to eliminate much of our emotional stress, our relationship stress, our stress at work, our stress at home, our stress of public speaking, etc., we have to deeply confront the many ways we are significantly wrong about each of these things.

We have to confront how deeply wrong we are about what it means to be human.

We have to confront how wrong we are about what stress really is, where it actually comes from, and why managing stress is such a weak and misguided solution.

We need to understand the truth about where our anger, frustration and anxieties actually come from, which is very different from where most people believe they come from.

We need to stop assuming that human relationships just naturally work out, as long as all parties involved are decent, loving and caring individuals (this is a myth).

There are so many things that we have to come to terms with, and so many ways we are wrong about so many things—that this is actually our single biggest barrier to having massive breakthroughs in our abilities to free ourselves from stress.

“We Do Chicken Right”

This big problem we have is many times compounded by living in a society that constantly indoctrinates us with the notion that we always need to be right.

Even if we aren’t right all the time, our society says that we at least have to act as if we are right in order to fit in with everyone else.

Just look at how many advertising slogans over the years have either directly or indirectly addressed our insatiable appetite for being right, being smarter or having the best:

“We do chicken right”
“Coke—it’s the real thing” (i.e., the right thing)
Apple—Think differently (i.e., better)
And many others

Thus, the last thing we EVER want to do in our society is humbly and honest admit that we may be wrong.

This is a very under-developed skill set, yet it is the key to stress mastery and to making most types of stress in your life eventually disappear.

So it’s not that we lack the ability to eliminate stress from our lives.

It’s not that it requires some “superhuman” skills or intellect, which only a select few possess.

Rather it’s that we are so uncomfortable and inexperienced at honestly admitting when we are wrong that turns out to be the biggest barrier we need to overcome.

To your health, happiness and success,

Dr. Mort Orman, M.D.. International Speaker, Author And Founder Of The Stress Mastery Academy | http://DocOrman.com