Free Superhealing: Engaging Your Mind, Body, and Spirit to Create Optimal Health and Well-Being (ARC) by Elaine R. Ferguson Page A

could some-
    times have a positive effect by stimulating creativity in those who didn’t seek to avoid change. His research—different studies conducted in the last thirty years—has proven that stress can be beneficial

    CHAPTER ONE: Your Superhealing Mind-Body Connection 43
    when it’s treated as a challenge. People who handle stress well share key personality traits, which Dr. Maddi cal s “hardiness attitudes and skil s.” 26
    From 1975 to 1987, Maddi conducted a landmark study of mid-
    level executives at Illinois Bell Telephone, a division of AT&T. In 1981, they faced losing their jobs as a result of the breakup of AT&T.
    Because it was an extremely stressful time for so many executives, the number of heart attacks skyrocketed, to the point that a coronary care unit was created at Illinois Bel ’s corporate headquarters. Two-thirds of the managers fell apart from the stress of the company’s downsizing. They had heart attacks and strokes, suffered depression and anxiety, and got divorced. But within this group of executives, there were also those who thrived in the face of severe adversity.27
    Although the managers in the second group were similar in age
    and ethnicity to their counterparts, they held a different perspective.
    Among the managers experiencing high levels of stress, those who
    showed “hardy attitudes” experienced fewer mental and physical il -
    ness symptoms. Those attitudes entailed a commitment to the job,
    an amazing sense of challenge, excitement in response to adversity, and a critical perception of self-control. These managers didn’t just survive, they thrived! They also rose to the top at Illinois Bell or at competing companies. 28
    The point is that no matter how bad things get, if you’re com-
    mitted, you will stay involved and give your best effort rather than pulling back. If you are strong in the attitude of control, you will tend to perceive yourself as in charge of your destiny, and you will try to influence the outcome of events rather than lapse into passivity. You thereby have the greatest likelihood of influencing the outcomes occurring around you. Sinking into passivity and powerlessness seems pointless to those with hardiness traits.
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    PART ONE: Your Superhealing Mind
    If you believe that change is normal, you will be more able to treat change simply as a challenge. If you are strong in the attitude of challenge, you will think that your life will be most fulfilled if you continue to learn and grow in wisdom from your experiences, whether
    they are positive or negative.
    Together, the attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge
    provide the foundation for turning stress from an emotional disaster into a growth opportunity. Dr. Maddi believed that the hardy attitudes of commitment, control, and challenge are the best description of human courage in action.29
    Several additional studies have demonstrated that hardiness mod-
    erates the stress-disease relationship. In combination with social support and physical exercise, hardy attitudes provide protection from stress-related illnesses, despite genetical y inherited vulnerabilities to certain diseases. Research psychologist Paul Bartone was commis-sioned by the U.S. Army to study military personnel in various stressful circumstances, including peacekeeping and combat missions. He
    found considerable evidence that the less hardy the attitudes were, the greater the likelihood was that life-threatening stresses and the culture shock of military engagement abroad would lead to mental
    breakdowns such as depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.30
    From all these studies, we can conclude that our behavior, guided
    by our personality traits, influences the way we live and how well we can adapt to life’s unpredictable trials and tribulations. Our perceptions, attitudes, and emotions are the keys to open either the doorway to health or the doorway to disease.
    But how do we open the doorway to health? In the next