“Of course not!” I bet you would hasten to reply, were you here with me now.

However, even though we cannot feel it by using one of the known senses we all experience some form of stress in our everyday life. In this case, how can we argue that we feel stress? With which of our senses?11 Allow me to enlighten you.

The answer is that we can feel our body’s responses to stress, as well as its immediate effects. We can also observe how someone perceives and experiences stress.

As will be discussed later, both the perception and the responses to stress caused by identical events may vary substantially between two individuals.

“Real” stress

The midnight news on Uranus ended with the weather forecast.

“Tomorrow Monday the temperature will range between 18 and 23 degrees Celsius. The S.P.I. (Stress Particle Index) may exceed the 250 S.U. (Stress Unit) safety limits, while there is the chance of local storms.”

The citizens of Uranus prepared their anti-stress umbrellas for the following day and went to bed. You see, on Uranus, stress fell from the clouds in the form of visible yellow and blue polka-dot particles and was … quite painful!

If you are an earthling you may find this news strange, but it’s probably the inhabitants of Uranus who would be puzzled to find out that on Earth stress cannot be seen, felt, smelt, tasted, or heard. That lifts do not have special mechanisms that produce vibrations and sounds to terrify claustrophobic people. That, buildings don’t have hinges to move around and terrify people who suffer from fear of heights. Uranians would be surprised to hear that on Earth stress exists only between the ears of each earthling and not a foot away from under their very nose.12

According to the weather report, there will be a stress storm tomorrow. I must remember to take my anti-stress umbrella and … helmet!

So, what is stress? Here is one of the most popular definitions:

“Stress is the response of the body to any event that threatens – or is perceived to threaten – our well-being and exceeds (or at least we think it exceeds) our ability to cope with it” (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984).13

Good or bad?

Can stress be positive? Record your response to this question: Yes … No …

Pressure and stress is the common cold of the psyche. – Andrew Denton

There is a slight confusion in the use of the words stress and anxiety. Let us clarify the issue. Stress refers to the demands for adjustment, without necessarily distinguishing between the negative or positive emotions associated with it. Anxiety, on the other hand, refers to negative emotions only.14

The answer to the question above is “yes.” There is positive (eustress) and negative stress (distress). In fact, a certain degree of stress is necessary in life, as we will see further down, in order to experience what Dr Peter Hansen calls the joy of stress!

Does eustress also pose a threat?

Indeed! Except, these threats are less intense compared to the effects of distress. One could even argue that the physiological responses to positive and negative stress are similar, as illustrated in the example below.

A mother learns that her son has been killed in the Second World War (the letter with the bad news took some time to arrive, because it was mailed by regular and not express post). She is shattered, she shakes, her blood pressure rises, she wobbles, stutters and, considering her old age, potential consequences could include a stroke or heart attack.

If she recovers and survives until next week, she will offer us the opportunity to examine an example of positive stress. Let us assume (this is our story, we write the script) that mum survives.

Within the next week, her son, who was mistakenly presumed dead, returns (he walked all the way from Japan; that is why he was late) and, not having mum’s mobile number to inform her of his imminent arrival, rings the doorbell.

His mother, upon seeing her beloved son, reacts in a manner very similar to last week, when she was informed of his apparent death. She is shattered, she shakes, her blood pressure rises, she wobbles, stutters, she is a week older now and as such, a stroke or a heart attack could again be imminent.