STRESS CAN BE HELPFUL, leading health psychologist Dr. Elissa Epel reminds us in her new book, (Penguin Life). It can be motivating, energizing, and delivers the body resources it needs to meet challenges. Stress is not inherently bad, she writes, but chronic stress is. Epel catalogues stressors we need and stressors we need to “delete.” For Buddhists, many of her strategies for meeting stress in healthy ways may be familiar: relax in the face of uncertainty; loosen expectations; accept and find peace with pain; and cultivate a present-centered mind, which is nimble and flexible. Epel intersperses science-based reflections on ordinary, daily stress with a week’s worth of exercises to embrace and transform unavoidable stress.
