How to beat worry and stress with the five second rule

Stress

“What am I doing?” I asked my self siting on a dusty stair in my school years. “What am I doing? Is this life? Is this it? Why am I stressed out?” I was not sure what to do as a mute book worm teenager whose ultimate goal was to please my superiors. My life was a closed book with chapters of stress and pain. Obsessed in the dilemma of the modern education where I suffered to keep my grades high while the rest of the world having fun. Without such sacrifice, the fulfilment of desire was impossible. But no matter what I did or no matter how I got on the top of the class every time, there was a gap between what I got and what ‘I should have got’.

I remember one day my perfectionist father told us to study and get good grades at schools with out him telling us what to do. And we did. I stood first, getting better grades than the rest.  Back home I was delighted , but soon to realise that wasn’t enough. That is nearly improbable. And it made an impact. This means what ever I get , there is more and i don’t have celebrate, i have to work more. (Is that good? I don’t know.)

No matter I am good at something there is more waiting for me… And I found myself sitting on dusty stairs, years after, asking myself what am I doing. Is life…?

What is stress anyways? Why am I always stressed? Stress for me is body’s pressure under the unknown. Like fear, it is a tool that makes us cross the river with great care. It gives us the temporary glitch of mind and body and assist us fight the fight with attention and fiercely.

But what if the stress become part of life? What if it overwhelmed us and makes us prisoners. This is where the problem arises.

I will show you one trick that helped many people get rid of unnecessary and irrelevant stress out of their life. This trick is called the 5 second rule of author Mel Robbins.(she even has a book on it, very powerful) Mel Robbins says “motivation is garbage”. Motivation, especially that you see in YouTube or motivating oneself does not come handy when we need them or when we are trapped in the problem. Emotions like stress and fear are not real, they are illusions created by mind to keep us safe.

For example, a classic man has to fear of the unknown or what is beyond the forest, as his life depends on it. These who don’t fear will let their way in to the forest and lose leg to wild animal or human enemy. However; in this age fearing what is beyond the block is ridiculous. There is better security today and we don’t fear ambushing enemy or wild animal. But the hard-wired fear in our DNA or stress from ancestor’s gene gets us weak in this age. (Don’t get me wrong here a little bit fear is useful A little bit stress is nice. Because that is what helps us graduate on time or get the work done on time.)

Back to the five second rule. Mel says the best way to get rid of stress, fear, procrastination, not getting up on time, not being on time to  meeting you scheduled weeks before is to snap your mid out of the negative.

And she says if you can do that with in five minutes of the time when these thoughts emerge in your mind, then you can beat them to death.

Here is how you can do that.

When you want to get up in the morning and you feel to sleep some more ,don’t think about sleep or don’t stress about your waking up or even don’t motivate yourself out of bed. Just circle your hand from the back part of your head to the front side and count 5-4-3-2-1 and run yourself out of the bed. When stress comes to your mind don’t stress more to get yourself out of the stress. Just count 5-4-3…and affirm yourself or change your location or talk to people.

This technique is not actually new. Years before I learnt about the 3 second rule for starting conversation with a girl you want to talk with. The technique is basically to be unique of the guys out there. Most guys want to talk to a girl in front of them but stress out. They give reasons not to do that. ‘’she is not looking back. she is serious. Who is she with. I will talk to her if she notices me again’’. And almost every time they depart without talking.

The three second rule is different. You should be able to say anything, I used the technique as well to test its effectiveness. ‘Are you next to me?’’ I asked a Turkish girl who sits next to me on a plane. ‘’Are you the one?’’ I asked a black girl who sits next to me on a bus. ‘‘Hi’’, I said smiling with in three seconds and with friendly eye contact that silently begs for acceptance.

Ignoring my point of making myself a pickup magnet(oups), the five seconds rule is so powerful it can help you become independent from fear and stress. The secret is not to overthink in the moment.  Just kill your thinking mind and do the spontaneous.

My life is a stress indeed. But it is up to me to be in a zone that I need to be. I shall do whatever to change my mind and my experience. And I shall snap my thinking mind out of the experience and become a better man.