Many benefits have been attributed to peace of mind or ataraxis. Some of these benefits are objectively measurable (reduced blood pressure, decreased heart rate, etc), some are subjectively measurable (perceived levels of stress, perceived levels of anxiety, etc.), and some defy measurement (mystical benefits credited to being in harmony with one’s self and the environment including: being in tune with animals and your surroundings, increases in positive coincidences, attracting wealth and health, etc.).Even without the mystical benefits, those who achieve ataraxis reap significant rewards on both the physical and emotional levels. These rewards can be divided into two categories: rewards that come from decreased “stress” and rewards that come from the time and energy liberated by maintaining a more serene state of mind (that is, a state of mind that is not burdened by worry and other features of stress).
Stress has been associated with many chronic physical and emotional illnesses. In addition, high levels of stress have been linked to impaired performance of the immune system and decreased rates of healing from acute injuries and illness. In other words, lowering your level of stress may be the single most important thing you can do to stay physically and emotionally healthy as well as to quickly recover from illness and injury if and when they occur.
Want some data to support these claims? In the book, Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers: A Guide to Stress, Stress-Related Diseases, and Coping, author Robert M. Sapolsky reports on studies that link stress to: cardiovascular disease, diabetes, gastrointestinal disease, inhibited growth and recovery, infertility, impotence, and depressed immune system performance. Depressed immune system performance has, in turn, been linked to disorders such as multiple sclerosis, respiratory infections, and cancer. Indeed, there are studies that find that “stress, including social stress, will cause tumors to grow faster in laboratory rodents, and render the rodents’ bodies less capable of rejecting a tumor.”
In the book, Adrenal Fatigue: The 21st Century Stress Syndrome, author James L. Wilson points out that the primary function of the adrenal glands is to help you cope with stress. He further notes that the adrenal glands secrete hormones in response to physical, emotional, and environmental stress and that if stress is chronic, the adrenal glands cannot keep up with the demand for the stress response hormones. Think of demand for something being greater than the supply – sooner or later, you run out.
The failure of the adrenal glands to keep up with the body’s demand for stress hormones produces a variety of physical and emotional ailments. In addition to the disorders listed by Sapolsky, Wilson, refers to Addison’s disease, chronic fatigue syndrome, and erratic or abnormal blood sugar levels. He also relates chronic stress and the related scarcity of stress hormones to an increased likelihood of experiencing allergies, arthritic pain, anxiety, depression, mental confusion, impaired attention and memory, fibromyalgia, and auto-immune disorders.
Stress impairs your ability to maintain or achieve physical and emotional health. Achieving peace of mind goes a long way toward ending chronic stress and putting stress back in its place as an intermittent but manageable condition.
The second category of rewards or benefits from achieving ataraxis come from the energy and time freed up by being less stressed. It may be obvious that if you are able to reduce the time and energy being expended in stress, you will have more time and energy for directed thinking, directed action, and for being at peace.
For most people, the most dramatic example of decreased stress and the liberating feeling associated with it takes place immediately after they have met an important deadline. Prior to meeting the deadline, stress builds both within and outside a person’s awareness. Once the project is complete (within or after the deadline), the burden created by the project and the associated stress ends. Most people will feel a palpable sense of relief and may find they are spending less time and energy worrying or “stressing” about the project.
If you are able to achieve ataraxis, it does not mean that you will never work under the pressure of a deadline or never take on an important project. It does mean that when you take on a project with or without a deadline, you will work toward completion of the project free of the burden of stress, comfortable with your efforts and able to tap energy and time that is not spent worrying or “stressing”. As a result, you will not experience a palpable sense of relief because you will not have taken on the burden of stress. But, you will have worked in a mindful and efficient way toward completing your project.
Some will object that only deadlines get them moving or that they would not get anything done without the pressure of a deadline. While common, this objection represents thinking that takes you away from ataraxis and toward mindlessness and stress. Furthermore, this objection represents thinking that fails to set or balance priorities, a type of mindless thinking. It is not as exciting (stressful) but working in a consistent, relaxed, and efficient manner toward a reasonable goal (with a reasonable deadline) achieves the rewards of ataraxis as well as any rewards associated with the project itself.
This section on the benefits of achieving ataraxis would not be complete without mentioning the mystical rewards that are often associated with being at peace with ones self. As noted before, peace of mind or serenity is viewed as a prerequisite for being connected to your spirit or “soul”. Achieving peace of mind is thought to open “space” or room for a connection to your spirit and powers outside of your awareness and greater (or higher) than you or anyone else can imagine (for example, God, Alla, etc.).
Although my observation is that achieving the state of ataraxis is a gateway to feeling in harmony with others and nature, I find that the full meaning of the feeling of being in harmony is inexpressible without limiting it through the mechanism of a belief system. It is not my intention to limit your experience of harmony with your self, with others, and with nature, by defining it. It is my intention that you experience it for what it is. I will hastily add that feeling in harmony has one benefit that I am comfortable defining. That is, feeling in harmony means NOT being in disharmony with your self, others, and your surroundings – a clear benefit all by itself.
Also, it is my hope that you will take note of the fact that all of the belief systems that attempt to define the experience of being in harmony and “connected” as well as to describe its benefits, are the work of other human beings. So, no matter how comprehensive and elegant and inspiring a belief system is, it is still the creation of a human being or beings and, as such is an interpretation of what is likely beyond anyone’s full understanding.
Some belief systems seem pure and universally life affirming. Others, seem to have an expressed bias against “nonbelievers”. Be open to any belief system and what it has to offer but be alert for mindlessness and the beliefs mindlessness generate.
With the rewards and benefits outlined, it is time to move into the prescribed thinking….
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