How to avoid hurry sickness and lead a better life

• Simplify your life. Avoid machines of all kinds. Buy fewer things.

• Throw away unnecessary documents.

• Get regular fresh air.

• Don’t use a car. Take public transport.

• Go for country walks. Nature is the most neglected therapy of all.

• Avoid long-distance commuting. Work and shop near your home.

• Go home from work earlier. Long hours don’t make you more efficient.

• Get more sleep. Lack of it lowers your resistance to disease. Stop watching your watch. Don’t cram your schedules. Stop pacing, seething or twitching.

• Take all your holidays.

• Relax, play sport or music, develop a hobby.

• Exercise regularly. Eat sensibly, don’t smoke, drink alcohol moderately.

• Laugh. Don’t bottle things up. Talk to someone.

• Co-operate, don’t compete.

• Plant a tree and watch it grow.

7.3.4 Yoga helps to relax

A: I, personally, do yoga when I’m really stressed. A large vodka tonic does help, sure, but yoga helps me to just relax enough so that I can sleep properly during the night and then I get out of that cycle of not sleeping, and, you know, not eating properly and, that seems to help a little bit with me.

B: Well, not sleeping is the first thing that happens to me if I’m under stress. And it’s only quite recently that I’ve realized that the best thing to do is not to try to sleep. What I tend to do now is I get up and make a cup of tea, camomile tea rather than tea with caffeine or tannin in it. And I put on a video of something that’s fairly lightweight and I will sit. But it’s the same with all stress, really, you have to, as you say accept that you are stressed and try and breathe deeply and be sensible. There’s no point in worrying because it’s not going to change anything and you have to try and think that way. It's easy to say that, it’s easy to give advice; it’s more difficult to actually do it. But I think I’m getting better at it.

A: One of the things is that when you are stressful you start breathing very shallow. You’re not taking oxygen down into your body panicking, you tighten up and you’re taking little shallow breaths, so there is, you know, a good reasoning for that.

B: Heavy breathing and deeper breaths. I think that’s my sort of solution to my stress.

7.3.5 Alternative Cure 1 An unusual present

The best present I ever received started as something of a joke. A cousin, a keen orientalist, brought me a pair of steel Healthy Balls from a journey around China. The balls are slightly smaller than billiard balls, lacquered in green, hand-painted with Siberian cranes and tree-covered crags, and contain a melodious chime. Held in one hand, the balls are circulated first one way, then the other. The benefits of exercising the hands, particularly for old people, were apparently discovered during the Ming dynasty (14th—17th century).

At the time, although my cousin did not know it, I was suffering badly from RSI, or repetitive strain injury, in my hands and wrists. Every joint and tendon felt as though it was on fire. I was under intense pressure to finish a book. But I was reduced to less than ten minutes’ typing on the word processor at a time and then I would have to rest my hands for several hours.

At first, I found it almost impossible to rotate two balls, partly because of the cramped state of my hands, and partly due to an inherent lack of dexterity. Not until a physiotherapist suggested that I try manipulating the balls in a hot bath did it become easier. I began to notice a temporary easing of the worst symptoms. Within a couple of days, the difference was so marked that I could work at the keyboard for up to 20 minutes at a time with relatively short breaks.

By the end of two weeks, the pain had gone, and 1 was able to work normally. If I went for a day or so without manipulating the balls, however, a little of the burning sensation would return and the tendons in my hands and wrists would start to tighten, although not as badly as before.