Stress is not something that happens to us, but rather something that develops from within our own thinking. From the inside out, we decide what is and is not going to be stressful. Gambling may be a thrill for one person, and for someone else the cause of a nervous breakdown. For one person, having children is the purpose of life, and for another it seems like too much responsibility. Working with rape victims for one person is a worthy cause, and for another it causes anxiety. Each of these examples, as well as every other situation in life, is actually neutral, not inherently stressful.

The moment we define stress as coming from anywhere other than from within ourselves, we set ourselves up to experience it - and are too late to prevent it. Each time we describe stress as out there, we validate its existence. We then need to find ways to cope with, manage, or manipulate whatever it is we believe is causing the stress.

So, for example, if we believe it is inherently stressful to be in a relationship with someone who works evening hours (or long hours), we will look for ways to cope with that situation. We might spend energy attempting to get our partner to change his or her career. Then, when our partner resists, we say, See, I knew we had issues to deal with. I knew this was a stressful situation.

Or we might take a completely different route and commit ourselves to working on the relationship. We attend classes and workshops, read books, or see a marriage counselor in the attempt to deal with our stressful relationship.

Whatever our strategy, we are validating the need to cope with the situation - which is only stressful because we defined it that way. We never stop to question our assumption; all the classes, workshops, books and counselors we sought out assume that our initial assumptions were correct, and that we do indeed need to learn to cope with stress. With each class we take or each book we read, the belief that we are in a stressful situation will be reinforced and create more stress as a result. The more we think about it or attempt to change it, the worse it will seem, because we are validating that the stress exists outside of ourselves.

The same pattern develops and deepens whether we believe stress comes from our jobs, the world, our relationships, our financial situation, or anything else. If we don't understand where stress originates, we will either look for ways to change the so-called source (our environment, for example) or we will search for ways to cope. In either case we are fighting an endless battle.

If we can't change our circumstances, we can continue to use that as an excuse for our unhappiness, and if we do manage to change, this validates our false belief that we had to do so in order to live a happy, stress-free life. Then the next time something isn't to our liking, we will think we have to change the circumstances again, engaging in an endless negative loop of stress.

Suppose you assume that being busy is inherently stressful. If you can't rework your schedule, you're out of luck - destined to feel stress forever! If you can change your schedule, you have really compounded the problem - not solved it - because now you have validated (in your own mind) that your assumption is correct (I must change my schedule in order not to feel stress in my life).

Even if it was a good idea to reflect on and possibly change your schedule, the next time you feel stress you will assume the same thing, that you have to alter your circumstances or your environment to feel better.

You cannot effectively deal with something that, in reality, does not exist. Stress does not exist - other than in your own thinking. Your stressful thoughts are no more real than your nonstressful thoughts; they're still just thoughts. To rid yourself of the stress in your life, first understand that stress is your perception of the situation, not something inherent in it. There is not a cause and effect relationship between the events in your life and the feeling of stress.

For us busy people, there isn't necessarily a relationship between our schedule and the feeling of stress - after all, there are busier people than ourselves who don't feel that stress! It's not the schedule, it's the thinking of the people who have the schedule. Once you see there is no such thing as stress, only stressful thinking, you are on the road to immediate change and can take up responsibility for your own life. When you redefine stress as something you can control, it's possible to maintain a positive feeling, even when circumstances are a great deal less than perfect.

Excerpted from You Can Be Happy No Matter What: Five Principles for Keeping Life in Perspective, copyright 2006 by Richard Carlson, Ph.D. Reprinted with permission of the publisher, New World Library, Novato, CA, USA 94949. 1-800-972-6657