I'd like to begin tonight by sharing a study that I ran across, I think, in New York

times and in the title is why can some kids handle pressure while others fall apart and then it

says scientists think bouts of panic and stressful situations can be traced to genetics but don't

freak out biology is not necessarily destiny and it's a really fascinating study about how all

of us have a certain genetic combo that determines whether we are what's called warriors which

mean that we have a lot of cognitive clarity a lot of the time but come a stressful situation we

freeze and we really perform poorly in that those instances and others are warriors that might not

have the same clarity when there's no stress but when there is stress some everything falls aside

and they're you know right on it and a lot of us are somewhere in a spectrum but the point

of the study is that how we respond to stress really has a very clear genetic determination which

means it's not our fault it really is not our fault and yet kids how many kids have tests in school

be one of the main formative experiences that creates low self-esteem I mean it's one of the

great tragedies in not understanding how we respond to a you know competitive educational system

and it's beyond education it's like we all experience stressful situations and how we respond

is driven by genetics so that's one piece that it says that the other pieces that

there are ways of relating to the stress that can turn someone who's a warrior and a

someone that's actually able to handle it so it's kind of two messages which is it's genetically

determined and how you relate to it can shift your neurology around okay now the reason I got

really interested is because I see so much of the suffering that we have come down to two basic

beliefs and one is what's happening is bad it's wrong in other words the stress that's happening

is a bad thing and I'm wrong in the way I'm dealing with things and if we're moving through life

with some combo of these two beliefs that things are wrong and I'm wrong we're going to suffer

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