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On Being Sane in an Insane Place:
Fostering Immunity against the Perpetual Stress Response
Richard O'Connor, PhD
Contemporary culture with too many decisions, too many hours, and too many fears has us
caught in a fight-or-flight mode, stuck in the left brain, and cut off from our souls and
bodies. We know now that constant production of stress hormones not only kills brain cells,
but damages the immune, endocrine, digestive, and reproductive systems, literally wearing us
out. Rates of depression and addiction, as well as anxiety and personality disorders, continue
to increase, and new stress-related diseases like IBS and CFS that no one knows how to treat
occur with more frequency. In fact, we're just chasing our tails when we treat the symptoms;
instead, we need to help our patients identify their stresses and plan their strategies. In this
workshop we'll learn how to gain control of stress, live our lives mindfully, deliberately, and
without illusions, and to integrate the instinctual brain with the logical brain (the left
hemisphere with the right and the heart with the head).
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