Can Knowledge Be A Cause of Paranoia?

Leadership Lessons (for yesterday’s piece): First-aid can be applied to relationships. Upon injuring somebody’s pride or self-esteem, you can reduce further injury by applying apology. Draw into the affected relationship, new value. Add value to the strained relationship by using relaxation. Learn to be less tense in future conflicts. Conflicts are inevitable, even with the best of friends or colleagues. Our choices of interventions matter, if we are to seek the results we desire. Build bridges, not destroy them. You never know if the colleague you disliked could one day be your employer.

Is this a possible cause for alarm? Extreme endurance training may be bad for the right ventricle of our heart. Could this be a cause of sudden death?

The more we learn about stuff, how much of that affects you? When you say that you have learnt, does that mean that you apply your new-found knowledge? When it comes to health matters, research material, new facts, clinical evidence, testimonials from patients and doctors, and the like can shift our equilibrium of what we belief, and how we behave. What leads us to feel anxiety, concern and fear? Can too much head knowledge be count-productive and counter-intuitive to our attitude and psyche?

Spend time with argumentative people, and you may acquire their trait. Arguments are more fun when you have loads of knowledge. A lack of knowledge leads to poorly structured arguments, with superficial grounding. If we spend too much time with people whom are hypochondriacs, manic-depressives, and those suffering from depression – can we become like them? Conversely, how do once-negative people become positive? More importantly, how do you stay positive-minded amongst a school of negative-minded colleagues?

As my student shared with me today: ‘Accidents do not occur accidentally! Our energies are transferred from person to person, from thing to thing.’ Respect things as much as you would people.

First Aid & Post-Recovery Strategies

Most people will skip this post thinking that it is a feature on medical first-aid. In fact, it is more. It also pertains to your leadership.

Having healed from injuries, and suffering a few residual ones (stiffness, inflexibility, rheumatism) I have learnt a few useful techniques about self-healing (versus self-medication, which I do not condone especially if you have an existing disease or medical condition or are under medical supervision) that may help you accelerate or exacerbate the painful symptoms of physical injury or trauma.

The sports-aid methodology of RICES holds. RICES is Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation and Support. It helps reduce further damage to the injured part, and treats mostly the symptoms; in most case, this is the preferred result when you are suffering from pain. Pain indicates something is wrong, so pay heed to the source of pain. Is it localized? How wide is the area of impact? Which visible signs of injury can you detect?

1)    With immediate injury from bruising or physical contact, use ice as soon as you can. Ice-therapy reduces the temperature of the injured area, reduces further inflammation, tissue damage, and lessens pain.

2)    A day or two after injury, you can apply deep tissue self-massage to relieve the tightness. One trick is to apply enough pressure on the sore or tender area, for about 5-10 seconds. You can feel it relax. Acupressure – using the fingers as acupuncture needles – can help provide relieve to the tensed muscle. Upon suffering trauma, most muscles tighten into ‘knots’ that are tender spots, and can be gradually softened with direct manual or mechanical contact.

3)    Some physical activity, however mild, draws nutrient-rich blood to the injured area. You can do supported, low-impact activity in the swimming pool or do light, high-cadence, spinning on the stationary-bike or walk.

4)    We are what we eat. GIGO: Garbage in, garbage out. Focus on higher quality foods that provide all the six major nutrients: carbohydrates, protein, fats, water, vitamins and minerals. Herbs can help by accelerating the cleansing and repair processes, however seek a trained TCM specialist for consultation.

5)    Because repair of damaged tissues take precedence, consume slightly more protein for the next few days. Also, consume more antioxidant-filled foods like juices of pomegranate, tart cherry, concord grape and blueberries. If you can consume the fruit all the better.

6)    Monitor the injured area for prolonged pain, or expanded pain. Seek immediate medical attention when you detect peculiarities such discolouration of skin, sharp pains, and reduced mobility (broken bones and fractures can impede movement and breathing).

7)    Sprained (torn) and strained (pulled or over-stretched) muscles take longer to heal because these are soft tissues. Use ice to reduce muscle swelling and when stretching do not exceed its flexibility or you will trigger the stretch reflex.