note: this concept is running on a predictive processing paradigm, approximately, but a fairly generalized version of said paradigm which seems obviously true.

target stress is the expectation of how much stress one is going to experience at a given time. a low target stress level is, for example, lying in bed before falling asleep: this is a low-activity state, the body is relaxed, etc. an example of a high target stress level would be, say, doing physical activity in the cold. low target stress is generally correlated with reflectivity and openness to change of direction; flow states are usually associated with high target stress. i claim that target stress is a parameter which you can alter explicitly if you so choose and one which you likely should be tracking.

this parameter heavily regulates pain tolerance and change tolerance, since it changes how surprising they are. hence, one of the avenues of dealing with pain, sensory issues, and the like is upregulating target stress so that the level of discomfort is no longer important/relevant to perception. chronic low target stress is basically the ever-present expectation that it is not worth it to spend energy on persisting through adversity because it is time to rest. the extreme form thereof can lead to inability to stand for long periods of time in seemingly physically healthy people.

chronic high target stress, particularly emotionally, is, i think, roughly the same thing as c-ptsd: it means constantly living in fear and eventually adaption to care a lot about avoiding pain and inability to lower stress (this is still better than having low target stress and being wrong). it is good to avoid that. it appears that in order to be healthy, people need to regularly cycle their target stress level. i do not yet fully understand this phenomenon. “self care” seems to basically describe dropping target stress really low and then taking care of all the needs that appear once they are not being filtered out, to keep them from accumulating (“self care” is also some other things).

when target stress is higher than experienced stress, you get twitchiness, anticipation, the need to exercise, and sensory underloading. the need to stim is sometimes caused by this. experiences stress higher than target stress is confusing, very unpleasant, and difficult to deal with. unexpected negative events like having a drink spille...

jeremybentham'sstolenhead

jeremybentham'sstolenhead

jeremybentham'sstolenhead

jeremybentham'sstolenhead