Stress is usually a four-letter word associated with bad things happening to you. Not sleeping, not eating – or eating too much – road rage and failed marriages. But Salvatore R. Maddi, professor of psychology at the University of California-Irvine, says stress can actually be a good thing, provided we know how to deal with it.

“Stress-hardy” people, Maddi says, see stress as a “provocation to learn rather than something that’s wrong with life.” Maddi consults with companies and public-safety agencies on stress in the workplace.

The Long Beach Fire Department in California is working with him to identify academy candidates who are stress-hardy.

“If you have hardiness, you can pull through anything that can confront you here at the academy,” said Richard Resurreccion, human-resources development consultant for the fire department.

After studying stress in the workplace since 1975 and writing academic books about it, Maddi and his wife, Deborah M. Khoshaba, have written a book intended for the public. The book, “Resilience at Work, How to Succeed No Matter What Life Throws at You,” will be out in February.

Recently, Maddi talked about what it takes to use stress to your advantage:

Q. Some people seem to thrive on stress. Who are these people, and how do I become one?

A. Hardiness is key to being resilient under stress. Hardiness is a combination of attitude and skills that stress-hardy people use to turn stressful situations into opportunities rather than being undermined by it.

Q. So, I have 40 hours worth of work, and only 20 hours to do it. How is that an opportunity?

A. It’s an opportunity to learn how to function more efficiently so you can finish the work in less time. You can learn to see what tasks are really important and do them first. If you grow and develop, the stress is easier to handle and you can finish the 40 hours of work in less time.

Q. Is keeping control of the situation the key to handling stress?

A. Well, it’s more about learning from failure. People who are only concerned with being in control view failure as a disaster. People who are stress-hardy see failure as a way to learn how to do better next time.

Hardiness doesn’t emphasize control; it emphasizes learning.

Q. Are we better off embracing stress than trying to relieve it?

A. Well, it’s a big mistake trying to avoid stress. If you don’t treat stress as something normal, and as a provocation to learn new things, pretty soon you are going to detach yourself from everything, and your life becomes the size of a postage stamp.

Q. How much of stress comes from outside pressure and how much comes from within?

A. These days, there is more outside stress because we live in turbulent times. Companies are constantly reorganizing, and there is less and less predictability. The inside pressures come from being unsure of our capabilities. The way you look at things are important so that you don’t add internal stress to the external pressures.

Q. What are the most stressful professions?

A. Life-threatening jobs such as police and fire. But regardless of the profession, stress-hardy people tend to rise to the top of the heap in that profession. Their attitude helps them use stress to their advantage, not turn away from it.

Q. And the least stressful jobs?

A. Any routine job, where you are not in a position of authority. But even less stressful jobs, such as jobs where you just do what you are told and than go home, are getting more stressful. There is less and less job security. We are in a mega-trend of change where technological advances and globalization add to the stress. I had a venture capitalist come in for psychotherapy because his job demanded that he communicate with people over the Internet while making deals. There was lots of money involved, and he had to trust people he had never met.

Q. Can stress kill?

A. Well, it kills through other illnesses. It’s been implicated in heart disease, stroke, even cancer. It also plays a role in alcoholism and drug use. Studies show that the higher your stress-hardiness level, the fewer illnesses you have, regardless of the stress level.

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(c) 2004, The Orange County Register (Santa Ana, Calif.).

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