If we're working for someone who criticizes a lot or who uses the threat of punishment or demotion or firing as motivation, we're bound to be much more stressed than others. If we have an instructor who focuses on trivialities in order to determine a grade, we're also doomed to focus on those trivialities and stress ourselves out, for we know in our hearts that those trivialities aren't worth our time. I had an instructor like that in one of my graduate programs. I would have spent that entire semester stressing out over his trivialities, but instead I focused on things that were much more important to me. I saved myself three months of stress that I would have undergone for no reason at all.
Stress is an ignorant state.
It believes that everything is an emergency. At times I rush about with such intensity that it must look to others as if someone is chasing me. Every emotion and mental attitude we are host to creates after its kind. So when we forget to stay centered, our bodies begin to weaken, our thoughts become confused, our words are less careful, our decisions less sure.