Controlling Adrenaline Stress: The Battle Cry, 2

Continued from "Controlling Adrenaline Stress: The Battle Cry"

The battle cry is THE traditional means of controlling and channelling adrenaline stress. Through history, warriors who knew nothing of adrenaline -- but a lot about stress -- adopted a common technique to help them master and use their adrenaline rush in battle. We call it a battle cry. The battle cry is a decisive, purposeful, aggressive action.

• Decisive -- a battle cry has the psychological effect of strengthening your resolve by letting every level of your being know that you have made a choice and commitment to fight rather than to freeze or to cower;
• Purposeful -- a battle cry bristles with purpose, and its very presence focuses all of your energies to the end of absolute conquest of the foe;
• Aggressive -- a battle cry is fueled by adrenaline, and by its very nature, feeds the aggressive mindset you need in battle;
  
• Action -- a battle cry is an action in and of itself, which mobilizes you to further action.
  

The battle cry has another, more curious aspect: in many, it transforms fear into something that can only be described as the joy of battle. As a bonus, it often demoralizes and confuses the adversary. The "rebel yell" and the "Apache war whoop" are just two examples. These battle cries channeled adrenaline stress to increase the warriors' own ferocity while, at the same time, making their enemies' stress self-defeating.

Ferocity that is fueled by adrenaline and supported by a battle cry can occasionally be so daunting to an adversary that he retreats before actual engagement. This may frustrate you because, after you'd done everything you could to avoid a violent encounter, you finally decided it was necessary and opened the flood gates. Now the enemy is gone, and you have nowhere to direct the torrent. It's tough on your system (I know!), but it's better than what you risk in an actual violent encounter.

Oh yes . . . and happy Stevenmas (2nd day of Christmas) or the "Feast of Steven" as it's called in Good King Wenceslaus (a Stevenmas Carol).