Stressed out

Our bodies have two modus operandi when it comes to the nervous system: parasympathetic one (aka relax and digest and heal one may add...) and the sympathetic one (flight, fight, or freeze).

Both have an important role to apply and we would not be around as species today had it not been for our ability to run from danger. Thus, stress by itself is not bad and actually very much needed.

But there is a difference between acute stress (i.e. running for your life away from burning house) and the more common chronic stress (i.e. everyday attack of various stressors that trick our body into thinking we are in danger).

The chronic stress and the resulting chronic inflammation it produces in our bodies has been pointed out as the root cause of all diseases. That’s a pretty damning accusation!

So why chronic stress is so bad?

The first thing to keep in mind that our nervous system makes no distinction between acute stress (burning house) and other stressors (like argument with your partner, a nagging boss at work, an unpleasant collegue, etc.) and each one of these stressors starts a hormonal and chemical reaction that is meant to help us run away from danger, shutting down the other systems in the body that serve no useful purpose at that time (like digestion, healing, etc.).

Second, it is important to keep bio-individuality in mind. The same event (talking about everyday stressors here) may stress one person out and have no impact on somebody else. So, it is not the stressor by itself but how you perceive it and react to it that causes the chain reaction in the body that is then largely out of our control. But, we can learn to be in position to choose how we react to some daily stressors – more on that later.

And finally, as a third point, let’s dig in deeper to understand exactly how stress affects our body. When we encounter a stressful situation, our adrenal glands release two hormones: adrenaline and cortisol. Adrenaline increases your blood pressure and heart rate to allow your heart to pump more blood to our muscles, boosting the energy supplies and allowing you to literally run away if needed. Cortisol, on the other hand, increases sugar in the bloodstream (glucose) and enhances your brain ability to use glucose as fuel. Equally important, are the things that cortisol makes our body stop doing, i.e. the already mentioned digestion but also growth and reproduction. This all makes perfect sense and indeed shows our body intelligent design when the stress is of short-term nature and then gets switched-off. The problem with the chronic stress is that we lose the ability to activate this off switch. When we are chronically stressed, there is too much cortisol in our bloodstream, which, among other things supresses our immunity (by decreasing the white blood cells that help fight off viruses) and over time leads also to an accumulation of belly fat. Definitely to be avoided ;-)

So, now that we covered the difference between acute and chronic stress, how can we go about minimising the negative effects of stress we experience in our daily lives.

First of all, it is worth having a deep and honest look at your life and reflecting on what is that stresses/annoys/causes anxiety every day for you. Can some of these stressors be simply eliminated? For an extreme example, let us imagine you are in an abusive relationship. Walking out of this would probably drastically reduce your daily stress and indeed would be an obvious (not saying easy) step to improve your well-being. But there can be more subtle examples such as job that you hate, a boss that stresses you out, daily driving to work and dealing with heavy traffic – you have more power to change your situation than you may think at first sight.

But let’s be honest. We can’t eliminate all and probably even most stress in our life. So, how do we go about mitigating the impact of this low grade chronic stress that we are experiencing. One that, as explained earlier, is having an adverse impact on our body and can over time lead to a myriad of health problems. The most important realisation here is that it is not the stress itself but how we react to it that makes all the difference. There is a great video by a psychologist Kelly McGonigal on how to make stress your friend.

There are some powerful proven techniques and practices that can help you improve your response to stress (mostly by avoiding acting on an auto pilot) and mitigate its impact on your body by better managing the off switch. I have already discussed some of these techniques in this blog, focusing on my three favourites: meditation, breathing and morning journaling/gratitude practice. But the key is to really invest some time into exploring what works for you, so that you have your own stress busting toolbox.

Apart from the three I have mentioned, other powerful practices include Emotional Freedom Technique (also known as Tapping), mind body exercises (yoga, Tai Chi, Qigong) but also other things like walk in the nature, bath, reading a good book, listening to a favourite song – it is really whatever works for you.

There are also some herbs and medicinal mushrooms that have been shown to reduce anxiety and helps our bodies adapt better to stress – hence the name adaptogens. The two that you may want to explore to support your body if feeling anxious and stressed out are ashwaganda and reishi.

I hope this post helps you look at stress differently and makes you realise that our mindset plays a huge role in how we perceive stress and how we react to it. Don’t live your life on autopilot! You will do a service to yourself and others around you.

I would be curious to know what is your favourite stress busting technique. Please share in comments here or on my account on Instagram or Facebook.

In case you need help in developing stress busting techniques in your life, do reach out and schedule a free consultation with me today.

Hello! I am Magda and I work with people that are ready to transform their health and wellbeing. What are your health goals that you have not been able to reach? Read more about me and my services.

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