Understanding Stress and Why it Isn’t Always Bad
Understand Your Stress
According to The Mental Health Foundation in the United Kingdom, “Stress is our body’s response to pressures from a situation or life event. What contributes to stress can vary hugely from person to person and differs according to our social and economic circumstances, the environment we live in, and our genetic makeup. Some common features of things that can make us feel stress include experiencing something new or unexpected, something that threatens your feeling of self, or feeling you have little control over a situation.”
The Foundation goes on to explain three signs of stress:
Emotional Changes
When you are stressed you may experience many different feelings, including anxiety, fear, anger, sadness, or frustration. These feelings can sometimes feed on each other and produce physical symptoms, making you feel even worse. For some people, stressful life events can contribute to symptoms of depression.
Work-related stress can also have negative impacts on mental health. Work-related stress accounts for an average of 23.9 days of work lost for every person affected.
Behavioral Changes
When you are stressed you may behave differently. For example, you may become withdrawn, indecisive or inflexible. You may not be able to sleep properly. You may be irritable or tearful. There may be a change in your sexual habits 11. Some people may resort to smoking, consuming more alcohol, or taking drugs. Stress can make you feel angrier or more aggressive than normal. Stress may also affect the way we interact with our close family and friends.
Bodily Changes
When stressed, some people start to experience headaches, nausea, and indigestion. You may breathe more quickly, perspire more, have palpitations, or suffer from various aches and pains. You will quickly return to normal without any negative effects if what is stressing you is short-lived, and many people can deal with a certain level of stress without any lasting adverse effects.
Most of us know it’s no good to be stressed. We’ve heard that this is bad for our health and we know it can make us unhappy.
But why exactly is this? What specifically is happening in the body and the brain when we’re stressed? And did you know that sometimes stress can actually be a very good thing?
Fight or Flight Response
At its most visceral, stress is characterized by the ‘fight or flight’ response. This is how the body reacts to danger and extreme stress: by releasing a combination of different hormones and neurotransmitters, each of which will bring about different physiological changes in the body and brain.
Those neurotransmitters and hormones include dopamine, adrenaline, norepinephrine, cortisol, serotonin, testosterone, and glutamate. These are all ‘excitatory’ neurotransmitters that increase our brain activity and make us more alert, more focussed, and better able to remember the details of whatever is happening around us.
Our body also goes through several changes at this point: our heart rate increases, our breathing gets faster, our muscles contract, our pupils dilate and generally we become better able to perform physically. This means that we can either run from danger or fight an opponent and stand a better chance of winning. Blood is directed away from our immune system and digestion and towards our muscles and brain and our blood even thickens so that it will be more likely to clot if we get injured.
Chronic Stress
So stress isn’t a purely bad thing. If you were in physical danger, then this response could genuinely save your life. But the problems emerge when the fight or flight response doesn’t go away. This is what happens when we’re stressed about debt, taxes, or work. We remain constantly excited and this means we can go a long time with suppressed immune function and digestion. Ultimately, this begins to make it more likely that we will become ill or malnourished!
This is why we generally think of stress as being bad and it’s why using something like mindfulness meditation can be so useful.
When Stress is Good
But stress can also be a good thing. That’s the case when, for example, you need a little bit of motivation to get something done. Low-level chronic stress is the same stress that makes us revise for exams, save money for the future, and generally take action to try and avoid negative outcomes. In this context, the stress is called ‘eustress’ and is highly desirable.
Finally, stress can also be a good thing if you’re able to harness it for good. If you can see your situation not as being dangerous but as being a fun challenge, then you can enter something known as a ‘flow state’. Here we enjoy heightened focus, stronger muscles, and improved reactions — but none of the negatives like negative thoughts.
Stress isn’t one response but is rather a whole spectrum of different states that are moderated by different levels of specific neurotransmitters and hormones.
Mindful Meditation is one way I have found to help me to manage my stress.
“Stress should be a powerful driving force, not an obstacle.” ― Bill Phillips
Meditation is a habit that may come easily to some. I have been meditating for over five years, but there were many days I found myself slipping. These days, not so much, not since I completed the no-cost Action Habits Challenge by Connie Ragen Green, Wall Street Journal and USA Today bestselling author, independent publisher, and serial entrepreneur. You can check it out here.
If you’re interested in revitalizing your life through meditation and would like to learn a virtually risk-free, and cost-effective practice, that people of all ages can do with a little patience and guidance and that will serve you for the rest of your life, I would love to connect with you. You can connect with me here.
I’m Donna SLam, who loves to blog about how meditation brings self-compassion, peace of mind, and clarity to my life and others by sharing tips and strategies on how to live a fulling and purposeful life. I enjoy championing others to lead a healthy and happy life through meditation, walking, self-development, and spending time with loved ones.
