Three tips to help yourself "get out" of a stressful state

Stress is very expensive for our body. We hear a lot about the damage of stress to the body. So intuitively you want to put that stress in the "black" drawer. But let's try to dig deeper.

Stress is our body's response to psychological and physiological stressors. It can be some kind of illness (physiological stressor), news of a loved one's illness (psychological stressor), an approaching task deadline or taking a cold shower - you name it.

The body's response to stressors occurs instantaneously. Our sympathetic nervous system, which is responsible for releasing the hormone adrenaline, is immediately activated.

When stressed, adrenaline immediately deploys immune cells to fight viral or bacterial infection, activates the heart muscle (pulse increases, blood pressure rises) and other muscles responsible for movement. In other words, it sends a message to the body to do everything to eliminate the stressor (fight or flight defensive reaction is activated): destroy bacteria or viruses, escape from the aggressor, activate the brain to solve the necessary mental task.

And at the same time, when there is stress, adrenaline blocks the activity of the digestive and reproductive systems.

Thus, a person under stress mobilizes the necessary areas of the body to fight or escape from a dangerous situation.

How did stress become undesirable in the minds of many of us?

It is important to understand that it is not so much the stress itself that is harmful, but the fact that we are often unable to deactivate the activated system when the situation is back on track. Even after the stressor is gone, we keep repeating the worst scenarios in our head, the body does not relax, it continues to remain tense, waiting for threats. By not being able to turn off this system, we turn stress that may have been short (a few minutes/hours) or medium (up to a few weeks) into long-term, chronic stress. Stress becomes our daily companion. Thus, in the long run, our immune, circulatory, digestive, reproductive and other systems are disrupted.

We can help our bodies. Although there are different techniques to apply depending on the duration of stress a person is dealing with, we want to offer some tips that are suitable for almost any stressful situation.

1. step back from the situation and try to look at it from, say, a 5-year perspective. Trying to imagine how significant today's situation may look in 5 years, will its effects be significant?
2. to remember previous situations that really happened - how did you behave? What decisions did you make? Who helped?
3. have a list of supportive people you can call or write to, ask for a listening ear or advice.

In other words, let's try to turn a threat into a challenge. Let's become a lion instead of a gazelle. Let's turn on the mindset: "I can overcome this, I have what it takes to overcome this madness, this is a great opportunity for me to learn something new." And really - in a stressful situation, our body, our mind works (can work) max. efficiency. Why not take advantage of it?

Because that's easier said than done, right? :)

The recording was prepared based on neuroscientist A. Huberman's programs "Tools for Managing Stress & Anxiety" and "Dr. Elissa Epel: Control Stress for Healthy Eating, Metabolism & Aging".