YOUR BRAIN ON STRESS

Your Brain on Stress

When you’re stressed, you feel unsteady. Your heart beats faster, you lose focus, and your muscles tighten. Your mind races with ‘what if’ thoughts and negative declarations. You counter quick solutions to try and lessen the stress. Eventually, you refuse to feel uncomfortable any longer and transition into doing familiar activities that make you feel better. This pattern is called your stress, and believe it or not, everyone has one.

The activities you crave to do—watching mindless TV, eating junk food, overconsuming alcohol, impulse spending, etc.—might take your mind off the stress, but it doesn’t build your resilience towards managing your stress most effectively. Rather, it becomes another distraction keeping your brain unchanged from the stress it is experiencing.

The purpose of stress is to detect danger and protect ourselves from experiencing harm. When we’re stressed, our body produces cortisol—a stress hormone that energizes and motivates us to resolve the stress. Our body’s automatic stress response is pre-programmed to alert us to run away from hungry lions and avoid touching hot stoves, which is how we want it to react!