Stress Can Actually Save Your Life
Did you know that we may actually benefit from stress? We can actually thrive on stress? That’s right, our body actually likes to adapt to stressful environments.
OK, I know what you may be thinking…that there is no way stress is good (as everyone says it is bad) and I must of snapped finally. But there is actually a naturally built-in powerful stress-response feedback system (say that 5 times fast) within us that will in turn provide positive benefits. Another fancy word for that process is “hormesis”.
Hormesis Hormesis (from Greek hórmēsis “rapid motion, eagerness,” from ancient Greek hormáein “to set in motion, impel, urge on”) is the term for generally-favorable biological responses to low exposures to toxins and other stressors. A pollutant or toxin showing hormesis thus has the opposite effect in small doses as in large doses: from Wikipedia
You can see by the graph that we can actually have good things come from small stressors. The key word being “small” or “short”.
There is a HUGE difference between that and “large” or “chronic”….as you can see on the chart, more is not better and soon enough things will take a turn for the worse. But having little stressors in our lives will actually help us to survive longer it seems.
Thrive on Some Stress
Newsweek just recently did a good story on this entitled “Who Says Stress is Bad for You” from their magazine published Feb 23rd, 2009. Below are a few good outtakes from that story:
Sure, stress can be bad for you, especially if you react to it with anger or depression or by downing five glasses of Scotch. But what’s often overlooked is a common-sense counterpoint: in some circumstances, it can be good for you, too. It’s right there in basic-psychology textbooks. As Spencer Rathus puts it in “Psychology: Concepts and Connections,” “some stress is healthy and necessary to keep us alert and occupied.” Yet that’s not the theme that’s been coming out of science for the past few years. “The public has gotten such a uniform message that stress is always harmful,” says Janet DiPietro, a developmental psychologist at Johns Hopkins University. “And that’s too bad, because most people do their best under mild to moderate stress.”
The mentally strong do survive the most stressful times and come out on top!
The stress response is the body’s hormonal reaction to danger, uncertainty or change evolved to help us survive, and if we learn how to keep it from overrunning our lives, it still can. In the short term, it can energize us, “revving up our systems to handle what we have to handle,” says Judith Orloff, a psychiatrist at UCLA. In the long term, stress can motivate us to do better at jobs we care about. A little of it can prepare us for a lot later on, making us more resilient.
Herein lies a problem. A lot of us tend to flip the stress-hormone switch to “on” and leave it there. At some point, the neurons get tired of being primed, and positive effects become negative ones. The result is the same decline in health that Selye’s rats suffered. Neurons shrivel and stop communicating with each other, and brain tissue shrinks in the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex, which play roles in learning, memory and rational thought. “Acutely, stress helps us remember some things better,” says neuroendocrinologist Bruce McEwen of Rockefeller University. “Chronically, it makes us worse at remembering other things, and it impairs our mental flexibility.”
So you see, being under short periods of stress can actually make us more productive and attentive! I can attest to this in my own life. I actually found out long ago my production on anything is best when I am under (short term) pressure. Doing things with no sense of urgency never got me anywhere, but a little added pressure and things do get done. Again for this to be healthy long term there has to be some balance, as these stressors need to be short and not chronic.
Apply the Same Rules to Exercise
We can take the same lessons into our exercise also (from the same Newsweek article referenced above):
For all of the science’s shortfalls, there’s animal research that suggests why something that should lower stress can actually cause stress if it’s done in the wrong spirit. In a classic study, scientists put two rats in a cage, each of them locked in a running wheel. The first rat could exercise whenever he liked. The second was yoked to the first, forced to run when his counterpart did. Exercise, like meditation, usually tamps down stress and encourages neuron growth, and indeed, the first rat’s brain bloomed with new cells. The second rat, however, lost brain cells. He was doing something that should have been good for his brain, but he lacked one crucial factor: control. He could not determine his own “workout” schedule, so he didn’t perceive it as exercise. Instead, he experienced it as a literal rat race.
Moral of the story, go enjoy your exercise!
Don’t get so obsessed with it and see it as a task. If you do not enjoy whatever you do for exercise, STOP doing it! Go do somthing else! There are plenty of ways to get your exercise in, so find what you actually WANT to do! (not have to)
Also remember that exercise is a stress to the body as well, one we can adapt to. BUT if you do too much of it, don’t expect “more is better” to lead to additional health and wellness…as if the stressors are too high, then you will just create a negative response long term. I see this the most in people going “cardio crazy”, and why I continually say that aerobics should not be the priority for weight loss.
Eating and Stress
Lastly we can see this model of hormesis working with how we eat. If you eat plenty (especially excess) all the time, you are not going to express much stress to the body (except perhaps just excess stress on the digestive system and oxidative damage from it).
We know that brief periods of under-eating is part of our ancestral patterns of feast-famine that our bodies were built on to survive…as you can see in just one of the many studies that prove the benefits of intermittent fasting / feeding:
“The present findings demonstrate the beneficial effects of IF on cardiovascular and neuroendocrine responses to stress. IF rats exhibited reductions in resting BP and HR, and decreases in plasma levels of glucose and insulin. Because the risks of cardiovascular disease and stroke increase with increasing BP and glucose and insulin levels, our findings suggested the possibility that IF can reduce the risk of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases.”
Source: Intermittent Food Deprivation Improves Cardiovascular and Neuroendocrine Responses to Stress in Rats (J. Nutr. 133:1921-1929, June 2003)
So there you have it, we thrive on short bits of stress. We work our best when under a little pressure. We are healthier when we stress our body into adapting and making it more resistant for the future.
It’s our lack of control of the stress over ourselves (mostly mentally) that can cause the big danger in our lives. Times are tough, nothing is easy…but it shouldn’t have to be. Most of us are not going to move to a monastery on a mountain-top to meditate full time, so we better learn how to deal with what we have going on. You don’t have to run away from things, just learn how to handle and control it. Keep your head, realize you have full control to take action in life and then just be happy one moment/action at a time.
Learn to use short times of stress to make you stronger, and you may just live longer because of it (while others who are not able to control them, take themselves into a negative downward spiral).
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I was taught in the army
“Stress is a normal reaction to an abnormal situation”.
That simple lesson completely changed my conception of stress.
Stress is good, do you think a workout would be productive if you felt comfortable the whole time. There is a guy at my gym who do only does quarter squats in the sense that it places less stress on his knees. I just want to tell him stress is how we adapt and then kick him the the back as he’s doing his half-assed squats.
Stress like most things that we naturally experience is a good thing. It has a purpose. We get stressed for a reason and it can drive performance, save or lives or any number of other positive things. Too much of a good thing though is a bad thing. Its like insulin… insulin has a purpose and performs a necessary function but too much of it too frequently is wicked bad bad.
The SoG
Scott – Exercise is a great postive stress to the body, as we have seen how the short and hard intense workouts can bring great benefit. I think the biggest thing for most people is not to get obsessed thinking more is better (hours of cardio)…as it’s not…and if you aren’t enjoying your workout, go find something else to do….as I enjoy lifting heavy stuff and running on a trail…but hate walking on a treadmill staring at 4 TVs put on news stations blaring misery and doom in my face….that is not relaxing…and probably actually takes away from my overall state of health. There is probably something to be said about people doing stressful exercise and competing all the time if they can’t learn to relax and focus. I feel great after a hockey game in which we have fun and just go play (and we usually do better that way also)…..but feel terrible (physically and mentally) after playing on a team that is too serious and bitching and moaning if they are not winning all game long. Compete for the sake of competing/challenging yourself….not for the sake of winning/losing…..I’ve learned that after 30+ years of playing hockey.
SOG – “wicked”….are you from the Northeast or something? lol
I am from the Rocky Mountains in the middle of the desert southwest actually. Not sure where I picked that up. Could be my youth skiing, childhood skateboarding, my so cal surfing days… who knows? lol
The SoG
hi. love the site and the first chapter of your book. i looked for an email but couldn’t find one. i think you have a typo on about page 4 or 5, not sure the pages are not numbered. You say ” So like the title says, “break free†from
every needing another diet book again and get back to taking full control of your results.” I think it’s supposed to be ever needing another diet book.
(I’m an editor, so it jumped out at me.)
keep up the great work.
[...] “Stress Can Actually Save Your Life“, The Life [...]
Interesting. Still… stress is good in bursts and as said, in the time of NEED. I guess you can now call it an oxymoron. It can save or help end your life… all depends on how you “use” it? That sounded odd… maybe I should rephrase that. Bah, why am I stressing… it’s just a comment! =)
Max – my email is mike@theiflife.com. I need an editor as I get dizzy looking at my own words all day long. Want the job? I pay little to nothing but can throw some free stuff your way. Tempting isn’t it? lol
FJ – Exactly….why stress over a comment.
Nice article!
I was once told by my high school basketball coach, “pressure (stress) is you telling me I have to dunk the ball or you’ll cut off my hand…”
Gave me an understanding of what stress and pressure really is, where it comes from, and how to handle it.
[...] Read the full article here. [...]
I never read the Newsweek article, but just from this authors summary it is blatantly obvious that the term stress is being equivocated upon. More importantly it is NEVER defined. For the purposes of discussion I would propose the working definition that stress is that which causes the hormonal stress response in an animal.
It is readily apparent that a percieved physical threat to our lives would provoke such a response in a human. In such a situation the human animal has a physical response to make as hasty escape as possible or is need be fight to preserve life. What happens if this stress response is triggered and the human is physically prevented from taking any action–rape victims, kidnap victims, hostages? Unless an individual is mentally and physically trained for such an event, long term exposure to the stress response trigger without the opportunity to act upon it will cause mental breakdown. The cause, as it was alluded to above is the victims lack of control. Without control over one’s situation, the hormonal stress response is thwarted, damaging the body over time.
However, as a rational animal, the human is also affected by perceived NON-physical threats. Is it not less of a threat to one’s life that food no longer provide proper nutrients, health care no longer cures illness, and even the most frugal person is robbed of most of his earnings by endless taxes and fees? What makes this threat deadly is that he has no control over it. His mind unconsciously puts him in the same position as the hostage–threated without an escape. This wage-earner’s situation however lasts a lifetime–however long it may be.
For this reason I would define stress as the unconscious instinctual recognition of a threat to our life or well-being which demands immediate action.
Dr. Robert Mendelsohn defines it more relevantly however as the constant feeling of powerlessness under the authority and oppression of the modern state. Against this feeling, FEW people can resist.
And no amount of exercise will banish THIS stress!
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[...] have seen how the body actually can thrive on “short term” stress such as exercise and even intermittent fasting. Our survival programming allow us to use short [...]
[...] exercise too). Both can be a stress on the body, and too much stress only leads to a burnout state (hormesis in [...]
[...] hormesis allowed me to be aware of how the body can get stronger through small amounts of stress. It is the basis of why I do intermittent fasting/2 Meals, short intense “burst” [...]