Stressors are what activate the stress in your body. Stressors can be anything that cause you to see, feel, hear, smell, taste or imagine that can cause you harm. External stressors can be family, cultural norms, or expectations, financial pressure, work issues, or situations such as a flat tire. Internal stressors can be less evident like the future, body image, self-criticism, or our thoughts about a situation.
Potential Responses
Stress is the neurological and physiological shift that happens in your body when you encounter one of these threats. It is an adaptive response that helps us cope with a threat. Our brain notices the threat and initiates a “stress response” setting off a cocktail of neurological and hormonal activity that starts physiological changes to help us survive. Our entire body and mind changes in response to the threat. We are hard-wired and soft-wired for survival and our body is preparing to fight or flee. If we think we can win we fight; if we think our better chance is fleeing, we run. If our brain assesses that neither will work and our only chance to survive is to play dead, we freeze and shut down.
Possible Emotions
Emotions we feel with the fight reaction can be irritation, frustration, anger, even rage. With the flight response we can feel unsure, worried, anxious, or terrified. The freeze response can cause us to be feeling immobilized, numb, or petrified, disconnected and like we do not care. With the freeze response we can judge ourselves harshly if we do not understand that our brain has produced a final effort for us to survive. Sometimes after a more traumatic or extreme stressor ends our body may shutter or shake, which can feel scary or out of control, but in doing this the body is completing the stress cycle and it is part of our healing process.
Completing the Stress Cycle
Animals naturally complete the stress cycle. After playing dead they shutter and shake to release the adrenaline and cortisol that has built up in the bloodstream. If a lion chases us, we run. Our current day stressors are more psychological or emotional than physical and our environment can limit our ability to complete the stress cycle on the spot. We need to be intentional about doing something each day to complete the stress cycle so that our bodies know that we are safe and secure. This can be accomplished through a variety of means.
Twenty to sixty minutes of physical activity is the best-known way to complete the stress cycle each day. This can be anything such as running or walking on a treadmill, elliptical, weights, Zumba, swimming, dancing and singing, or laying down and imagining yelling at someone while tensing all your body muscles then releasing them. Not everyone can do physical exercise. We will explore other ways to complete the stress cycle in my upcoming two articles.
Nagoski PhD, Emily, Amelia Nagoski, DMA. Burnout, The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle, Ballantine Books,2019.
Sapolsky, Robert. Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers, Holt,2004
