Dealing with Stress - Part I
As we know, in our professional life and in our personal life, we are constantly dealing with and managing stress. In Dr. John's August 29th 2006 podcast, he dealt with this issue from an interesting perspective, focusing on the effect that stress has on your body, how to recognize stress and how to de-stress.
Dr. John began by reminding us about the harmful effects that negative emotions can have on your body. Negative emotions cause the body to respond by releasing hormones, that can be helpful if released in moderation, however in the context of a stressful situation, these hormones become harmful, and can actually reduce the amount of blood flowing to your heart.
Dr. John elaborated, explaining that adrenaline is one of these hormones which can be very damaging to the your body when it reaches a high level and remains for too long in the body. It increases your heart rate and blood pressure, prevents deep breathing, and tenses up your muscles. If you are chronically stressed, the constant presence of these harmful hormones results in a decline of your immune system functioning, you will lose bone and muscle mass, and your fat will accumulate at a faster rate. Memory and learning capability can also be impaired.
Dr. John identifies a little-known fact. In regard to stress, it is not so much the stressful big events (such as a death in the family) which cause the most damage. Rather it is the little things that are slowly killing us. The daily accumulation of little stressors does the majority of the damage because it takes a constant toll on our body.
Things like traffic, deadlines and running late cause chronic stress, and as these factors put a constant strain on the body, you cannot rest enough to properly recover.
In a future blog, we will talk about some of the suggestions that Dr. John has with regard to avoiding chronic stress and changing your lifestyle to eliminate stress.
All the best,
Ian and Suzana.
