Stress... Friend or Foe?

Stress….The word is used frequently in our daily vernacular. It carries an ambiguous meaning, ranging anywhere from intensive labor to a purely cognitive burden. Regardless, the effects are all very real and manifest in various ways that negatively impact the health of our bodies, our state of mind, and our ability to exercise our willpower. Quite commonly, stress is described as a ‘silent killer’ implying that its presence is a slow march towards an early grave. I would like to tell you that such claims are entirely hyperbolic but there are a few grains of truth hidden beneath the exaggeration. While it isn’t the whole story, stress does have some lasting negative effects, that if not met with will degrade your quality of life and increase your rate of aging. As an added bit of nuance, stress isn’t inherently a negative. In fact, stress is necessary for the development and maintenance of your physical and mental resiliency. My intention with this article is to add some clarity to the process that is the ‘biological stress response’ and how you can utilize it to sustain your health. First, we must understand what is going on when we use this term.

What is Stress?

‘Stress’ as a term used in biology that refers to the up-regulation of specific hormones (adrenaline and cortisol) and their subsequent effects on different tissues of the body. Capital S ‘Stress’ is a holistic description of the body responding to the rapid need for energy to be expended (usually in the form of a physical threat or challenge). It can be plainly understood as a necessary process to deal with physical challenges one would encounter in the world. Energy needs to be expended to hunt, fight, another f-word that I won’t write here, and to deal with anything requiring long stretches of physical activity. While absolutely necessary for navigating the physical world safely, it also carries a psychological component as well. When someone describes feeling ‘stressed’ about a situation, this is a broad stroke description of a specific internal cocktail of hormones acting within the body. The event itself is rather non-consequential, but the INTERPRETATION of that event is causing a remarkably powerful change to the body’s internal state.

The Stress Response System

The response begins in the brain as an interpretation of a situation. This situation can be rooted in the real world (i.e. I see a tiger, time to run away) or it can be purely psychologically projected (i.e. I’m concerned about what MIGHT happen if I don’t get to work on time / meet this deadline / get good grades etc.). In both cases, real or imagined, the body is responding to the potential that exists for danger, damage, or loss. The purpose of the up-regulation of stress hormones is to prepare and mobilize the systems of the body to meet the potential risk of damage and loss. Primarily, cortisol and adrenaline act on the body to increase heart rate, increase breathing rate, redirect blood flow away from the gut, mobilize blood sugar to be ready to use, and alter brain activity to focus on the immediate threat. In a nutshell, this combination of factors is what ‘being stressed’ is referring to when using a physiological lens. All are incredibly valuable if we are in a situation that requires them, as they provide the mobilized readiness to do what is necessary to avoid a threat. Nothing good ever happens without a cost. This mobilization of resources places a physical toll on the cells, structures, and resources being leveraged.

Why Stress Damages the Body

Energy in the human body is finite and the stress response is expensive. Mobilizing that many resources and redirecting that much blood flow does not occur without trade-offs. If the stress-response is prolonged, there will be inevitable consequences to the systems undergoing up-regulated activity. At some point, you’ll deplete or desensitize different tissues or receptors (increased risk of obesity, type-2 diabetes), wear out the physical capacity and resiliency of the tissues (atherosclerosis and high blood pressure), and potentially degenerate the health of various organs (gut issues, skin issues, reproductive issues). Each of these consequences are downstream from the CHRONIC or LONG-TERM activation of the stress response, which in all cases, means that recovery is not available to rebuild, regenerate, and strengthen the pathways being used. This is the end result that the media loves to highlight and use as a scare tactic. They are very much a real result but the causes of that result are left ambiguous. What is necessary is an understanding of a dose-response relationship that allows for the systems undergoing the stress response to develop resiliency to the demands being placed upon them. Mismanagement of stress results in a feedback loop where all structures undergo some form of degeneration as a result of overuse and under-recovery. Here in lies why ‘stress-based aging’ is such a common phenomenon. The question is not ‘how do we avoid stress?’ but ‘how do we use stress?’

Stress is a Tool

As many major media sources have highlighted, Stress is a valid threat to your longevity, but it’s not the whole story. The stress response is also NECESSARY for the purpose of building and toughening the pathways of the body that allow us to enjoy our lives to their fullest potential. A world without ‘Stress’ is one that leaves you fragile, underdeveloped, and dangerously unprepared for the challenges of existence. The main distinction that must be made is that of CHRONIC and ACUTE stress. Short-term exposures of stress provide the body with a signal that it can learn and recover from. When that same stress is applied for an excessive duration, the recovery process is negated. The body eventually take too much of a beating and begins to degenerate. To try and remove stress entirely from your life is a mistake. Rather, you should aim to reap the benefits of the stress response and develop an increased level of resiliency to its use. This is the very purpose of any training program; to put the system under load and to extract an adaptive response that increases the capability of those affected tissues. The main takeaway here is simple.

1.) Cut out unnecessary stressors

2.) Increase / Maintain exposure to valuable stress-based activity.

A simple formula to express but remarkably difficult to practice. I wont bore you with the details of what constitutes BAD stress, as it is fairly intuitive. Clean up your diet, improve your sleep, use less social media, cut out drugs and alcohol, and prioritize time with friends and family. Once areas of negative stress have been exiled, you’ll have more time and energy to emphasize the addition of GOOD stress.

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What is ‘Good’ Stress?

The stress response is inherently trigger happy towards the perception of damage or harm to the body. This makes perfect sense from a survival standpoint, as it is more valuable to live another day than to end up as tiger food. A sensitivity to negative outcomes is good way to keep yourself alive, hence the stress response seems to be heavily weighted in that direction. This does not mean that the stress response is PURELY wired for interpreting the negative or harmful aspects of life. The stress response plays a role in mobilizing resources to prepare for positive outcomes as well. Anticipation of reward, positive praise, or accomplishment all trigger the same systems into action but with much different outcomes. Rather than preparing to take damage or deal with an existential threat, the body is preparing to achieve something that provides a possible benefit. This subtle difference in framing is all it takes to alter the effects of the stress response. These conditions are called ‘good stress’ or ‘eustress’, and when mobilizing stress hormones, adrenaline is the predominant hormone in play (as opposed to cortisol) which provides all of the activation and focus but none of the physiological damage. Adrenaline provides the ‘GO’ that many extreme sports athletes crave. It alters focus, inhibits pain, and has an interesting interplay with dopamine, influencing the desire to compete and amplifying the motivation to chase after reward. Aspects of life that promote this are fairly obvious. Anything that is physical and promotes a sense of self-efficacy and skill development leverage this effect to it’s most powerful extent. Whether it be learning to surf, going on a challenging hike, playing recreational sports with friends; the areas of opportunity are endless. Often times, what keep people from engaging with these activities is simply down to priorities. It is my professional opinion that one must elevate the need for ‘Good Stress’ to be near the top that list, as any alternative results in a decline in your quality of life.

Applied Stress

There is ample research suggesting that exposure to small acute doses of stress can have a positive effect on longevity. This phenomenon is known as hormesis, and it is a central figure in many physiology disciplines (exercise science included). Hormesis refers to the idea that exposure to low levels of stressors, such as heat, cold, exercise, or even toxins, can stimulate adaptive responses in our bodies that improve our resilience and resistance to stress in the future. This is sometimes referred to as the "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" effect. Here in lies the very core of what our training is intended to do. Training is simply an input that triggers cellular repair mechanisms and produces desired adaptations. Longevity and well-being are enhanced when we ensure that we are dosing stress enough to reap the benefits while providing the time and space to allow recovery and regeneration. In general, these small acute doses of stress can help stimulate beneficial adaptations in our bodies that improve our lifespans, maximize our health, and minimize the effects of aging. Stress in your life isn’t a choice but you can decide how you use it.

There will be no stopping a continued trend of sensationalizing stress as a ‘silent killer’. While you get bombarded with product after product to help you relieve your worries, know that USING stress is actually the best trick in the book to tolerating its downsides. There is no path forward without stress being a part of it. Rather than running from it, learn how to leverage it.

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