It is quite common nowadays to hear that stress is affecting students and adults alike. You often hear adults lamenting that their stress is due to relationships, health, children, work issues, finance, COVID, conflicts around the world, environmental degradation and the list goes on. Students too are saying they face stress due to exams, studies, social anxiety, appearance, and future. So, it seems that stress is caused by external factors, and we are not in control of these factors. Is it really the case? Read further to understand what stress is and how to beat your stress.
All the external factors imposed on us (and we say cause us stress) can be called loads placed on us. They are either an emotional load or a physical load. Have you found superhuman strength to wrench that rugby ball off your opponent or power lifted 150kg in a jiffy at the gym or pushed your car a kilometer when it stalled. These are some physical loads you have experienced. Similarly, have you managed to stay awake throughout the night to cram for your exam tomorrow? The looming exam created an emotional load and your system responded by operating without a shutdown till early morning. Where did this sudden spurt of strength or energy come from? This was the response of your mind, body, and nervous system to the external physical or emotional load placed on you. This response is what is called Stress.
In summary, Stress is not caused by external factors, incidents, or individuals, stress is your response to these situations.
In these situations, the nervous system picked up the situation as perceived by your mind and spewed out Adrenaline from your glands which in turn made you a short-term superman. Along with the Adrenaline came spiked blood sugar and followed by Insulin from your Pancreas. After the incident, the stress hormones (Cortisol) remain in your bloodstream along with elevated blood sugar and insulin levels. This leads to a whole heap of health issues from muscle tightness, shallow breathing, reduced immunity, potential diabetes, and insulin resistance and belly fat deposition, or even heart issues.
Therefore, you need to realise that Stress is our own making and that we can train ourselves how to respond to emotional or physical loads and situations that occur to us and around us throughout the day until we stop breathing (whenever that may be)
Can you train yourself to modify your response to physical or emotional loads and avoid all the ensuing hormonal imbalances and health issues? The answer is a resounding Yes!
Yoga offers techniques based on Yoga Asanas (Postures) , Yoga Breathing ( Prana Yama), One Pointed Concentration( Dharana) or Mindfulness, Contemplation Practices ( Chintana), and Meditation ( Dhyana) practices to train your body, mind, and nervous system to respond calmly. As long as you commit 20 to 30 minutes a day to practice the above regularly (at least 5 times a week if not every day) you will experience both physical and mental health.
And for those who say, “I am too busy, I can’t find 30mins or 45 minutes a day”, I have this to say “By saying that you are busy, all you are doing is advertising to the world that you do not know how to prioritise your life needs and your time. Start making a diary of how you spend the 24 hours of your day, and you will discover that there were so many nonpriority or time-wasting activities that you could ditch to reclaim your health, which should be the number 1 priority to any human being on this planet”.
