Melody Mischke
Updated 2021
Is stress playing a bigger role in your life than you would like it to? For most of us, the answer to that question is a resounding YES!
Stress is a fairly universal element of the modern human experience, and while some stress is appropriate, even productive, we now know that too much stress can be quite harmful, and can compromise our health physically, mentally, and emotionally.
Ayurveda offers a beautiful perspective on stress management, but in order to better understand it, we will first explore the potential consequences of excess stress and establish a contextual understanding of the human stress response.
The Consequences of Excess Stress
When we are suffering excess stress, many systems in the body can be negatively affected: the digestive system and metabolic function (including imbalances in body weight), the cardiovascular system, the musculoskeletal system, the nervous system, the reproductive system, and the immune system.1
Excess stress can also impact our mental and emotional states, our relationships, as well as the health of our bones2 (and related tissues such as the teeth, hair, and nails). Stress tends to wear us down on a systemic level, so even though it is a contributing factor in a variety of ailments, its influence is easily overlooked.
The bottom line is that, if you know that you’re stressed (even occasionally), there is a good chance that making some supportive adjustments could benefit you immensely.
The Mechanics of Stress
The human stress response is an evolutionary adaptation that has helped humans cope with moments of crisis through the ages. It occurs in response to danger in any form—whether a natural disaster, war, devastating emotional loss, or an encounter with a powerful predator.
In the face of a perceived threat, the sympathetic nervous system floods the body with stress hormones (cortisol being the primary player), and initiates a complex cascade of events known as the “fight-or-flight response.”3 Hormones can travel anywhere in the body, so the effects of cortisol are felt virtually everywhere in the body.4
Cortisol reallocates the body’s resources; it makes more energy available to the brain and large muscle groups in order to accelerate speed and response times, but it simultaneously decreases urine production, inhibits inflammation, slows the digestive capacity, and stifles the immune response.5
These physiological changes are meant to support us in navigating (and hopefully surviving) the crisis at hand. Truth be told, the system serves us beautifully, as long as the crisis is followed by a period of rest, recovery, and recuperation, which has generally been the case throughout evolutionary history.
