Mindfulness & Stress

If you experience every day as an emergency, you will pay the price. -Dr. Robert Sapolsky

Mindfulness

Mindfulness is a skill that we all have and can develop, the ability to be more deeply present with our body, our thoughts, and our emotions. Practicing mindfulness can lead to very deep levels of relaxation, calmness, and inner balance, as well as to a greater sense of control and more effective coping with stressful situations. Mindfulness also helps us to respond creatively to pressures and demands, rather than blindly reacting out of habit. Mindfulness connects us to our intrinsic wakefulness and allows us to inhabit our lives fully.

As a stress management tool, mindfulness meditation can help us:

• Lower blood pressure and basal metabolic rate
• Bring awareness to our habits
• Cultivate inner calm
• Live in the present moment (not lost in anxiety about the past or future)
• Notice negative thoughts and their effects on stress
• Create a sense of spaciousness in our lives
• Keep things in perspective
• Build up emotional and mental reserves for stressful times

Stress

Up to 80% of today’s health problems are related to chronic stress.

Stress is caused by a pressure or demand, called a “stressor.” Stressors can be external or internal. When you are walking across a street and have to dodge a car running a red light, the car is an external stressor. Thinking, “I am so stupid for letting this happen” or, imagining a bad argument that might happen later, are internal stressors.

Internal stressors can cause the same or more stress than external ones. It is useful to reflect on what internal stressors you create for yourself.

But what exactly is stress? When confronted with either kind of stressor, the mammalian brain releases powerful hormones that trigger biological changes.

These changes include the heart beating stronger and faster and rerouting blood flow to muscles. Our digestive, immune, and reproductive systems largely shut down. Some kinds of learning and memory, and growth (in children) are suspended. When the perceived challenge is over, the body returns to a state of relative rest (“recovery”), in which our non-emergency capacities can function again.

The reason for our stress is to maximize resources for a response to a critical situation.

Stress is intrinsic to life – it can help compel us to action and can give us a heightened awareness and perspective. The body and mind need stimulation – and they also need to relax.

info@stressreductionatwork.com
(415) 820-1533