This article looks at stress, how it impacts your body, and how mindfulness and meditation can help relieve stress.
Disclaimer: This post includes affiliate links, and I will earn a commission if you purchase through these links. Please note that I’ve linked to these products purely because I recommend them and they are from companies I trust. There is no additional cost to you.
Stress has become a common part of everyday life for many of us. So common that there’s a good chance most of us don’t realize how stressed we truly are. But even though we may not notice the stress, our bodies certainly do. They send out warning signals when they first sense something is off, and we’re often just too busy to notice these signals.
While short bursts of stress are okay and sometimes even good for you, chronic stress can have a range of negative impacts on your body.
The good news is our bodies are resilient. So while we can’t eliminate stress from our lives, we can learn how to notice it and help ourselves through it, so our bodies can regain some calmness and get back to functioning optimally.
Here’s what you need to know about stress, how it impacts your body, and how mindfulness and meditation can help.
What happens to your body when you’re stressed?
Stress is a natural response to life events. It happens when a situation triggers a biological response in your body. When your brain receives the message that you’re facing a threat, the hypothalamus, a gland at the base of your brain, sends nerve and hormonal signals out to the adrenal glands.
The adrenals then release hormones like adrenaline, which is responsible for putting you into fight-or-flight mode.
Once adrenaline is released, it quickly gets to work, making sure your body is ready to face danger or get away from it. Your heart speeds up, you breathe faster, and your blood vessels contract so your muscles receive blood more quickly. Adrenalin also inhibits insulin release.
As insulin processes glucose, inhibiting it means more glucose is available in the blood to maintain your energy.
The adrenals also release another stress hormone, cortisol, which dampens nonessential bodily functions, like digestive and reproductive functions. These processes are energy-demanding for your body, so it shuts them off to divert more energy to your brain and muscles.
While stress can help face or escape a dangerous situation or even help when you’re under pressure, such as working to a tight deadline, it can take a toll on your health if your body doesn’t get the chance to bring itself back to baseline levels.
6 Signs you may be suffering from chronic stress
1. Digestive issues
You might attribute changes in bathroom habits to food intolerances or allergies. While this may well be the case, chronic stress could also be playing a role. Your gut is linked to your brain through the gut–brain axis, so stress in the brain can cause stress in the gut too.
Because cortisol slows down digestion, you may experience heartburn or acid reflux. You may also have constipation, nausea, or diarrhea as the intestines may tense up under stress.
2. Insomnia
Cortisol doesn’t just play a role in your stress response. It’s also involved in other bodily processes, like waking you up in the morning. You may have heard of melatonin, which your brain makes to help you feel tired and fall asleep at night.
In the morning, you get a surge of cortisol, which suppresses melatonin and helps you wake up. If your cortisol levels are chronically elevated, it could lead to suppressed melatonin levels in the evening, making it difficult to fall asleep.
3. Recurring headaches
Because your muscles tense up when you’re stressed, tense muscles in your head and neck can lead to a feeling of pressure in your head, a consistent dull headache, and migraines. Research also suggests that reduced sleep quality can lead to more painful headaches, so if chronic stress is causing sleep issues, this could also contribute to headaches.
4. Skin problems
Research shows that stress also impacts the skin. Stress hormones are also produced in skin cells, which can cause inflammation, making conditions like acne and eczema worse.
5. Irregular menstrual cycles
Stress can also impact your menstrual cycle. As well as signaling stress hormone release, your hypothalamus is also responsible for communicating with your pituitary gland. Your pituitary gland then tells your ovaries to release estrogen and progesterone to regulate your menstrual cycle.
Because cortisol shuts down processes that are unnecessary for you to survive when in danger, such as reproduction, it can lead to disruptions in your cycle if cortisol is chronically elevated. Irregularities in estrogen and progesterone can prevent you from ovulating, and you may get delayed periods, light periods, or start missing your periods altogether.
6. Recurring illness
Chronic stress can impact your immune system. Your body’s white blood cells are responsible for fighting off pathogens and cortisol interferes with your body’s ability to make certain white blood cells. It also impacts the white blood cells receiving signals from your body to fight illness.
So you may get sick more frequently when stressed, and for longer periods too. Poor sleep quality also suppresses your immune system, so stress-induced insomnia also increases your likelihood of getting sick.
See also 10 Foods That Help boost the Immune System.
How mindfulness can help with stress
Our minds are incredibly powerful, so if we can figure out how to use the mind in helpful ways, we can lower our stress levels. Mindfulness can help achieve this.
Mindfulness is all about paying attention to the present moment through awareness of thoughts, feelings, sensations in your body, and things happening in the environment around you. It’s also about acceptance of yourself and your experiences. So you observe your thoughts and feelings without judgment and without labeling them as “good” or “bad.”
Stress often takes us out of the present moment, as our thoughts drag us down roads leading to all sorts of scenarios that may or may not happen. It also causes us to rush so we don’t notice where our thoughts are going, the signals our body is sending us, or the little moments every day that can help us feel good.
Additionally, if you’re having constant stressful thoughts, your brain will always be getting the message that something is not quite right.
It will then keep you on edge in case you need to confront or escape danger. Stopping to take in your surroundings and pay attention to your breaths, surrounding smells, and your thoughts helps your brain realize that you’re not in immediate danger — allowing it to reduce your stress response.
Research shows that incorporating mindfulness into your day can provide various psychological, physical, and social benefits. It can help you regulate your emotions and lower stress levels. Some research shows it can even physically change your brain by altering structures that increase concentration, memory, and positive emotions.
So, how do you get some mindfulness into your day?
Find mini moments of mindfulness
You can find various moments throughout the day to incorporate some mindfulness and bring yourself into the present moment.
In the shower
In the shower, you could take a few moments to notice the sound of the water running, how it feels on your skin, and what your thoughts are doing.
While driving
While you’re driving to work or dropping the kids off at school, you could pay attention to what the steering wheel feels like under your hands. Take some deep breaths into your stomach and notice how your breath feels in your body.
Upon waking
When you first wake up in the morning, you could take some long deep breaths into your diaphragm, squeeze and relax your hands and feet, and notice how the mattress feels pressing up against your body.
Engage your five senses
Whenever you notice yourself feeling stressed or overwhelmed, it can be helpful to engage in your five senses: touch, taste, hearing, smell, and sight.
Using your five senses to notice your surroundings can help ground you to the present moment. It enables you to move your focus away from thoughts that are causing you stress and shift it towards what’s happening around you, allowing your body to calm down from its stressed state.
Sight
If you’re inside, focus your attention on an object, like a mug, observing the shape and color. If you have a pet near you, observe them playing or watch their belly move as they sleep. If you’re outside, you could watch the clouds drift in the sky or find a flower to admire.
Touch
If you’re inside, you could run your hands under water and notice how it feels, rub your hands together, or stroke or cuddle your pet. You could walk barefoot on the grass or lie on the grass and brush your hands through the blades if you’re outside.
Some research suggests that allowing your body contact with the earth can have positive health effects, like stress reduction and increased immune function.
Hearing
Take notice of any sounds happening around you, like a pet barking or purring, the pot boiling, rain on the roof, or wind in the trees. You could even put on your favorite music or listen to birds singing and cars driving.
Smell
Diffuse some essential oil. Research has shown that holy basil essential oil can help decrease stress levels, and lavender essential oil can help relieve anxiety. If you’re outside, you could smell some freshly cut grass or flowers in the garden.
Taste
You could chew some gum, sip a hot drink, or grab some food. Taking a moment to savor things like food has been shown to make us happier. If you don’t have anything on hand to taste, take a few moments to think about the distinct flavor of your favorite food or drink.
How meditation can help with stress
Meditation is a set of techniques that’s been used for thousands of years to increase awareness and focus attention. With meditation, you can become more aware of the thoughts and images continuously flowing through your mind, and you can detach yourself from them.
It’s not about controlling your thoughts; it’s about learning that your thoughts don’t have to control you.
Many types of meditation can be practiced, and all provide health benefits. For example, research has shown eight weeks of mindfulness meditation lowered cortisol levels in some participants and increased sleep quality.
Other research showed that eight weeks of daily 13-minute meditation increased attention and enhanced memory and emotional regulation in the study participants.
Mediation and your brain
Mediation can also cause physical changes in your brain. This is called neuroplasticity, meaning your brain can form new connections based on new information, sensory inputs, and development.
Research has shown that participants practicing mindfulness meditation decreased activity in the brain’s default mode network (DMN), the region responsible for mind wandering and rumination.
In another study, meditation increased the thickness in nerve density within the hippocampus, which is responsible for learning and memory.
Also, meditation decreased the number of brain cells in the amygdala, the part of the brain involved in sensing and stress. In addition to structural changes in the brain, participants also reported better psychological wellbeing.
3 ways to incorporate meditation into your life
Because there are many mediation types to choose from, you can do some research and exploration to find the right way to meditate for you. Here are some tips to get you started.
1. Do some breathwork
Meditating can be as simple as taking deep breaths, where your inhale is shorter than your exhale. For example, you might breathe in for a count of three and then out for seven. You do this for 5–10 minutes, just paying attention to your breaths. Whenever you catch your mind wandering, return your focus to your breath again.
When your exhale is longer than your inhale, it triggers your body to relax. This is because it stimulates the vagus nerve, running from your neck to your diaphragm.
Your brain gets a signal that it should activate your parasympathetic nervous system, which is your “rest and digest” state. Doing this type of breathwork could also be handy for helping you relax in bed to drift off to sleep easily.
2. Scan your body with your mind
Body scan meditations can be a helpful way to notice tension in your body that you otherwise may not realize is there. If you’re short on time, even just 5 minutes will do.
Start by getting comfy, sitting or lying down, and bring your attention to your environment. Then turn your attention to your body, either closing your eyes or by holding a soft gaze. Take a deep breath in and out and notice the feeling of your body on the floor or chair beneath you.
Then starting from anywhere you like, scan over your body with your mind. As you do, notice the sensations in the different parts of your body. See if they are tense, and try to relax them. Once you’ve made your way around your body, gently bring your awareness back to your surroundings.
3. Go for a walk
Walking meditation is a mindfulness practice that incorporates movement. You can do it anywhere you have space to take a few steps.
Once you’ve found your spot, take 10 to 20 steps in a line, going at a slow pace. Pay attention to each step, and when you reach the end of that set of steps, turn around and go back the other way.
With each step, notice how your legs feel when you lift them and put them on the ground. When your mind wanders, use the sounds and sensations of your steps to bring your attention back to the present moment.
The bottom line
Stress is a common occurrence in our lives and can lead to many negative effects on our health. Mindfulness and meditation can help relieve stress and even structurally change your brain.
By incorporating small moments of mindfulness and meditation exercises into your day, you can help your body relax and get your bodily process working smoothly again.
Take Action
Set aside five minutes every day to practice at least one meditation technique. It may seem hard at first, but just give yourself those uninterrupted minutes. Even If you feel like you aren’t doing it right, don’t worry – you are!
Disclaimer: This post includes affiliate links, and I will earn a commission if you purchase through these links. Please note that I’ve linked to these products purely because I recommend them and they are from companies I trust. There is no additional cost to you.
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