The Joy of Stress

I once read somewhere that one way that you can tell if an animal is monogamous or polygamous is that animals who have just one mate for life release significantly higher levels of oxytocin, the social bonding hormone, during reproduction. In a TED Talk with over 34 million views titled How to Make Stress Your Friend, the speaker Kelly McGonigal shares another fascinating thing about oxytocin. Your body releases oxytocin when you are stressed. It turns out that oxytocin has multiple health benefits, especially for your heart, and these are amplified by socializing when stressed. McGonigal puts it this way: “So when you reach out to others under stress, either to seek support or to help someone else, you release more of this hormone, your stress response becomes healthier, and you actually recover faster from stress. I find this amazing, that your stress response has a built in mechanism for stress resilience—and that mechanism is human connection.” 

This week, I invite you to consider: 

How do I respond when I am stressed? To what degree do I reach out and allow others in when I’m stressed? Who might be a potential support for me when I am stressed? 

How do I respond when others are stressed? To what degree do I make an effort to listen and support? Who is someone I know who might be stressed that might benefit from my reaching out? 

God bless,
Dan