Mild levels of stress force your body to optimize brain cognition, body function:
The holidays are a stressful time for many, but that may not be a bad thing when it comes to your brain functioning, according to new research from the Youth Development Institute at the University of Georgia.
The study found that low to moderate levels of stress improve working memory, the short-term information people use to complete everyday tasks like remembering someone's phone number or recalling directions on how to get to a specific location.
There is, however, a caveat, the researchers said. The findings are specific to low to moderate stress. Once your stress levels go above moderate levels and becomes constant, that stress becomes toxic.
[...] Constant high levels of stress can actually change the structure of the brain. It leads to increases in white matter at the expense of gray matter, which is involved in muscle control, decision-making, self-control, emotional regulation and more. Chronic stress can also make people more susceptible to a variety of illnesses ranging from nausea and migraine headaches to high blood pressure and heart disease.
"But there's less information about the effects of more limited stress," Oshri said. "Our findings show that low to moderate levels of perceived stress were associated with elevated working memory neural activation, resulting in better mental performance."
Journal Reference:
Assaf Oshri, Zehua Cui, Max M. Owens, et al., Low-to-moderate level of perceived stress strengthens working memory: Testing the hormesis hypothesis through neural activation [open], Neuropsychologia, 176, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2022.108354
(Score: 3, Insightful) by inertnet on Friday January 06 2023, @01:57PM (18 children)
That's funny, for me the holiday period is one of the few without any stress at all. As far as stress is concerned, of course some stress is good for you, it's what our evolution made us good at. People need challenges and achievements, no matter how small, to become happier. If life doesn't give you challenges, maybe if you're rich, you still have to create them yourself.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Friday January 06 2023, @02:11PM (4 children)
Absolutely: without SOME stress, are you actually alive?
Which is why, i think, that Elon Musk is so self-sabotaging: he can, if he wants, just walk away from Twitter (which he already, really, seems to have turned his back on) without it really stressing him.
Tesla could tank, really, without it really stressing him.
Unless he REALLY started losing billions upon billions, what stress does he have?
Someone at work stressing him? You're fired.
Twitter stressing him? Sell, bankrupt, whatever... walks away, brushing lint off his jillion dollar suit.
He invents stress by opening his mouth and saying whatever he wants just to get excitement from the media shit-storm he creates.
He's a bored, spoiled person who's not even, for whatever reason, intelligent enough to know Donald Trump is a baby-man.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Opportunist on Friday January 06 2023, @02:37PM
He could well be intelligent enough to know it and just enjoy trolling the world and getting a reaction out of it.
I have a hunch that's pretty much his game. I mean, he has more money than any sane person (or even an insane one) can squander in a lifetime, and he's an incredible narcissist, why not use that money to be constantly in the news and have everyone talk about him?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 06 2023, @03:47PM
I'd suggest at some level of richness, the only question worth bothering with is What is the Meaning of Life?
Seeking approval of others - either directly or by notoriety, in fact any sort of fame - means you are bound by the gravity of society. If the meaning of life is chinking champagne glasses with a Kardashian and putting it on Insta... well, fuck me, then I've really fucked up.
(Score: 2) by inertnet on Friday January 06 2023, @03:51PM (1 child)
A couple of years ago I saw an interview with him, where he explained that he had trouble sleeping because his mind wouldn't stop trying to solve things. I believe he even took sleeping pills. So indeed he's very much the creator of his own stress, but the question is if that is voluntary. Rich people who can't stop wanting to get richer likely all have a specific abnormality. That's probably the main reason why they keep accumulating money and we don't.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 06 2023, @04:55PM
That's funny because a couple years ago I heard him talk about something I know about.... and he sounded like an AHDH poser clown that wanted to talk in generalities in ways that reflected mostly on the greatness of leadership.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Opportunist on Friday January 06 2023, @02:34PM (10 children)
I need challenges and achievements, but I sure as all hell don't need stress. I like to pit my mind against problems and solving them gives me a sense of satisfaction, but I don't allow this to stress me. Why should I? I don't impose stress on myself, where's the logic in that?
(Score: 2) by inertnet on Friday January 06 2023, @03:54PM (4 children)
Excitement and stress are closely related I think. For me stress is mostly other people making choices that take away mine.
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Friday January 06 2023, @04:20PM (3 children)
The key to a stress-free life is learning how to avoid such people.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 06 2023, @04:59PM (2 children)
Yes. There's a precursor stage where you try to connect people's actions with the consequences of their actions. Mostly, shitty bosses externalizing training (that they are paid to do) to the goodwill of underlings. Then after that stage passes, you just clock in and collect a paycheck. After that you start looking for more meaningful work. Lesson complete.
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Friday January 06 2023, @09:06PM (1 child)
And I wish they would teach that at school or university, it took me almost 'til the age of 30 to learn this.
It kinda pains me that it seems that some people never learn this altogether.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 06 2023, @09:45PM
30? Son, you probably haven't learned a damn thing yet. But nice humble brag.
(Score: 2) by crafoo on Friday January 06 2023, @05:43PM (3 children)
You might have an emotional distaste for stress and suffering, but surely you understand their necessary place in life?
people who've lead carefree, relatively stress-free lives do not fair well at all when things don't work out. they throw baby tantrums or just give up. they lash out at those around them. they do really stupid things. they also have no frame of reference for how most lives are lived.
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Friday January 06 2023, @09:04PM
Nope, I don't. All it takes is some careful planning and avoiding the more risky endeavors and you can actually live a fairly stress-free life.
You can actually get a pretty good idea what other people do by simply taking an interest in them. Yes, that's permitted. You can actually go out there and examine other people's lives so you have a frame of reference for your own. That doesn't stress me. It's information, information isn't stressful.
The key is that you need to plan ahead so you can gather information and deal with events at your own pace. That does require work. Yes. If you just lean back and pretend that problems don't exist, guess what, they'll come to you at inopportune moments and then you get stressed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 06 2023, @09:50PM (1 child)
I would point out "give up" is a perfectly valid reaction to situations where winning is not a prize worth the effort. Know when to fold so you don't waste your life on shitty problems.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 06 2023, @11:22PM
Sometimes the only winning move is not to play.
(Score: 2) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Saturday January 07 2023, @06:50PM
It's an adaptation response, and stress hormones serve purposes. For example, shortly before you wake up your body does a cortisol surge.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by crafoo on Friday January 06 2023, @05:40PM (1 child)
I agree, except for your use of "happiness". Happiness is a fleeting emotion induced in your brain by the release of, well, essentially feel-good drugs into your brain. I would say setting goals, overcoming obstacles, dealing with necessary suffering and stress, and then meeting those goals and achieving something that you value - that brings contentment, satisfaction, an earned sense of pride.
(Score: 2) by inertnet on Saturday January 07 2023, @01:27AM
You're right, that's exactly what I meant by "become happier". English is not my native language and sometimes it just takes me too long to find the right words to express myself accurately.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by fliptop on Friday January 06 2023, @06:53PM
Last February an ice storm went through that brought down about a dozen trees on my property. One came down directly onto the lines between my house and the nearest pole and cut off my electric service (for 4 days). Two others came down on my roof. This all happened around 1:00 am.
I had just gone to bed, but I got up, got dressed, got my tractor and chainsaw out, and proceeded to start cutting with my chainsaw while ambling around on slippery, uneven ground during an ice storm, using only the headlights on my tractor to illuminate what I was doing. At one time a cherry tree came down and landed about 15 feet away from where I was working. It was quite possibly the most scared I've been in my life.
By 6:00 am I was as finished as I felt was necessary, so I threw my saw in my pickup and headed out to see if there were any trees blocking traffic. After cutting up and dragging a few off the road, around 7:30 the Dept of Highways showed up and I finally went home. I was exhausted but glad to be alive.
The next day I was at my chiropractor's and telling him about what happened (I go to my chiro once a week to stay "in tune"). He said my body's ability to handle stress is enhanced by my seeking regular adjustments. He's right, a lot of people I know were freaking out and trying to get a room in the already booked hotels in the area. I was just glad my roof didn't have a hole in it and that I had enough kerosene to keep me warm until the electric was restored.
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.