How to Change Your Stress Response

Every meaningful moment in your life comes with a stress response:

1. Your heart rate increases
2. Your state of consciousness changes
3. You feel things.

It doesn’t matter whether you see it as “good” or “bad” (threat or opportunity). If some part of you deems it important, then you will experience emotions which are a sign that neurochemicals are flooding your bloodstream.

Whether those neurochemicals lead to a positive or negative response depends on a few factors which we cover in this episode:

• 00:00 - Intro
• 01:46 - Announcements
• 10:50 - Why do you get nervous?
• 15:55 - Steroid hormone stress
• 22:40 - Understanding your physiology
• 36:00 - Emotional distress vs. chronic stress
• 39:45 - The winner vs. the loser effect
• 45:45 - Practice right emotional response
• 1:05:00 - Why breathing calms your brain
• 1:08:50 - Recap

I’ve become a bit obsessed with this topic. Many years of coaching men have shown that no information really can help a guy in love or purpose or life, if he doesn’t have a positive (anabolic) response to stress.

So I’ve started working on a short book that compiles some of the step by step information in changing your stress response that I couldn’t fit in a one hour episode.