Stress Is The Number One Killer

did you know that stress is the number one killer but what is stress and what

do you do about it stay tuned and I'm gonna explain it hey I'm Dr. Sten Ekberg

with wellness for life and by subscribing to this channel you will

learn everything that you need to know to master true health so you've probably

heard that stress is the number one cause of headaches and heart disease and

digestive upsets and migraines and so on and stress does all those things but

what is stress the stress actually hurt us not really because stress is just the

thing out there what hurts us is our stress responses

it's our nervous system responses to these events and these actions going on

around us technically speaking and we're just gonna get a little bit technical

the only thing that is stress is a sympathetic response the only stress

response that matters is a sympathetic response so what is that well your

autonomic nervous system the part of your nervous system that regulates

everything about you has two branches one is called a sympathetic also known

as fight/flight and the other half of it is called a parasympathetic or feed

breed so the purpose of the fight/flight is to keep you alive so that you can

have a stress response so your body can come to life and get into action and run

away when there is a threat so you need to save your life and the sympathetic

the fight/flight is what does that for you it increases your heart rate

increases blood pressure increases blood flow increases stress hormones increases

energy utilization through stress hormones and on and on and on and while

these things are life-saving in the long run they hurt you so here's the problem

your body doesn't just have a sympathetic response when your life is

in danger it also responds to every little thing

that makes you feel tense or upset or angry or frustrated and I'm sure you can

think of a few things in your daily life that can do those things so traffic and

news and so forth there's several other factors that can set off a sympathetic

response so you can have a chemical stress a toxic stress you can have a

food allergy that sets off your sympathetic nervous system you could

have a misaligned spine you can have a vertebra that isn't moving properly that

is creating what's called nociception which is a stress activator activates

your sympathetic nervous system so you can have chemical structural and

emotional factors that trigger a stress response and because we have so many of

these the stress becomes a norm that we have like a baseline of stress that is

so common and so familiar to us that we don't even notice it that's why as much

as 80% of the things that stress you you don't even notice so what do you do

about this the single simplest method there's lots and lots of things because

if you have vertebra that aren't moving you need to get adjusted you need to

stretch you need to exercise if you have a toxic environment or toxic diet you

need to address those things but you can still do something really simple right

now to interrupt that stress response and reset the balance and that thing is

called breathing all right so what happens when we breathe well when you

breathe in your heart speeds up did you know that when you breathe out your

heart slows down and what is it that makes the heart beat faster

it's the sympathetic what makes the heart slow down is the parasympathetic

so every time that you breathe you have a little bit of sympathetic and

parasympathetic activation but the pace of breathing determines how well this

balance is going to work out so for most people they breathe too fast

so if you breathe in for a couple of seconds your sympathetic engages and

then you breathe out but most people just breathe in like that out-breath is

too fast it's too sudden it doesn't last long enough for the parasympathetic to

kick in so the result is people breathe in and they breathe out but they don't

breathe slow enough or regular enough for this seesaw for this balance to work

itself out so the way you want to do it is you breathe in for four to five

seconds and then you breathe out for four to five seconds it's a good idea to

try to keep the out-breath just a little bit longer so maybe breathe in for four

and breathe out for five or something like that it's not that technical but

the point is you want to breathe much much much slower on the way out you also

want to focus on the belly so it's a belly breath it's not a shoulder breath

this is a stressful breath it's designed to bring in as much air as quickly as

possible that's a stress response but when you breathe from the belly you

breathe real real slow you breathe a little bit into your chest but not so

much that your shoulders start moving most people when they do this the first

thing they do is they take a full deep breath that's not the idea it's not you

want to breathe maybe a little bit deeper than a shallow breath but not

it's not about filling your lungs to capacity it's nothing like that then

you're gonna get lightheaded because you're breathing off too much carbon

dioxide so what happens most people think okay so I breathe for

a few minutes and I feel good and I get this relaxation

response that interrupts the stress response and that's all great but I only

have five minutes at a time to do it so it's not going to change my life is it

actually it is because anything that you do on a regular basis becomes a habit

and your nervous system is constantly changing your brain your synapses your

pathways they're always changing to adapt to your current situation and

that's called neuroplasticity so if you just do the breathing exercise once for

five minutes and not going to create a habit

nothing's gonna change but if you breathe for five minutes in and out nice

and slow and you do that once or twice a day then you will actually create a

habit and the more you do it the more you're gonna strengthen the pathways

that help you relax is going to get faster and faster and easier for your

body to create the relaxation response until it becomes automatic until it's a

way of life so the cool thing about this is it doesn't matter really if the

initiator if the thing that started the stress response was emotional or

chemical or structural yes you do want to address all those but you can still

interrupt the stress response in that moment by practicing some relaxation so

the better you get at this the better you can offset all those other stressors

in life so the sympathetic handles your fight flight or survival they everything

gets revved up but what is the parasympathetic do other than slow you

down well it also handles all of your immune system all of your digestion your

production of hydrochloric acid your production of digestive enzymes the

peristalsis the movement everything that has to do with repair

and digestion and slowing down is managed by your parasympathetics so by

feeling a little more relaxed you're not just lowering your blood

pressure and your heart rate you're also actually maybe digesting that food that

you're paying very close attention to what to eat but how do you digest it you

can put the best food in your mouth and if you can't digest it it really didn't

matter that much it's not the stress but it's the stress response and the

habitual sympathetic activity that it creates and you also know that you can

do something to interrupt it in this moment give it a try I'd love to hear

from you about your experiences if you've tried this or if you're going to

try this let me know what's happening and remember you have to make it a

regular habit for it to really work give us some comments give us questions if

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