Cortisol is a stress hormone so in order to reduce cortisol we have to reduce stress. We know that stress is the cross over point into ill mental health and stress has been linked to every disease condition known to man because stress is often a result of a lifestyle it’s a way of life that we have adapted then in order to truly reduce stress we have to change our lifestyle.

So today we’re going to talk about not just what the steps are but why they work and once you understand that then you can turn your lifestyle into one of stress reduction.

Stress is an enormous topic and cortisol is super important and people have different reasons but since so many people have issues with weight they want to lose weight and cortisol is part of that picture that’s where a lot of people start looking at cortisol that’s when we get their attention; but in order to reduce cortisol we also have to change the whole picture and that’s a side benefit that once you reduce cortisol and you understand the bigger picture you don’t just change one thing you get a trickle-down effect that can be tremendously beneficial. Some people look at cortisol because of adrenal fatigue, chronic fatigue syndrome, they just don’t feel right, other people look at it because it’s involved with insulin resistance, weight gain and also with type 2 diabetes, Cushing’s disease. Cushing’s may occur if the body makes too much cortisol. Symptoms include, excessive weight gain, weak muscles, high blood pressure, a tendency to bruise easily and slow wound healing. A round ‘moon face’ is common. Treatment is in the form of cortisol suppressing medication. Extreme cortisol levels can also be involved with muscle wasting.

So once we address the root core issues we turn around all of these things all at once.

So what is stress?

Well stress is a response from your sympathetic nervous system so your autonomic nervous system the part of your nervous system of your brain that manages everything about your body, everything that you don’t have to think about is your autonomic nervous system. It has two branches and the sympathetic nervous system responds to things that threaten you, when there’s some threat real or imagined the sympathetic nervous system prepares you, it increases resources so that you can defend yourself, so you increase your heart rate, your blood pressure, your body wants more blood sugar for quick fuel so that’s where cortisol comes in. Cortisol goes up to raise the blood sugar but you also increase muscle tension, increase LDL cholesterol because LDL cholesterol is part of wound clotting and during a,”fight or flight.” Situation you might get a situation where you start bleeding so all of these things are part of the stress response but there’s a balance.

We have to understand that the parasympathetic, that’s the other branch of the ANS, it handles your digestion, it stimulates immune responses, it’s responsible for reproduction function and it’s responsible for healing. so the key takeaway here is that you can defend yourself.

You can activate the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and defend yourself or you can activate the parasympathetic nervous system (PSNS) and heal but you can’t do both at the same time it is like being a see- saw.1 You can do a little bit of one or the other but the more you do of one the less you do of the other that’s just how we are wired and we’re going to look at that, so even though the sympathetic is a stress response that doesn’t make it a bad thing. It’s not like a mistake in the way the body is created, the sympathetic nervous system keeps you alive in emergency situations it’s just that we’re not supposed to have emergency situations all the time. It’s designed for bursts of activity so if you get chased by some wild animal, if you have an emergency you’re supposed to engage that SNS to a very high degree and then you’re supposed to be done with it.

But in our modern lifestyle it doesn’t matter if it’s a real short threat or if it’s a long term imagined threat. So financial pressures, bad news, being overwhelmed at work and feeling overwhelmed in general; all of these are stresses, they activate your sympathetic nervous system and we develop chronic stress. I don’t have any exact numbers but just to give you an idea I would guess that were designed probably for 10% or 20% burst sympathetic activity and the rest of the time 80%, 90% we should be in parasympathetic; but with a modern lifestyle it’s kind of the other way around. We don’t have many of those extreme burst activities but we have a little bit of stress, a little bit of sympathetic activation most of the time so it’s like this balance is reversed, we’ve developed habits and we have become stuck in sympathetic dominance so this is why stress is so destructive.

This is why the things that the sympathetic nervous system develops like heart rate, high heart rate, high blood pressure, high cortisol, muscle tension and cholesterol that’s why people take the most medication for these symptoms because your sympathetic drives those things. When they become a chronic habit that’s when we end up taking drugs for them, they become chronic degenerative diseases.

The next thing to understand about stress is that most of the time that you have stress you’re not aware of it because stress can be many different things, anytime your sympathetic nervous system is activated you have stress. It could be something chemical, it could be an infection, it could be toxicity, could be long-term, low-grade toxicity, or it could be something like food poisoning, you could have Dysglycemia is a broad term that refers to an abnormality in blood sugar stability, which the body has to compensate with cortisol that’s a lot of stress. Stress can be mechanical being sedentary is a form of stress having passed trauma, like slips and falls, car accidents is a form of stress having a spinal stiffness having a lack of spinal movement also known as subluxation in chiropractic is a form of stress. Subluxation is a term used by some chiropractors to describe a spinal vertebra that is out of position in comparison to the other vertebrae, possibly resulting in functional loss and determining where the chiropractor should manipulate the spine.

We can also have emotional stress and that’s what people usually talk about when they mean stress, that’s when you have an emotion that you don’t like when you feel bad, when you have fear, anger, when you’re feeling overwhelmed, when you have feelings of grief and those are obviously types of stresses. But they are not the only types of stress; they’re not the only thing that activates the sympathetic stress response so we want to think of this as a triangle where every part is equally important. We have chemical structure and we have emotional stress. It’s sort of like three legs on a table. If you have a three-legged table you can’t balance the table on two legs, you can’t balance the table on one leg, you want to start addressing all sides of the triangle to create balance in your life.

We’re getting to the really cool stuff. This is what true stress management is.

What is it that manages stress in your body?

Well it is your brain and specifically it is your frontal lobe, because stress is lifesaving, stress responses are life-saving when something threatens you. You’re supposed to react, you have to, if you don’t you’re a sitting duck and whatever threatens you gets you. so stress responses are necessary and life-saving but the frontal lobe has the ability to determine when it’s time to turn it off. If the frontal lobe doesn’t work so well then stress responses just kind of come and they’re acting unopposed and they go on much stronger and much longer than they’re supposed to; that’s why different people have different stress tolerance, that’s why they manage stress differently; some people act very calm in stressful situations and some people completely freak out, that’s depending on how well is their frontal lobe working.

What is it that the frontal lobe does well? The frontal lobe inhibits it, turns things off, it’s like a light bulb that the brighter it burns the better it is at turning things off, it’s like turning off the darkness if you will. The way that we’re wired is that the frontal lobe can turn off the sympathetic stress response and the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) in turn is wired to turn off the parasympathetic nervous system (PSNS)

Why is that? Because the body has limited resources so in a stressful situation you’re not concerned about digestion, that’s the liability, you’ll be wasting resources on digestion if there’s something threatening you, so your body is wired that any time that you have a threat, you turn off the parasympathetic nervous system (PSNS) so even though the parasympathetic helps you digest and defend you from immune issues, it helps you reproduce and heal, it is not an asset in an emergency the frontal lobe turns off the sympathetic stress response so indirectly the frontal lobe turns on the parasympathetic, it turns on digestion, it turns on immune system, it turns on reproduction, it turns on healing so by turning off the thing that was turned on you turn it on and this is just how we’re wired; that’s just part of the design. We can use it to our advantage because if we understand this then we can use this to control stress.

Solutions to stress and understanding why they work

So let’s talk about the solutions but we’re not just going to talk about the solutions we want to understand why they work?

Because if you understand what the mechanism is then you’ll start noticing in your life when you start to apply this. You become more sensitive and that’s how you truly can turn it into a lifestyle which is necessary if you want long-term results.

So the way that you can manage stress is primarily through a few different mechanisms, it’s by doing a pattern interrupt.

So why is that important? Because the reason that you have a stress dominance is that you’re stuck, it’s become a habit; the brain doesn’t quite know it’s done. So much of it just gets stuck in that habit and what we want to do is interrupt that pattern. The other way we can manage stress is through brain stimulation just like we talked about if we increase the activity of the frontal lobe then we manage stress we can also do it with nutrients, we can give it nutrients, we can give the brain nutrients that help it function better and we can give nutrients that are innately calming to the brain, then we can have certain lifestyle modifications that are going to affect hormones and neurotransmitters such as growth hormone and cortisol primarily.

So let’s look at the list.

Aerobic Exercise, aerobic exercise is fantastic because it is a pattern interrupt it gets you away, it gets you out, it gets you moving all of those are pattern interrupt. It’s also brain stimulation because 90% of what stimulates the brain the signals they get to the brain 90% of those are from movements and you’re also increasing oxygenation which your brain loves. You are starting to not get a tremendous amount of growth hormone from just walking but you’re getting just a little bit and you’re also reducing insulin because your muscles become more insulin sensitive during aerobic exercise. So it’s a fantastic way to reduce stress and reduce cortisol of course.

The next thing you can do is another type of exercise and this might seem counterintuitive because this is kind of the opposite of aerobic exercise this is extreme high intensity interval training (HIIT) and this will stimulate cortisol but the trick is to do it for such a short duration you do it 15 seconds at a time, you do a few repetitions of 15 seconds until you get exhausted, until you max out your heart rate, then you have increased your growth hormone by 3% to 400%. Human Growth Hormone it opposes cortisol, they work against each other so you can do things to reduce cortisol or you can do things to increase growth hormone and you can accomplish the same thing so even though you produce cortisol with HIIT the trick is to keep the duration so short that the growth hormone benefit far outweighs the cortisol. Downside if you’re really really fragile though, if you have just totally burned out your system, if you’re feeling sick, you’re feeling bad, you’re not fit then you might want to hold off on the HIIT or you might want to do it extremely carefully because this is a stress on the body and some people are just not at a point yet where intense exercise is a good idea. So if you have any question marks about that then hold off on the HIIT and as always when you are trying something new seek professional medical advice before you start anything new.

Recover after exercise can be beneficial but just because it’s beneficial doesn’t mean that more is better, it’s the contrast between exercise and recovery that helps your body heal, so anytime that you exercise you want to allow enough recovery, you never want to exercise so much that your body starts feeling fatigued or worn down.

Yoga Yoga is fantastic, it is a pattern interrupt, it is brain stimulation, you stretch, you teach your brain about paying attention to different things, it’s a different mindset, highly recommended just don’t get into the modern versions of yoga where they turn it into something intense, something upbeat, fast moving, because that defeats the purpose of reducing cortisol.

Qigong Qigong practice typically involves moving meditation, coordinating slow-flowing movement, deep rhythmic breathing, and a calm meditative state of mind. People practice qigong throughout China and worldwide for recreation, exercise, relaxation, preventive medicine, self-healing, alternative medicine, meditation, self-cultivation, and training for martial arts. Qigong for me was the discovery of breathing correctly and the dantian, energy cultivation, your internal battery.

Breathing exercises, very, very powerful because your sympathetic and your parasympathetic nervous system are tied to your breath, when you breathe in that’s a sympathetic activity when you breathe out it’s a parasympathetic activity so if you do a slow breath in and a slow long breath out then you’re balancing your sympathetics and your parasympathetic. So the trick is keep your out-breath about five seconds or even a little bit more but at least five seconds, that gives your parasympathetic nervous system five whole seconds to engage and you’re in training a pattern there. Through Qigong I then went on to learn, practice breathing techniques and cold water therapy that Wim Hof created in the Wim Hof Method WHM.

Meditation very often tied to breathing but meditation is more about paying attention to your mind, it’s about changing your focus which increases frontal lobe activity so it’s a pattern interrupt, it is brain stimulation, it’s about finding a profound place of peace and in doing that in reaching deeper and deeper levels of peace that you’re getting more and more pattern interrupts and brain stimulation and you can start undoing by finding that deep peace. You can start undoing past stresses also.

Mindfulness often associated with meditation it’s even called mindfulness meditation which it is but mindfulness goes much, much, further than that it’s something that you want to turn into a lifestyle habit. It’s something that you do all day long if you can remind yourself every minute as you get better and better it runs more an automatic, remind yourself every minute to pay attention to how you feel, make how you feel the most important thing that there is and start looking on the bright side that’s what mindfulness really is; it’s a it’s a way of life.

Celebrate whenever something good happens don’t just brush it off and move on to the next thing, take some time pat yourself on the back, milk it, take a minute to really sort of celebrate and appreciate and soak it in. Why that was so good and take a moment to just feel good about it and now you’re building momentum.

Appreciate, show gratitude looking around you at your wonderful life, looking at how beautiful nature is, looking at the good things in life there are few things as powerful for feeling good and undoing stress as appreciation or gratitude. That is why it is so important to practice gratitude daily. You cannot appreciate and be stressed at the same time.

Read make it a habit to read or if you’re reading challenged then listen to something get a good audio program most of the time you’re limited to your own mind, your own thoughts, but when you read or listen to something uplifting you have a third party putting in good stuff in your mind it’s a pattern interrupt, it helps build your momentum, it helps you change perspective, it helps you build a positive outlook. I can’t emphasize that enough take 10, 20 30 minutes everyday and let yourself grow, learn something.

Positive people, notice how you feel around people and give yourself the liberty to avoid the people who make you feel bad, the people who pull you down, the people where you feel like there’s a shadow coming as soon as you get in their presence, energy vampires. Give yourself the freedom to avoid those and instead find the people to make you feel good, find the groups of people the organizations where positive people hang out and go there on purpose. Find People who vibrate at a higher positive frequency, your vibe attracts your tribe, if you know what I mean.

Essential oils, they have become extremely popular in recent years. But how do they actually work? The thing to understand is I’m not opposed to essential oils at all, I think they’re great but a lot of people use them as a form of nutrition, which they are not, they don’t add anything that the body is missing. What they do is, they provide a pattern interrupt, their smell is very, very, powerful it’s the most primitive, is the most fundamental of all human senses and it has profound impact on the brain; so when you smell something and you pay attention to that, you’re interrupting a pattern, you are stimulating the brain and you’re changing your focus. You’re paying attention to something else, you’re getting a timeout and it’s very, very, powerful, it doesn’t have to be essential oils but anything that serves that purpose can be excellent. There are also homeopathics of flower essence, they have excellent effects in calming you down, you can also use herbs.

There are adaptogenic herbs like ashwagandha, ginseng and kava and they help your body calm down were there they have safe medicinal effects.

Smile and laugh give yourself a moment when you’re sitting in the car just put a big silly grin on your face and smile for no reason at all and just notice just ask yourself how good could I feel right now for no reason at all put a big smile on your face and just let that emotion go, just let that state go for a few seconds and you’ll have a state change you’ll have a pattern interrupt and you’ll feel better. If you do that on a regular basis you can have long-lasting effects,you can build momentum, allow yourself to laugh for no reason or watch a funny movie.

Sleep, sleep increases growth hormone especially if you get a couple of hours of sleep before midnight and you need to get enough sleep. You need to have certain regularity to your sleeping times it’s very beneficial for your recovery and for growth hormone which again opposes cortisol, another way to raise growth hormone is through;

Intermittent fasting whenever you go a period of time without food then you increase your growth hormone so if you just go from three meals a day to two meals a day you’re just making more growth hormone, you are reducing cortisol but you can’t get very good results with that if you’re eating a lot of carbs because if you’re creating a blood sugar rollercoaster then every time your blood sugar dips in the low end then your body makes cortisol to compensate; so you need to be fat adapted and have stable blood sugar in order to benefit optimally from that intermittent fasting which brings us to;

Stable blood glucose so that goes together with the above, unstable blood sugar is a stress, it stimulates cortisol whenever the blood sugar is low.

There are specific nutrients that help your brain and your adrenal glands work better. Your adrenal glands, (on the top of each kidney) of course are the ones who respond to stress. Your brain detects the stress, it sends signals to the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and it’s the adrenal glands that carry out the orders of the SNS so when you have a lot of stress you’re wearing your adrenals down and you want to give them the optimal nutrition so vitamin D3.

B vitamins primarily B1 and B5 but don’t get the synthetic stuff you want to get it from food. You want to get it the best natural source that you can take sort of as an isolated source is nutritional yeast it tastes good, you can put it in smoothies, you can sprinkle it on things it’s got kind of a cheesy flavour.

We are still in the nutrition category those are minerals; minerals not only provide necessary nutrients for the brain but they also have a calming effect on the brain, magnesium especially is generally considered calming it helps the neural membranes regulate ions better. Potassium and calcium are also very important minerals.

DHA which is docosahexaenoic acid; don’t worry about the name it is one of the two most important parts of fish oil. So the EPA is anti-inflammatory the DHA is a brain building nutrient that also has a calming effect and an anti stress effect.

There are a couple of adrenal points that you can stimulate, you have if you go to your belly button and you go one inch over on each side and one to two inches up on side then those are your adrenal reflex points these are points that have been identified in applied kinesiology as early as the 1960s and they relate to the adrenal gland so if you take and you rub those you put a finger on each and
you rub them for a few seconds and then you just hold them while you relax you will notice pretty soon 10, 20, 30 seconds that you start getting a pulse right in the skin and as you hold it longer that pulse increases and you’re actually allowing the adrenal glands to calm down. So it’s a direct treatment that you can do a couple of times a day you don’t have to rub very hard because they tend to get tender if you do.

You could get a pet. They are very, very, calming, they have a good energy about spending time with a pet. Focusing on the pet interrupts your pattern and it changes your hormone balance. If you haven’t seen or read the book, ” A Street Cat called Bob,” a true story I highly recommend it. It really helps you reduce cortisol levels and you could also get a hobby, you could go exercise, you could join a chess club, you could join a choir, anything that you consider fun, anything that’s your idea of fun is going to help you feel good. It’s going to help your pattern interrupt and have tremendous benefits so even though this is about how to reduce cortisol it’s important to understand that you never reduce one isolated thing. That cortisol is just one component of the stress response which has a multitude of components and once you learn how the bigger system works and you start bringing the whole system back to balance then you will reduce cortisol.

Every one of these steps will reduce cortisol but if you understand the bigger mechanism then you understand how you can turn this into a lifestyle; you can reduce the bigger picture of stress.