Why controlling your neurophysiology is the best way to deal with stress

Trying to avoid stress is a terrible way of dealing with it. Unless you live in a monastery, that’s impossible anyway.

A much better way is understanding stress on a neurophysiological level – and deliberately taking control of your own neurophysiology. If you want to learn the essentials of pulling that off, this post is for you. Let’s delve right in.

As it turns out, stress is a state: It’s a position on what scientists call the continuum of autonomic arousal – the scientific term for what I often refer to as “mental energy”. The arousal continuum, in turn, is governed by two subsystems of our autonomic nervous system: The sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system.

Yet, you don’t need to remember these complicated terms. Instead, think of the sympathetic nervous system as the alertness system, and the parasympathetic nervous system as the calmness system.

Here’s what the autonomic arousal continuum looks like:

As it turns out, we're somewhere on that continuum as long as we are alive. Of course, we want to avoid its extreme states – panic and coma – for obvious reasons. However, in between these, there are states that – for better or worse – we go through on most days.

On the left side of the continuum, autonomic arousal is high. The alertness system is very active, while the calmness system is inactive. That’s the "fight-or-flight" response, colloquially known as stress. On the right side of the continuum, autonomic arousal is low. The alertness system is largely inactive, while the calmness system is highly active. That’s also known as the "rest-and-digest" (or calmness) response.

Our autonomic nervous system governs all of our sensations, perceptions, feelings, thoughts, and actions. And for most waking activities, the sweet spot is in the middle. That’s where our alertness system and calmness system are in balance. Our level of autonomic arousal is moderately high, and we’re both alert and calm.

Don’t get me wrong: We can’t be at that sweet spot all day long. After all, life happens, and so does work. Also, moving to the continuum’s left side episodically – which is known as acute stress – is good for both our body and brain. In our body, acute stress improves wound healing and immune function. In our brain, it speeds up cognitive processing and primes our system for faster, better, and sharper cognition: According to one study, acute stress leads to a doubling in concentration performance.

When we’re stressed out continuously, however, problems start to arise. That’s when acute stress turns into chronic stress. Chronic stress not only feels terrible, but is also actually bad for us, both physically and mentally: Research shows that chronic stress leads to high blood pressure, ravages our immune system and increases the risks of diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Also, it can result in mental exhaustion – and eventually burnout, which the WHO defines as "a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed".

That definition points to the key to dealing with stress: Not letting acute stress turn into chronic stress – by managing it well.

In many ways, doing that resembles driving a car. When we're out on the road, there are constant changes in traffic conditions and speed limits, as well as the occasional steep turn. That's why we need to use our car's throttle and brake to get to our destination without crashing. As it turns out, the (sympathetic) alertness system is our brain’s throttle, while the (parasympathetic) calmness system is its brake. 

In the remainder of this post, you’ll learn the most effective practices for working with both systems to take control of your neurophysiology – and deliberately get back to that optimal state for most waking activities (i.e., being both alert and calm) throughout your day.

These practices fall into three broad categories. The first is about getting out of stress when our autonomic arousal is too high. This works by activating our brain's brake – the calmness system – in real-time, thus getting our autonomic arousal back down to being alert and calm. 

The second category works by deliberately getting into stress by pushing our brain’s throttle – the alertness system – for brief periods of time. As it turns out, that’s one of the most effective ways to increase our “stress threshold” – and get more comfortable with being uncomfortable. 

The third category comes in handy whenever our autonomic arousal is structurally low throughout the day. Whenever we're more tired than we'd like, these practices get us into a sleep-like state that moves our autonomic arousal back up to being alert and calm. 

Next, let’s explore each of the three categories.

Calming down in real-time

As it turns out, our autonomic arousal and the way we breathe are deeply intertwined. That’s why some of the most effective ways to calm down whenever we’re more alert than we’d want to be (read: stressed) include breathing.

However, it's not about taking a deep breath. That's precisely the opposite of what we should do when stressed out. If you want to get your autonomic arousal back down to being alert and calm, you need to exhale more than you inhale (here’s why). And here’s how, depending on the circumstances you find yourself in:

1. Physiological sigh
   If you're sufficiently private, do 1-3 “physiological sighs”: Inhale as deeply as possible through the nose for a count of two, add a second deep inhale on top of the first one through the nose for a count of one, and exhale as fully as possible through the mouth for a count of six. In this video, neuroscientist and Stanford professor Andrew Huberman demonstrates how to do a physiological sigh.

2. Three-six breathing
   If you're with others, go for the simplest (and most covert) exhale-emphasized breathing technique: Three-six breathing. Inhale through the nose until a count of three before exhaling through the mouth until a count of six – and repeat this cycle at least three times, for a total of 27 seconds. With some practice, you'll be able to do it without anyone else noticing, even during meetings or calls.

Getting more comfortable with being uncomfortable

While intentionally activating your innate brake can help you reduce your autonomic arousal and calm down in real-time, the second category involves doing the opposite: activating your "throttle" to stress yourself for a short period of time.

By doing so, you can increase what scientists refer to as "stress threshold", which is the level at which your alertness system goes into overdrive. When you stress yourself out deliberately, you can learn to be more comfortable with being uncomfortable. In other words, you can raise the bar at which your alertness system gets triggered, which enables you to handle more stressors before reaching the point of becoming very stressed. 

Stressing yourself out a couple of times each week will quickly and significantly increase your "stress threshold". Here are two of the most effective practices to pull this off.

1. Cyclic hyperventilation
   The first practice involves a breathing pattern known as cyclic hyperventilation, which was popularized by Dutch extreme athlete Wim Hof. While exhale-emphasized breathing triggers your calmness system, inhale-emphasized breathing does the exact opposite: It strongly activates your alertness system so that you can learn to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Here’s how: Inhale deeply through the nose, and then exhale by passively letting the air "fall out from the mouth". Do 30 breaths (in and out) in this manner. After that, exhale all your air through the mouth – and then calmly wait with your lungs empty for 15 seconds. Once you've completed that full cycle, go for two additional ones – for a total of three.

2. Cold exposure
   In addition to cyclic hyperventilation, another great way to increase your "stress threshold” is cold exposure. Like cyclic hyperventilation, it was popularized by Wim Hof, which is why he is also known as "The Iceman". By self-inducing and forcing yourself to embrace the stress of cold, you quickly learn to remain calmer when real-life stressors hit. If you want to try it for yourself, it’s important to focus on safety first: Start warm and turn the water to cold at the end of your shower to avoid cold shock. According to Prof. Andrew Huberman, the key is to aim for a temperature that evokes the following thought: "This is really cold, and I want to get out, but I can safely stay in." The colder the water, the shorter the duration of cold exposure necessary. Go for 1-5 minutes per session, and limit it to 2-4 sessions per week – for a total of up to 11 minutes. Also, get into the cold early instead of late in the day to make the rebound increase in thermogenesis (i.e., the effect of waking you up) work for instead of against you.

When tired during the day, get some deep rest

Being on the left side of the arousal continuum – and feeling too alert or even stressed – is one state that we regularly want to move out of throughout our days. Another is being on the right side of the continuum, where we’re too drowsy and thus struggle to focus. 

The most common example is the afternoon trough, that slump in mental energy that is especially severe after having too much caffeine in the morning or a too-hearty lunch at noon. However, we experience that trough to some degree no matter what we do during the first half of our day. The reason is that we evolved to sleep twice throughout the 24-hour cycle, once during the night and once during the day. That's why we all reach a "circadian trough" at some point in the afternoon, usually between 1 pm and 3 pm. 

When that happens, one way to leverage our lower alertness is getting into creative discovery mode. As I’ve explained in my recent post on defocus, when we're drowsy, our brain is less able to exert top-down control, and due to this looser mindset, we're better at "thinking outside the box". 

If you want to replenish your mental energy (and focus) for the rest of the day, getting some deep rest is an even better idea. Whenever we’re more tired than we’d like, these practices get us into a sleep-like state that subsequently moves our autonomic arousal back up towards being alert and calm. Two of the most effective ways of accomplishing this are taking a brief nap and doing a non-sleep deep rest protocol.

1. Brief naps
   From the moment you wake up and throughout your day, a chemical called adenosine builds up in your brain. It drives sleep pressure and tells your brain when to be tired. Like sleep, brief naps reduce the level of adenosine in our system – and thus alleviate some of that sleep pressure.That’s why the simplest fix for feeling less alert than you’d like is taking a “siesta”. According to research by NASA, this improves alertness by a whopping 54% – and job-related performance by 34%. However, both duration and timing matter. Go for naps of 26 minutes or shorter. Take them no later than 8 hours before bedtime. And avoid them entirely if falling asleep at night is challenging for you.

2. Non-sleep deep rest (NSDR)
   If napping is not for you, use Google CEO Sundar Pichai’s favorite variant of deep rest. It’s called “non-sleep deep rest", or NSDR. It puts us into a state between being awake and falling asleep and is very similar to “Yoga Nidra”, which is also called yogic sleep.In essence, Yoga Nidra/NSDR takes you into deep relaxation by combining exhale-emphasized breathing and a body scan. You can do it seated or lying down, making it easy to integrate into a busy day. All you need to do is find a quiet place and listen to a script. Prof. Andrew Huberman, who coined the term NSDR, offers such a script on YouTube. It takes 10 minutes and features the essentials of Yoga Nidra – without the language typically associated with Yoga.

TL;DR

1) Instead of trying to avoid stress, a much better way is understanding stress on a neurophysiological level – and deliberately taking control of your own neurophysiology

2) The most effective practices for pulling that off enable you to get back to the optimal state for most waking activities – which is being both alert and calm – throughout your day

3) Whenever you’re more alert than you’d like to be, practice exhale-emphasized breathing. When sufficiently private, do one to three physiological sighs. When not sufficiently private, go for three rounds of three-six breathing

4) Deliberately activate your “throttle” to increase your stress threshold a couple of times each week, ideally in the morning. Do so by turning the water to cold at the end of your morning shower, or do some rounds of inhale-emphasized breathing instead

5) Depending on your preference and work environment, cultivate brief naps or non-sleep deep rest (NSDR) whenever you’re feeling tired throughout the day – which is most likely going to be between 1 pm and 3 pm

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Until next week,
Christian