This past weekend, I was at a used brand-name clothing sale with my teenage daughter. It is held only a few times a year in our town, and it’s quite an event. It’s set up in a huge hall with clothing racks wall to wall, and people everywhere because, well… there are great deals to be found. This wasn’t a calm shopping environment, but we were there with a purpose and made our way through the all the racks for her size, then stood in a long line to get a change room for her to try on the pieces she had chosen. While she was in in a change tent for what seemed to me like forever (I am glad she had to maneuver her way around in this small pop-up change tent, not me!), I had some time to observe people around the hall.
One of the words that I overheard repeatedly that stood out to me was ‘stress’. People talked about being stressed, both people who were working at the event, as well as people shopping. The people working at the event had to deal with enormous amounts of clothing being tried on and then having to reorganize the pieces that people didn’t want to purchase, and the shoppers had to navigate the narrow pathways between clothing racks, the long lines, and of course their personal emotions of trying on clothing in tight pop-up tents.
All this made me think about stress, how we perceive it, what it means to us, and how we manage it.
You and I experience stress every day, and it’s often seen as a negative. But what if that’s only part of the story?
Stress isn’t just about overwhelm or burnout. It’s also the pit-in-the-stomach, but ultimate surge of energy before a big presentation. It can help us become laser-focus when we face a challenge.
Understanding our relationship with stress is essential. It’s not about eliminating stress, but about recognizing what it means, and how we respond to it. So, let’s dive into the science of stress…
What Is Stress?
Stress is our body’s response to a real or perceived challenge or threat. Stimuli, or triggers, are also referred to as stressors1, and ‘physiological and behavioural changes in response to exposure to stressors constitute the stress response’2. They can be external (such as overwhelm at a clothing sale, a difficult conversation, traffic, or illness) or internal (such as self-doubt, worry, rumination or unmet expectations).
When we experience a stressor, our body initiates the stress response. This response is part of our evolutionary survival system. The challenge is that today’s stressors are often psychological rather than physical (there are not many sabre tooth tigers chasing us). And our bodies don’t always know the difference.
Hans Selye3, an endocrinologist, described the stress response in three stages: alarm, resistance, and exhaustion. When stress is ongoing without relief, we can get stuck in that final stage, leading to fatigue, anxiety, or burnout.
Not all Stress is Bad
A certain amount of stress can be motivating and energizing; it can help us rise to a challenge and perform at our best.
Research shows that moderate, short-term stress can enhance memory and focus. It can also build resilience, enhance our ability to adapt and recover after a difficult event. In other words, learning how to face and move through stress strengthens us4.
Studies from Stanford psychologist Kelly McGonigal reveal that how we perceive stress affects its impact5. People who view short-term stress as enhancing, rather than harmful, report better health, greater satisfaction, and improved performance.
I get nervous and feel anxious and stressed every time I get in front of an audience to speak or hold a workshop. I have been speaking in front of groups countless times for over 20 years, and I have proven to myself that I can do it, however I still can’t sleep well the night before a presentation, and my stomach doesn’t take kindly to a big meal before I speak. But I have also learned over the years that this short-term stress dissipates the moment I step in front of the audience. In that moment, I no longer care if my PowerPoint presentation works, or if my dress is perfectly fitting… I can let go of the anxiety and be focused on the people I speak to and engage with.
When Stress is Harmful
While short-term stress can be helpful, chronic stress has a very different impact.
Long-term exposure to stress can interfere with sleep, digestion, concentration, and emotional regulation and it affects how we think, feel, and act.6
Chronic stress builds when stress is ongoing. Signs of chronic stress can include irritability, fatigue, disconnection, or emotional numbing. The challenge with chronic stress is that it can creep into our lives. Stress that goes unnoticed or unaddressed can become part of the background noise of life, quietly draining our energy and joy.
Emotional Intelligence: The Bridge to Stress Management
Emotional intelligence (EQ) is our ability to recognize, understand, and manage emotions—both in ourselves and in others. It can help us understand our beliefs, emotions, thoughts and actions in relation to stress7.
- Self-awareness helps us be aware of our early signs of stress before we spiral.
- Self-management allows us to pause between stimulus and response, and choose our next step, which can possibly be a different behaviour we would just if we were, ‘just reacting’.
- Social Awareness allows us to hold space for others who are stressed, with empathy, and without judgement.
- Relationship management helps us communicate under pressure and maintain connection when we face conflict.
Emotional intelligence doesn’t remove stress, but it changes how we relate to it.
Healthy Emotional Responses to Stress
Managing stress isn’t about avoiding it or ignoring it; it’s about responding to it in a conscious way.
Here are some practical strategies you can use to help you:
- Name it. Labeling your emotions and feelings (“I’m feeling overwhelmed” or “This is anxiety”) helps you create a pause between stimulus and response, and step back into your observing self.
- Practice reframing. Ask yourself, “What’s this stress trying to tell me?” or “Is there an opportunity to respond differently?”
- Be aware of your physical response. What can you do differently to feel differently? Basics like breathing, movement, healthy food, water and rest help regulate our bodies.
- Create emotional boundaries. It’s okay to say no, take a break, or step away from draining situations.
- You don’t have to do it alone. Connection is powerful. Don’t underestimate the strength in sharing how you feel to reduce your stress. Sometimes we cannot change a stressful situation, but talking about it can make a difference.
What Stress Tells Us
Stress signals what matters to us, what’s not working for us, or where we might be stretched to grow.
We can learn to pause before reacting, listen to what stress is trying to show us, and choose responses that align with our values and positive core beliefs.
Stress is not good or bad. It’s information. And when we understand it, we can move through it, not just survive it, but evolve because of it.
It’s important to remember that healthy emotional responses to stress take ongoing practice. And it’s not perfect, at least not for me. When I find myself in high stress situations healthy responses are most difficult for me. So, I consciously practice when the stakes are low so that I can manage better when I’m in a high stakes situation.
And my own takeaway from the clothing sale? I made a choice to make eye contact and share a little smile with people… you know that little exchange of ‘we’re all in this together’.
References:
- Hendry, E., McCallister, B., Elman, D.J., Freeman, R., Borsook, D., Elman, I. (2024). ‘Validity of Mental and Physical Stress Models’. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 158, Article 105566. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2024.105566 ↩︎
- Chu, B., Marwaha, K., Sanvictores, T., Awosika, A.O., Ayers, D. (2024). ‘Physiology, Stress Reaction’, In: StatPearls. StatPearls Publishing, Treasure Island (FL). https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK541120 ↩︎
- Selye, H. (1956). ‘The Stress Of Life’. British Medical Journal , 1(4667) pp.1383–1383. https://www.bmj.com/content/1/4667/1383 ↩︎
- Hendry, T.A., Haq, M.A., & McGonigal, K. (2018). ‘The Upside of Stress: A Meta-Analytic Investigation of the Effects of Stress Mindset on Performance, Health, and Well-being’. Journal of Research in Personality, 75, pp.1–12. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2018.03.004 ↩︎
- McGonigal, K. (2015). The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You, and How to Get Good at It. United States: Penguin Publishing Group. https://www.google.ca/books/edition/The_Upside_of_Stress/U8TQBAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0 ↩︎
- McEwen, BS. (2017). ‘Neurobiological and Systemic Effects of Chronic Stress’. Chronic Stress, 2017;1. doi:10.1177/2470547017692328 ↩︎
- Goleman, D. (2020). Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ. 25th Anniversary Edition, Bantam Books. https://books.google.ca/books/about/Emotional_Intelligence.html?id=c3PDO7jKTJMC&redir_esc=y ↩︎
