✅ Once we’ve dealt with the stressor, we’re ready to move on, right?
❌ Not necessarily, according to the Nagoski sisters. They state that:
❗“Your body is [still] soaked in stress juice”♨️ from that cascade of hormones that gets activated in the face of a stressor, even though the stressor has ended.
❗”The stress will kill you faster than the stressor will – unless you do something to complete the stress response cycle.”
💥 So, if you physically bolted🏃🏽♀️from pitching for that contract or wrestled🥊your egotistical colleague to the ground (I recommend neither), you would have completed your stress cycle and used up the energy provided by your stress juice.
😥 But, if you took the socially appropriate and safer options by pitching 🗪 for the contract and smiling benignly🙃at your egotistical work colleague, your stress cycle remains incomplete. Your body is still waiting for you to use up your stress juice to let it know you are safe from the stressor and can finally relax🧘🏽♀️.
🪄So how do you complete the stress cycle and stop stewing in your stress juice?
🤸♀️EXERCISE – half an hour to an hour most days seem to work for most people.
😮💨Breathing exercises – best when stress levels aren’t high.
🥰Positive social interactions – seeing friends, giving compliments, networking.
😂Laughter – good old belly laughs are the best!
💋Affection – a long, warm hug, a 6 second kiss (advice from John Gottman).
😭A good cry – sob it out to your heart’s content (literally).
💃Creativity – drawing, painting, writing, dancing, singing, sewing – whatever your heart desires!
🔚 Completing the stress cycle is a PHYSIOLOGICAL shift, not an intellectual one. As Nike says, “just DO it”!
❓How do you complete your stress cycle?