TABERNACLES....and being STRESS-LESS

FEAST OF TABERNACLES....STRESSLESS

FOR 7 DAYS AND 8TH DAY (LEV.23) WE ENJOY, WE CELEBRATE, WE THINK OF THE GOOD THINGS; WE LIVE A TYPE, A SMALL TYPE, OF THE AGE TO COME.  WE TRY TO BE STRESSLESS.

From the book "Change Your  Brian  Change  Your  Body"  by  Dr. Amen

THE  BRAIN-BODY  RESPONSE

Don't get me wrong. A little stress can be a good thing. When stress hits, the brain tells your body to start pumping out adrenaline (epinephrine) and Cortisol, two hormones released by the adrenal glands (located above the kidneys). Within seconds, your heart starts to pound faster, your breathing quickens, your blood courses faster through your veins, and your mind feels like it is on heightened alert. You are ready for anything—running away from a would-be mugger, giving a speech in front of a roomful of peers, or taking an exam.

These stress hormones are the primary chemicals of the fight-or-flight response and are especially useful when you face an immediate threat, such as a rattlesnake in your front yard (which happened to me once). What's amazing is that the human brain is so advanced that merely imagining a stressful event will cause the body to react to the perceived threat as if it were actually happening. You can literally scare your body into a stress response. The brain is a very powerful organ.

Brief surges of stress hormones are normal and beneficial. They motivate you to do a good job at work, study before a test, or pay your bills on time. The problem with stress in our modern world is not these short bursts of adrenaline and Cortisol. The problem is that for many of us, the stress reactions never stop-—traffic, bills, work, school, family conflict, not enough sleep, health issues, and jam-packed schedules keep us in a constant state of stress. Take note that it isn't just the bad stuff in life that makes us stressed. Even happy events, such as having a baby or getting a promotion, can be major stressors. Take a look at the following lists of just some of the many events and situations that can cause stress.

Negative Events That Cause Stress

Death of a loved one

Getting laid off

Getting divorced

Unwanted pregnancy

Miscarriage

Financial problems

Being involved in a lawsuit

Having health problems

Having a sick relative

Caring for an ailing family member

Having a mental disorder or living with someone who has one

Problems at work

Problems at school

Positive Events That Cause Stress

Getting married
Having a baby
Starting a new job
Getting a promotion
Moving to a new home
Transferring to a new school 
Going to college
Having a bestselling book

HOW  CHRONIC  STRESS  HARMS  THE  BRAIN

Chronic stress constricts blood flow to the brain, which lowers overall brain function and prematurely ages your brain. A series of studies published in the journal Psychoneuroendocrinology looked at long-term exposure to stress hormones, especially Cortisol, and its effect on brain function in people of varying age groups. The research showed that older adults with continuously high levels of Cortisol performed worse on memory tests than older adults with moderate to low Cortisol levels. The older adults with high Cortisol levels also had a 14 percent smaller hippocampus, the area of the temporal lobes involved with memory. The hippocampus is part of the stress response system and is responsible for sending out signals to halt the production of Cortisol once a threat has vanished. But when the number of brain cells in the hippocampus is depleted, it no longer sends out this signal, which results in the release of even greater amounts of Cortisol.

Researchers found that short, temporary spikes in Cortisol had a negative—although temporary—effect on young adults' thinking and memory skills. In young children and teenagers, the research showed that kids with lower socioeconomic status had higher average stress hormone levels than the other children. As a group, these studies reveal that chronic stress impairs the brain function of people of all ages.

Excessive amounts of Cortisol affect other areas of the brain, too. Canadian researchers used functional brain imaging studies to show that exposure to stress hormones is associated with decreased activity not only in the hippocampus, but also in the amygdala, part of the emotional brain and the prefrontal cortex. As a result, chronic stress has negative consequences for both cognitive function and emotional balance.

It gets even worse. An ongoing overload of Cortisol reduces brain reserve, which makes you more vulnerable to the many physical effects of stress. When stress hurts your brain, it can also ravage your body.

If you have crow's feet, wrinkles, sagging jowls, or thinning skin, don't blame it on your parents. New research shows that environmental factors-— including chronic stresss—rather than genetics, may be at fault. In a fascinating study involving identical twins, environmental factors were found to make people look older than they really are. For the study, which was published on the Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery -journal's website, a panel of plastic surgeons examined digital photos of 186 pairs of identical twins who had attended the Twins Festival in Twinsburg, Ohio, in 2006 and 2007. The physicians attempted to determine the age of each individual based on their facial features. What they found is that individuals who had experienced stressful events tended to look older than their siblings who had led more stress-free lives. For example, twins who were divorced looked almost two years older than their siblings who were married, single, or even widowed. One of the study's authors cited the presence of stress as one of the common denominators in the twins who looked older.

ACTION STEP

Before you spend hundreds of dollars on wrinkle removers, consider that your skin problems may be due to stress as opposed to the natural aging process.

Other scientific evidence shows that chronic stress can mimic the effects of aging to make you look and feel like you've aged beyond your years. According to a 2009 study of 647 women, the physical effects of chroxiic stress were found to be similar to the effects of smoking, being obese, or being ten years older than their actual age. The study looked at the association between perceived stress levels and the length of telomeres, the protective caps located on the ends of chromosomes. The longer the caps are, the more protection they provide. The shorter they are, the less protection provided.

Telomeres naturally shorten over time as we age, eventually becoming so short that they trigger cell death. In this study, the women with higher levels of perceived stress had shorter telomeres than women with low-level stress, indicating premature aging.

You can see the effects of stress-induced aging by simply looking in the mirror. With natural aging, your skin begins to lose collagen and elastin, two proteins that provide support and- elasticity for a more youthful appearance. Stress causes collagen and elastin to break down prematurely, which leads to sagging skin and wrinkles. Unfortunately, wrinkles aren't the only skin problem that comes with unrelenting stress. Since chronic stress toys with your hormones, it can also lead to acne breakouts regardless of your age.

HOW  CHRONIC  STRESS  MAKES  YOU  SICK

Your body responds to the way you think, feel, and act. Because of this brain-body connection, whenever you feel stressed, your body tries to tell you when something isn't right. For example, high blood pressure or a stomach ulcer might develop after a particularly stressful event, such as the death of a loved one. Chronic stress weakens your body's immune system, making you more likely to get colds, flu bugs, and other infections during emotionally difficult times. It has also been implicated in heart disease, hypertension, and even cancer. In fact, too much stress can actually kill you.

In a 2004 issue of Psychological Bulletin, a team of psychologists published findings from a thorough review of nearly three hundred scientific studies linking chronic stress and the immune system. According to their analysis, the studies, which dated from 1960 to 2001 and involved 18,941 test subjects, show incontrovertible evidence that stress causes changes in the immune system. What they found is that short-term stress temporarily boosts immunity, but chronic stress weakens the immune system, making people more vulnerable to common ailments and serious diseases. In particular, the elderly and people who are already suffering from an illness are more susceptible to changes in the immune system due to chronic stress........

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DR. AMEN  HAS  A  GREAT  DEAL  TO  SAY  ABOUT  STRESS,  BAD  STRESS,  HOW  TO  PREVENT  OR  OVERCOME  STRESS.

A  VERY  FINE  BOOK  HE  HAS  WRITTEN: "CHANGE  YOUR  BRAIN  CHANGE  YOUR  BODY"  --  I  HIGHLY  RECOMMEND  IT.