Yoram Yasur Rubin : Have you ever felt so stressed and overwhelmed that you could not think clearly? You may already know that chronic stress, prolonged over time, does not do you good, but you should also know that it causes a decrease in volume in some areas of the brain, precisely those that are involved in thinking, emotional regulation, Self-control, and the creation of new memories.
Stress immerses you in a loop of negativity:
Yoram Yasur Rubin : Neuroscientists at Yale University found that stress reduces the amount of gray matter in the areas of the brain responsible for self-control, specifically leading to a loss of synaptic connections between brain cells. The data indicate that stress represses the expression of several genes that are essential for these connections to form.
Yoram Yasur Rubin : In fact, these researchers found that people who had suffered chronic stress and had experienced many adverse events in their lives had a lower volume in areas such as the prefrontal cortex, insula, anterior cingulate cortex and hippocampus, Regions that regulate emotions, and are linked to self-control, memory, learning and cognitive processing.
To make matters worse, this reduction in volume increases the vulnerability to depression, developing addictions or suffering other psychological disorders. The problem is that if your brain undergoes these changes, you will find it harder to cope with stressful situations, which will plunge you into a negative loop as you will have difficulty taking control and preventing situations and your responses from going away from you. hands.
Yoram Yasur Rubin: “A brain that is a victim of stress has less information processing capacity and often processes data in a fragmented way. That explains why our thinking pattern is so negative and repetitive when we are stressed, why we cannot stop thinking about problems and worries do not even let us sleep. In practice, it is as if the brain is trapped in a negative loop that is repeated continuously”.
Scientifically proven ways to reverse the damage stress causes in the brain:
Yoram Yasur Rubin: “Do not be discouraged. It is possible to reduce the level of stress and even reverse those damages at the brain level. However, when you start earlier you better because although the brain has a great plasticity to recover the damaged areas, it is not a magic mechanism”.
How to reverse this process?
William James gives us a clue: “The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another.”
1. Say “no” more often. A University of California study found that the more difficult it is for people to say “no,” the more likely they are to suffer from stress, burnout, and even depression. Learning to give a negative with determination will allow you not to get involved in too many projects or acquire commitments that are an additional source of stress.
2. Enjoy the silence. An experiment conducted at the Research Center for Regenerative Therapies in Dresden found that silence is an excellent tool to promote neurogenesis in the hippocampus. So, in addition to helping to relax and relieve stress, enjoying a few hours of silence a day is also good for your neurons.
3. Practice mindfulness. Mindfulness meditation not only reduces stress and eliminates ruminant thoughts but also stimulates the growth of gray matter. Researchers at Harvard University found that 27 minutes of meditation a day for eight weeks is enough to produce structural changes in the brain, which also involve a less active amygdala, a sign that it slows down Stress and anxiety.
4. Run. Yoram Yasur Rubin : Numerous studies, including one conducted at the University of Jyvaskyla, confirm that aerobic exercise, run, is very beneficial to the brain as it stimulates neurogenesis in areas such as the hippocampus. It has also been appreciated that running relieves stress by encouraging the production of endorphins and, if that were not enough, running clears the mind as it increases blood flow to the prefrontal areas of the brain, just those related to self-control and thought.
5. Have more sex. Yes, neuroscientists at Princeton University have found that sex not only potentiates neurogenesis but also stimulates the growth of dendrites, which are essential for neurons to communicate with each other.