Too much stress is bad for your health — but so is too little. Stress is a perfectly natural reaction that prepares you for action. It's the old "fight or flight" principle, and it worked to keep our ancestors alive back when they lived in caves. In a stressful situation, cortisol and adrenaline are released into our bloodstreams, raising our normal blood pressure and getting us all fired up.

Trouble is, this works much better when you're being chased by a saber-toothed tiger than it does when you're working on an annual report. Stress hormones were designed to be quickly flushed out of our systems by action — either fight or flight. We often don't get that release with modern day stressors. The hormones linger in our blood, pushing up our normal blood pressure.

Get involved. Do a little research to find information on these stress-reducing techniques:

Continuous stress can raise normal blood pressure. Researchers have known this for years. But stress that causes higher than normal blood pressure for one person may have no effect on another person.

We react individually to stressors, and because of this, stress management techniques have to be tailored to the individual. Not every strategy works for everyone. While deep breathing and progressive relaxation may lower one persons blood pressure, another person may find those stress management techniques actually increase stress.

Many people are put off by the flowery, "release your inner child" language that describes many stress management techniques. Often, though, some solid, tried and true applications are hiding behind this language. There just seems to be a tendency to want to "pretty it up."

The first step toward reducing stress and lowering your blood pressure is identifying what you, personally, deem stressful. Make a list of the stressors in your life, and consider your options. You can fight stress in two ways — by learning general stress-reducing techniques, or by removing the stressor. Perhaps learning deep breathing techniques are all you need to reduce stress at work, or perhaps you need to find a less stressful job.

Preventing stress from affecting your normal blood pressure can be as easy as taking up a hobby you enjoy or exercising. Physical activity works stress hormones out of the bloodstream, thereby lowering blood pressure.

Stress reduction need not always involve deep breathing or New Age mysticism. Try some of these simple ideas to get your stress under control:

Resources

Linden, W., Lenz, J.W. & Con, A.H. (2001, April 23). Individualized stress management for primary hypertension. Archives of Internal Medicine 161(8), 1071-1080.