I just read this post from Claudia Welch PhD in my Healthier Hormones class. It uses Ayurvedic terms and neuroscience but I think it is vitally useful information for all of us.

“I learned such a good term yesterday, from the amazing neuroscientist, Robert Sapolsky : “energetic endangerment.”

It’s when cortisol is high and affecting the neurons in the hippocampus, because it is sabotaging all the ways those neurons receive energy. High stress–high cortisol causes “energetic endangerment.” When there is energetic endangerment, those neurons–the brain–will be way, way, way more damaged by any “insult” that comes along; a stroke, an epileptic fit, etc. and it radically interferes with immune system and our body’s organs.

This is what happens throughout our koshas–our various levels of bodies–physical, energetic, mental. Our energy on all fronts is endangered by our stress response. The challenge: change the stress response.

There is not much more important. I know there are times when our dinacharyas [daily healthful routines] are sacrificed for immediate crisis, but it is so important to recognize when the crisis is really over and it is time to return to dinacharya and pick up the truly important pieces and let the less important pieces lay for a while.

Picking up the pieces might mean getting some regular body work, regular acupuncture, a regular date with a friend and letting some stuff go that is hard to let go (“let me just pay my bills before I can go for a walk,” etc.”
– Claudia Welch

Here is more from Robert Sapolsky:

How to Relieve Stress
By Robert M. Sapolsky | March 22, 2012 |
Robert M. Sapolsky explains why stress can become a chronic problem—and how we can reduce the toll it takes on our lives.

In this excerpt from his talk, the best-selling author and Stanford University professor explains the difference between bad stress and good stress, and how we can manage the effects of chronic stress on our lives. Click this link:

How to Relieve Stress | Greater Good.

Here is a snippet on the modern causes of death and disease:

But some of it has to do with issues that nobody ever had to think about before in medicine—totally bizarre questions like, “What’s your psychological makeup?” or “What’s your social status?” or “How do people with your social status get treated in your society?”
And this one: “Why is it that when we’re feeling unloved, we eat more starch?” Figure that out, and you’ve cured half the cases of diabetes in this country
Indeed, when you look at the diseases that do us in, they are predominantly diseases that can be caused, or made worse, by stress. As a result, most of us in this room will have the profound Westernized luxury of dropping dead someday of a stress-related disease. That’s why it’s so urgent that we understand stress—and how to better manage it.

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