Train the Body, Calm the Mind – How Healthy Stress Transforms Your Life

by Dr Gene | Aug 28, 2025 | Mental Health

Stress gets a bad rap. In the modern wellness lexicon, it’s almost always the villain—blamed for everything from burnout and insomnia to chronic disease. And to be fair, there’s good reason for that. Unmanaged, chronic stress is indeed harmful. It taxes the body, fogs the brain, and chips away at our well-being over time. But the story of stress is far more nuanced than it’s often portrayed. In fact, not all stress is bad. Some forms of stress are not only beneficial—they’re essential for growth, resilience, and long-term health.

There’s a word in biology for this concept: hormesis. It refers to a phenomenon in which a small amount of stress or toxin stimulates the body to grow stronger. Think of it as the biological version of “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” Whether it’s lifting weights, skipping a meal, or stepping into an uncomfortable conversation, controlled exposure to stress teaches the body—and the mind—to adapt, heal, and evolve.

In a world that prizes comfort and ease, we’ve become deeply conditioned to avoid stress at all costs. But what if we’ve misunderstood it? What if stress, when used with intention, is not the enemy but the catalyst?

Let’s start with the basics. The body is a beautifully dynamic system designed to respond to challenges. The stress response, at its core, is an adaptive mechanism. When we experience stress, our bodies release a cocktail of hormones—primarily cortisol, adrenaline, and norepinephrine. These hormones sharpen our focus, quicken our pulse, and flood the bloodstream with energy. It’s nature’s way of saying, “Wake up. Something important is happening.”

But what happens next is key. In a healthy system, the body returns to baseline after the perceived threat passes. Heart rate slows, breathing steadies and cortisol levels normalize. This ability to switch between states—to rise to the challenge and then recover—is what resilience is all about. The trouble begins when the recovery phase never comes. When stress becomes constant, unrelenting, and undefined, the body remains stuck in a heightened state of alert. That kind of stress leads to disease, fatigue, and emotional exhaustion.

However, when stress is applied strategically, in measured doses and followed by recovery, it becomes a tool for transformation. This is the essence of hormesis. It’s the reason why lifting weights builds muscle, why fasting sharpens metabolic health, and why breathing through discomfort can quiet the mind.

Let’s take exercise as a prime example. When you engage in strength training, you’re literally breaking down muscle fibers. That damage is a stress signal, prompting your body to respond by rebuilding those fibers with more strength and resilience. Without that initial stress—without lifting more than feels comfortable—there’s no signal to grow.

The same goes for cardiovascular training. When you push your heart and lungs to work harder, your circulatory system adapts, becoming more efficient. Your mitochondria—the powerhouses of your cells—increase in number and function. Your capacity expands. This is hormesis in action: stress, followed by adaptation, leads to greater capability.

Nutritional stress can also serve a purpose. Take fasting, for instance. Temporarily abstaining from food may seem counterintuitive to health, but science tells a different story. Fasting activates a process known as autophagy, in which the body begins to clean out damaged cells and regenerate healthier ones. It’s like a reset button at the cellular level. Hormones shift in beneficial ways: growth hormone spikes, insulin sensitivity improves, and inflammation drops. The mild stress of fasting forces the body to become more efficient and more resourceful. Again, it’s the presence of stress—not its absence—that triggers these benefits.

Even cold exposure, another form of hormetic stress, has profound effects on the body. Brief cold plunges or cold showers activate brown fat, increase norepinephrine, improve circulation, and bolster immunity. It’s uncomfortable, yes—but it’s also a wake-up call to your biology that leads to adaptation.

But hormesis isn’t limited to the physical realm. Emotional stress, too, plays a powerful role in shaping who we are and how we relate to the world. Consider interpersonal conflict. Most of us try to avoid it—preferring harmony over confrontation. But facing conflict, when done with mindfulness, can teach us invaluable lessons about boundaries, empathy, and communication. Each difficult conversation becomes a form of practice. Each emotional discomfort a chance to grow in patience, clarity, and compassion. Over time, you build emotional strength. You learn how to stand in discomfort without being swept away by it. You learn how to repair, how to speak truth, how to listen. And you carry those skills with you into every relationship you touch.

Breathing, too, becomes a tool to train resilience. Many ancient practices like pranayama or modern techniques like box breathing and the Wim Hof method leverage breath as both a stressor and a soothing mechanism. Holding your breath, extending your exhale, or breathing through the nose during physical exertion all create controlled stress. They train the nervous system to stay calm under pressure. They improve CO₂ tolerance and oxygen efficiency. Most importantly, they teach you to stay anchored—to respond rather than react.

When we begin to see stress through this lens, we stop fearing it. We start working with it. And in doing so, we gain access to a deeper, more resilient form of health.

At a hormonal level, the body’s response to stress is a finely tuned system. Cortisol, the so-called stress hormone, gets a lot of blame. But cortisol is not the villain. In fact, it plays a crucial role in regulating blood pressure, reducing inflammation, and supporting energy production. Problems arise not from cortisol itself but from chronic, unchecked release. When stress becomes a lifestyle rather than an event, the feedback loop that governs cortisol breaks down. This is where burnout begins. Adrenal dysregulation. Fatigue. Insomnia.

But short bursts of cortisol—elicited through intermittent stress—can be incredibly beneficial. They prime the brain for focus, signal the body to mobilize energy, and prepare us for action. What matters is what happens after the stressor is removed. Do you return to calm? Do you give your body the rest and recovery it needs to grow?

Hormesis depends on that balance. Stress + recovery = growth. It’s not enough to apply pressure; you must also release it. Just as muscle repair happens during rest, healing from any form of stress requires space. This is why sleep, nutrition, connection, and reflection are essential counterparts to every stressor you introduce.

The beauty of hormesis is that it’s self-reinforcing. The more you expose yourself to small doses of stress, the more resilient you become—not just physically but mentally and emotionally. You begin to welcome challenges rather than avoid them. You start to trust that discomfort is not the end of safety but the beginning of strength.

I’ve seen this play out in my own life and in the lives of patients and peers. I’ve watched people use intermittent fasting not only to manage their weight but to deepen their relationship with hunger and satiety. I’ve seen those who once feared exercise find empowerment in their first pull-up, their first mile. I’ve listened to individuals describe how facing a difficult relationship changed them—not because the other person changed, but because they learned to speak and listen in a new way.

And I’ve felt it myself—in the breath held just a little longer during meditation. In the challenge of pushing forward during HIIT training. In the difficult truth spoken kindly but firmly. In each of these moments, the message is the same: you are capable of more than you think. And stress, when approached wisely, will show you just how capable you are.

This isn’t to say we should glorify stress or seek it recklessly. Chronic stress—especially the kind that comes from toxic work environments, harmful social or romantic relationships, financial insecurity, or unresolved trauma—is not the same thing as hormesis. It overwhelms rather than strengthens. That’s why discernment matters. That’s why we must pair challenge with care and intensity with intuition. Hormesis is not about pushing through everything. It’s about training the body and mind in a way that builds—not breaks—you.

So, where do you begin?

Start by noticing your patterns. Where do you shy away from discomfort? Where are you coasting in comfort that’s keeping you stagnant? Then, choose one area—movement, food, breath, or relationship—and apply just a little stress. Skip a meal and see how your body responds. Take a cold shower. Have the conversation you’ve been avoiding. Walk an extra mile. Hold your breath at the top of an inhale. Then, recover. Rest. Reflect. Listen.

This is how resilience is built—not in leaps, but in layers, not through avoidance, but through intentional exposure. You don’t need to overhaul your life. You need to learn to harness stress, one moment at a time.

The body was made for this. The mind was made for this. You were made for this.

References:

• Calabrese, E. J., & Baldwin, L. A. (2003). Hormesis: the dose-response revolution. Annual Review of Pharmacology and Toxicology, 43(1), 175-197.
• Mattson, M. P. (2008). Hormesis defined. Ageing Research Reviews, 7(1), 1-7.
• Longo, V. D., & Panda, S. (2016). Fasting, circadian rhythms, and time-restricted feeding in healthy lifespan. Cell Metabolism, 23(6), 1048–1059.
• Van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Viking.
• Hof, W. (2020). The Wim Hof Method: Activate Your Full Human Potential. Sounds True.
• Sapolsky, R. M. (2004). Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers. Holt Paperbacks.