In a National Geographic video documentary, “Stress: Portrait of a Killer,” Stanford University neurobiologist Dr. Robert Sapolsky shows us the effect of stress on our bodies. The stress response is critical to our survival, as for example when we run away from a physical danger. What is interesting is that we turn on the exact same stress response for purely psychological states: thinking about our job, the taxes we have to pay, or a 30-year mortgage. “The key difference,” says Dr. Sapolski, “is we are not doing it for a real physiological reason and we are doing it non-stop.” So by not turning off the stress response for “life’s traffic jams,” we secrete the same corrosive hormones, and after a while, the stress response is more damaging than the stress itself. Chronic stress undermines our immune system, clogs our arteries, restricts blood flow and kills brain cells which affects learning and memory. If you have ever doubted the effects of stress on your body, this documentary will dispel them. In studying wild baboons for the past 30 years, Dr. Sapolsky reports that these primates organize themselves into distinct social hierarchies and subject one another to social stress. The stress increases blood pressure, damaging artery walls in low-ranking baboons. The research also discovered that the same applies to humans. Our standing in the social hierarchy can produce high stress hormones—subordinates, for example, are more subject to the harmful effects of stress. “Feeling” low-ranking is also detrimental to our health. This is tied primarily to a lack of control and predictability the lower we are in the corporate food chain. New findings also show that stress shortens the genetic structures, called telomeres, which protect the ends of our chromosomes from fraying. The shortening of the telomeres accelerates the aging process in low ranking baboons, and the same happens in humans who are chronically stressed. While we cannot eliminate stress from our lives, there is a lot we can do to minimize its effects. Here are some tips to help you:

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