Step One in Making Change: Understanding How Your Body Reacts to Stress
It’s no surprise to any leader that our workplaces are experiencing exceptionally rapid change, and as of now (February 2025), massive changes at the federal level are sowing even more uncertainty, and honestly, fear.
When faced with big changes, whether it’s moving to a different team at work or wanting to live a healthier life, our brains are wired to initially fight against that change.
Not cool, right? It feels so unhelpful, but trust me when I say your brain is only trying to keep you alive.
Understanding what’s happening in your brain at a basic level and learning how to strengthen it to make changes will help you stop resisting change.
Our brains don’t respond well to change. Change = threat, and we like to keep our nice routines and habits that have been working for us for so long. It is all too easy for your brain to switch on the stress response once it is aware of a change, which then renders your “thinking” part of the brain less effective.
The cool thing is that we can actually rewire our brain to not perceive the change as a threat. Doing this takes work. Much like lifting weights builds muscle, repetition and gradual increasing of effort is what will build up your brain’s neuroplasticity – e.g. the ability for your brain to make new neural connections and rely less on the old ones that are keeping you from making the change.
Think of it as flexing a teeny tiny bicep.
And here’s the first step – recognizing when you’re in the stress response. Because you can’t work on developing neuroplasticity if your brain is shunting all its energy to your muscles, lungs, and heart to prepare you to run away from a lion.
Think about what happens in your body when you are reacting to stress. For me, my heart beats faster, I get sweaty, and the most tell-tale sign is that my face and neck flush bright red. Which, I have to say, is a super annoying stress response because there’s no way of hiding it.
The next time you start to feel any of the tell-tale signs for your own stress response, take a few deep breaths. If you can, remove yourself from the situation and complete the stress cycle by taking a walk, doing deep breathing, getting a hug – whatever works for you. You’ll be able to re-address the thing that brought on the stress cycle with a clear head once you’ve had time to switch your rational brain back on and convince your body that you’re not in danger.
Neuroscientist I am not, but I am finding that understanding the biology behind our resistance to change is incredibly helpful in taking steps to making that change, or adapting to it.
