5.+Eustress

Stress is a psychological function; the reason why you are under stress is because something happens in your brain. The hypothalamus, which controls the emotional functions in the body, sends a signal to the adrenal medulla. The adrenal medulla then starts secreting stress hormones like adrenaline and noradrenaline in the body. When this happens, the body starts to react. The heartbeat and the pulse increases, you get higher blood-pressure and the breathing gets more intense. This reaction is called the active system. The active system is the reason why you can do anything at all, it does not matter if we are talking about a test, a soccer game or just ordinary problems during weekdays. This means that stress is something natural and important for our daily lives. Today people often think about negative things when they hear the word stress. They think of diseases like worn-outs or angst but stress can be a good thing too.
 * What happens in the body? **

Eustress (positive stress) can make you achieve better and it can help you to use your full capacity. For example, when you are having a test, a little stress can help you focus and to solve the problems you have in front of you. Or if you create something and get credit for the work, stress can be a challenge more than a incrimination. Sometimes stress is used like it was from the beginning, when the stress helped people prepare for fight. If you end up in a violent situation the body will give you the energy you need to survive. Studies also show that the stress your body feels when you increase the weights on your training tools helps the body to create bigger muscles.
 * How can stress be good for me? **

But the body need to rest, otherwise the body will not recover. And that is not just for the stress you get when you have a work-out, it is for all kinds of stress. Our body and soul needs to recover and rest, otherwise the eustress will turn into distress (negative stress). We need time to relax and recover because our body is like a battery that needs to be charged sometimes. If you want your well-being and performance capacity to be as good as possible, the stress has to change between intension/struggle and relax/recover often because the stress system in our bodies is created for short term-periods.