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TruthWorks Podcast Episode Notes: The Shocking Truth About Stress
Episode Overview In this inaugural episode of "TruthWorks," hosts Jessica Neal and Patty McCord engage in a transformative conversation with Dr. Rebecca Heiss, a stress physiologist and author. The discussion revolves around the misconceptions surrounding stress, fear, and burnout, aiming to reshape listeners' perceptions and approaches to these common workplace challenges.
Key Themes
- Understanding stress as a feature, not a bug.
- The dangers of viewing stress as a negative force.
- Strategies for reframing anxiety into a productive energy source.
- The societal implications of fear and pressure on individual well-being.
Key Concepts and Insights
Stress as a Feature
- Stress is inherent to human experience and should not be viewed solely as a negative.
- Dr. Heiss emphasizes that our cave-brain interprets modern stressors (like difficult conversations) as life-threatening scenarios, impacting our ability to process and manage stress effectively.
Reframing Anxiety
- Instead of viewing anxiety as a personal failing, it can be reframed as energy and excitement that prepares one for challenges.
- Recognizing that the most meaningful moments in life often come with stress can help shift one’s mindset.
Coping Mechanisms
- The discussion introduces the idea of "inviting the tiger in for tea," which encourages acknowledging stress rather than suppressing it.
- A practical exercise discussed is the “disaster diary,” where individuals document stressors to confront and analyze them, transforming fear into actionable steps.
The Role of Leadership
- Leaders should model healthy responses to stress, creating an environment where team members feel safe to express their own stress and challenges.
- Encouraging a narrative of adventure rather than ordeal can help teams navigate high-stress situations collectively.
Key Discussions
- Jessica shares her personal experiences with panic attacks and stage fright, highlighting the universality of fear.
- Dr. Heiss discusses how parents tend to be less happy but more fulfilled, linking fulfillment to meaningful, albeit stressful, experiences.
The Impact of Social Media
- The episode addresses the influence of social media on stress and acceptance, particularly among younger demographics.
- It highlights the pressure to maintain a certain image online, exacerbating feelings of inadequacy and stress.
Practical Takeaways for Listeners
- Acknowledge Stress: Understand that stress is a natural aspect of life; it’s how we respond that matters.
- Reframe the Narrative: Shift the perception of stress from a negative force to a potential source of motivation and energy.
- Practice Curiosity: When feeling stressed, ask questions about the source of that stress instead of reacting impulsively.
- Model Healthy Behavior: If in a leadership position, demonstrate a balanced approach to stress to foster a supportive team culture.
Final Thoughts The episode concludes with a powerful reminder that stress can be a competitive advantage when managed thoughtfully. Listeners are encouraged to embrace their fears and uncertainties as part of their growth journey, fostering resilience both personally and professionally.
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Listeners are invited to reflect on their relationship with stress and consider how they can implement these insights into their own lives. With a mindset shift, stress can transform from a burden into a powerful ally in achieving personal and professional goals.
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:00Helplessness isn't learned. It's our default setting. So if we believe that we don't know, we just throw our hands up. We're like, whatever. I don't know the things. I'm just dumb. We start telling stories. And the reality is, no, you just, why should you know that yet? Right. There's no earthly reason you should know all the things.
0:23What would happen if we just told the truth? Welcome to TruthWorks, where we dig into the nitty gritty of leadership and work. and what needs to change. I'm Jessica Neal. And I'm Patti McCord. Our journey together started in HR, but trust us, it's evolved into something wild, honest, and well, a bit rebellious. So throw out the handbook. We're here to redefine rules to work for us, not against us. Let's dive into another episode.
1:01Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of TruthWorks. I'm Jessica Neal, your host. And Patty's still out, but she's going to come back, I promise. So don't worry. But exciting, exciting news. We have, I don't know, I'm just excited about this conversation that I'm about to have because this, I don't know, the energy I get from you is just so wonderful. But we have Dr. Rebecca Heiss here. She is a, I'm going to hopefully pronounce this correctly. She's a stress physiologist. Nailed it. Check me out. Check me out. And you're obviously an author. But I think what's really interesting about your work is that you help turn fear into fuel, right?
1:45Like you have studied this. You have obviously coached and helped not only individuals, but corporations think about this. And, you know, fear is something that we all struggle with. And you're going to explain it better than I can because you've actually studied it, whereas I have not. I've just talked to smart people like you who have studied it. And so I feel like I kind of have. But, you know, our brains kind of work against us, right? And they tell us stories and things that are not true. And I think it's because our brains needed that maybe when we were in the caveman years. Jessica, you're nailing it.
2:29Oh, you're nailing it. I love this. Perfect. But okay, I'm not going to spoil everything. But anyways, Rebecca, tell us who you are. Tell us about your work. I don't even know how you started doing this, but I'm glad you did. Tell us the whole story. We want to know everything. Sure, Jessica. Well, first of all, thank you so much for being here or having me here rather. I'm so excited for this conversation and you're so far nailing this stress physiologist. So what that means is I study the hormones that drive our behaviors in particular when we're in stress and fear and overwhelm, which is like most of us most of the time, I think.
3:02So basically I study human behavior and help people to really utilize that stress response the way that it's supposed to be used because it is, I tell people, it is a feature, not a bug of our system. Yes. I love that you say that. it's a feature. We just look at it as like a feature. We all have it. It's a feature, right? It's not a bug. And I don't know, you're going to talk about this, but I think like, and you talk about this in your books and things, but you're sort of told with fear, like, you know, meditate, you know, like take, you know, bubble bath. I don't, yeah, get rid of it. Shove it down deep inside.
3:40Swallow it down because that works well. We know those, these things work great, right? Yeah. Yeah. Listen, there's been tons of research done on this. And the reality is, first of all, stress, it's not going away. So you can bubble bath and meditate and do all those things in self-care all day long, and you're still going to have stress in your life. So let's stop like trying to focus on getting rid of it. And instead, I call it inviting the tiger in for tea. So let me give you a little context on this, because you nailed it when you started and saying like our stress response is built for, you know, cave person days.
4:13It really is. It's built for three minutes of screaming terror, getting chased by a tiger, right? Like that's what, that's what our body is responding to constantly, right? In the modern environment, like you're not going to be killed and eaten in the next three minutes by 99.99999 % of your stressors. So when we feel this response, what we have to recognize is one, it's not a tiger, Right? And then we can say, this isn't life and death. This is just energy. This is my body preparing me to perform, to rise to the occasion. And we can get curious then and say, okay, what do I need to do? What is the small step that I can do to utilize this energy in a way that serves me rather than paralyzes me?
4:53Right. Well, how did you get started on this? I don't know. How did this all happen? Super stressed out person, Jessica. I mean, that's how it started. You don't seem stressed to me. You seem fine. Thanks. I appreciate that. And I think it's because I really do utilize this work in my own life. You know, I'm never going to tell anybody to do something I don't do myself. The short version of a much longer story is I've been studying stress for a long time. And unfortunately, my sister's wife had been diagnosed with terminal cancer. And it's one of those moments that just like pulls the rug out.
5:27Right. And we all have these moments in our lives. You know, it may not be that exact thing, but it's going to be a moment that just stops you dead in your tracks. And for me, it was the moment that I went, every decision I've been making in my life, I've made out of fear. And I don't want my legacy, my life, my diagnosis. When I have that diagnosis, I don't want to look back and go, I wish. And why didn't I? And I should have. And so I, um, that month I quit my job, sold my house and divorced my husband. My God. What? Yeah. Full stop. So I'm not saying that's a solution, y 'all. I'm not saying go out and do those things.
6:02It was to be clear. But it was a moment of reckoning for me and going, you know, I need to be utilizing a lot of the work that I do. I need to be applying it to my own life. And that's really how this all got started. Wow. So, okay. So what happens when you do all that? Like, that's a lot of, well, first of all, that's a lot of working through fear right there and doing all those things at once. But what happened right after that? Like what? Such a good question. It's such a good question. Here's what I think happens. What I think happens when we realize that it's not, these aren't tigers, right?
6:37Is we realized it's not the tiger that's going to kill us. It's not the stress that's going to kill us. It's the cage that we build to protect ourselves from those tigers, from those stressors. And what we're actually doing is we're preventing ourselves from living our most meaningful, authentic, and purposeful lives. because our research has found that the number one to a meaningful, purposeful life, it's stress. And so we're actually like, when we're fighting against stress, we're fighting against the thing that's bringing all of this purpose to our lives. So my hope is that people can start to realize that when they're doing their most meaningful, purposeful work, how they're feeling that stress, that's not necessarily a bad thing.
7:17Right. Because stress can be good. It can be a motivator. I think a lot of my stress came from work, comes from work, because I cared about it so much. I loved doing it so much. I wanted I wanted to be great for my family I wanted to be great for the people at work and so I think that there was just a lot of pressure I'm just trying to think back there's a lot of pressure that I put on myself there wasn't necessarily pressure people were putting on me of course there were high expectations but you know I think back to like, you know, I used to have to get up and do these talks in front of the company, you know, thousands of people.
8:16And it was super stressful. And I don't, you know, I, I would get so nervous. Like I would just practice so much so that, you know, it would just roll off my tongue so that, cause I literally would have an out of body experience. Yeah. Like I was so, you know, I'd be up there and the lights on me like, oh God, this is horrible. But anyway, I got better at it. This is the more I did it. And maybe a little less fearful. But I always had that like, I felt like I was going to puke every single time. Jessica, I'm so glad that you're saying this because listen, I'm a professional speaker, right? This is what I do for a living is I stand in front of people and do the thing that is often people's biggest fear, which is speaking in public.
8:59And it does get easier to your point because you train your brain that it's not a tiger, right? these people are going to kill an E2. But the fear, the anxiety, it's still there. And I really want people to recognize this. Like that is not a bad thing. It's a barometer for how much you care. Like the day I don't feel stressed or anxious when I'm taking the stage is the day I need to quit because I don't care. Really? Whoa. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. I can't think that that was the goal to get to like get so good that I wasn't stressed when I go on stage. So I'll reframe this a little bit. When we feel stress and anxiety, what we're actually feeling is the results of all of these hormones being released in our body.
9:41And we have almost the identical response in our body to excitement and other high arousal emotions. So excitement, anger, being amped up, being highly caffeinated, like very, very similar responses. The only difference between excitement and anxiety or stress is how our body is interpreting what our body is doing. And so when we are saying to ourselves, I'm scared, I have to calm down. I just need to take some deep breaths. First of all, that's an evil thing to do because you can't calm down. You can't physiologically just force yourself to calm down. Yeah. I would try that and it literally didn't work.
10:18The only thing that worked was I practiced enough to fool everybody. Right. And so that's exactly it, Jessica. What you did, meaningful, whether you were trying to do this or not, what you did was practice what I call the transfer, where you're transferring all of that energy that stress is delivering to you into a brand of excitement. And by practicing, I think you were, and here's why, like, I think you convinced your brain you were, or at least that like, because I've practiced, I've practiced, I've practiced, I can blank out, I can get up there, I can blank out. And my guess is your body took over.
10:53And when, when we're scared, right, you'll see us hunch and we'll like pull into ourselves and we have this very like tight, fearful positioning. And when we're excited, our body opens up and we smile, even if we are faking it, right? And so is faking it. Yeah, absolutely. But this is the magic of the brain-body connection. When we fake it, when we throw our shoulders back, we want to smile on. Yeah. See, people think they smile because they're happy, but they're actually happy because they're smiling. Okay. Full stop, right? Full stop. So like when you're positioning yourself and you're acting as if I am excited, here we go.
11:31You may not be excited, but your brain reads that as my body's excited. This is okay. And so we're going on stage and you're feeling safe. Yeah. Okay. That's wild. That's wild. Yeah, it is wild. Okay. So help me understand, like, I don't know, cause it kind of seems like all the advice that you get around this again is to just, you know, like make it go away. And the more you practice, the better you'll get at it. And the fear, but you're saying that the fear never goes away and that it shouldn't go away because I feel like that's the opposite of what we're told. Yeah. I'll give, I'll give three points here.
12:13Okay. The first point is the research we did last year, which basically the more you try to get rid of stress, the more stressed out you become because you feel like a failure. You're like, I'm trying to do all these things and it's not going away and it must be me. And now we get in our head and we're like, oh my gosh, this is worse. All right, so a 2013 study looked at 90 different workplace interventions, right? 90 of them. We're talking meditation, massage, all of this. Like, and trust me, I'm really - And this was all in the workplace. Yeah, all in the workplace, right? Of those 90 workplace interventions, Do you know how many actually worked to mitigate stress?
12:52Zero. One. One. One. And it wasn't massage. Now I'm deeply disappointed. What was it? Service to others. I can see that working. Right? Yeah. And immediately, immediately I'm like, well, okay, that makes a lot of sense. Because when we look at the hormones of the stress response, everybody's familiar with cortisol, right? Your major stress hormone. The second major stress hormone is oxytocin. Yeah. which is a togetherness hormone, right? It's going through discomfort together. So when we reach out and we serve others in the discomfort, we actually make it better for ourselves. Yep. Isn't that wild?
13:28I get that. I guess that's why, you know, because they talk about like dogs giving that to you as well. Like maybe that's why dogs are helpful with this dress. I don't know. You know what? I'm making step up. I'm not you, but. Jessica, listen. I'm pretending to be. Okay. Look, I think you are. I think you just hit on a really good point. I'm sitting here going, wait a second. You're right. I'm taking care of my dog and therefore I feel better as a result. Right? Like that. Oxytocin. Yeah. I also go, and I, um, I don't know if, if you have kids, but I have a, uh, almost six year old. He's going to be six in like nine, nine days.
14:10And, I will stare in his eyes and it makes me less stressed. Oh my gosh. You just gave me all the feels. You just gave me all the feels. Is that a thing? Probably. Because I get a massive amount of like oxytocin from him. Yeah, absolutely. And I think you're grounding yourself in the meaning and purpose, right? Like, listen, one of the most stressful things that anybody ever does is have children. Like it's horrifically stressful and you're choosing that, right? That's wild to me. Like people choose this. This is a life decision people make. It is stressful. On repeat. On repeat. We do it once and we're like, oh, this is horrible.
14:47Let's do it five more times. Yeah. And the reason for that, again, is this is a barometer for how much we care, how much meaning and purpose is brought into our lives. And so I think as you're looking at him, as you're like looking, you're going, right, this is worth it. This is meaningful. Right. Yep. It's beautiful. I love that. Interesting. Interesting. Interesting. Okay. So is there a difference though for this stress hormone thing for men versus women? Is there a difference? Because I feel like I'm definitely more stressed than my counterpart, my husband. You are. So yes, women do have more stress, experience more stress.
15:27And again, when I say have more stress, this can be interpreted in a thousand different ways. Like, are we measuring the hormones themselves? Are we measuring how they feel? Are we measuring the actual stressors that they're tackling. And on all of those levels, the answer is yes, women have more of all of those things. They have more stressors in their lives. They're caring for more people and we're better at handling it. Yeah. That's true too. Yeah. I just think about traveling with my husband. He's like, yeah. Yeah. He's so strong. I'm like, this is, we're just going through TSA. You know what it's going to be every single time, you know, Like, I don't know, but he's so wound up.
16:08Yeah. And a lot of that is, it is part, partly practice. Like women have to juggle more from a very early age. Part of that is also, we are much more, especially in this country, it's much more acceptable for us to have friends and people that we lean on and we build community. And as a result, because community is seen as this feminine trait, we have a lot more support systems to lean into. And that's huge when it comes to mitigating stress. Service to others, right? Like the ability to ask for and receive help. That's what oxytocin does. So yeah. Okay. Well, all right. And I think one of your mantras, if you will, is fear less.
16:51Yeah. Right? Like you've sort of reframed the word like fearless to fear less. Yeah. Don't be fearless. That's dumb. Well, yeah. Well, tell me about that because everybody tells you to be brave, be fearless. And I mean, maybe I need to, like, sometimes I tell my son, like, you just need to be brave here. Like, you know, he'll want me to go. He wanted to play with these kids on the beach this weekend. He's like, you go ask them. I'm like, no, you go ask them. You know, like, if you want to play with them, like, mommy's right here, but you can do it. Like, you know how to go. Yeah. You know, but I did.
17:28I said, you can be brave and do it. but maybe I shouldn't say brave. I love that. I think that's perfect. I think you're, you're handling it. You're giving him actually the confidence to do that and to take those small risks. And that's what I mean when I say fear less, right? It's not that we shouldn't have fear. Fear is there's a time and a place and don't jump into the cage of a hungry tiger. That's dumb. Right. Let's be fearless. But like, that's dumb. Yes. And so like fearing stress less or feeling, fearing anything a little bit less just means being a little more cognitive about it. Like, what is it that I'm actually afraid of?
18:05Am I afraid? Oh, I'm afraid of rejection. I'm afraid of that little boy rejecting me. Is that a life and death situation? No. So let me set this small trajectory of bravery. So I think what you're actually doing there is you're empowering your son to take these small, brave trajectories. And this is something that's really important because Because in the workplace too, we often look at outcomes as the goal, right? There's one goal. I have to be accepted. Well, you don't control that. You don't control that outcome. What you control is your small trajectory towards something. And what you're asking him to do is take ownership of this small trajectory towards the outcome that he wants.
18:44There's no guarantee on it, but it allows him to build some confidence and fear a little bit less in taking that small step forward. Why do we want to be accepted so much? Do you know? Yeah. Yeah. You know the answer? I do know the answer. So the reason for this is we grew, we grew up, we evolved in these tribes of about 150 individuals, right? And you cannot survive out there in our ancestral environment alone. You can't make it. And so fitting into the tribe, making sure you understand your place in the tribe was crucial. It was literally a life and death situation, which is why, you know, feeling this, this social rejection, it sets off the exact same pathway in the brain as like physical pain.
19:29If you have a social rejection, it's like getting your arm broken. It's terrible. It's terrible. Yeah. Well, I wonder how you think like all these social sites and things play into this like fear and acceptance thing because i feel like you know i feel like there's a lot of positivity that can come from it but there's also like you know a lot of negativity you know and you know i have to do stuff for the podcast and like post on like linkedin and like whatever and there'll be occasionally where somebody like oh that was terrible and you're like oh yeah why why does this person matter so much to me right i don't even know him right right but it doesn't matter because a hundred, you know, 200 ,000 years ago, you would have known that person.
20:18And that would have been a direct like hit to your reputation. So yeah, these social sites, I think are particularly terrifying for many reasons. Like one, we're only seeing people's highlight reels, right? So this isn't reality, but especially, you know, I really worry about young men, young women too, but young men looking at what's available to them. And, you know, for men, the way we value masculinity in our society is what they can obtain, like their status. And when you're online and you're only seeing, I've made this billion dollars this month and this billion dollars, like, and you are just feeling like this horrible failure all the time.
20:57And for women, same thing, like evolutionarily we're valued for our beauty. And so you're seeing all these filters you're seeing. And how will I ever keep up? I really truly believe that if we all had the option to like secretly press a button that said, I never want to have to do social media again. If everybody else agrees to never have to do social media again, I think we'd all press that button. Yeah. Oh, thank you for that release. Yeah. But because you're doing it, I have to do it too. And she has to do it too. And like everybody. Yeah. Well, yeah, it's wild. Okay. Well, listen, I'm peppering questions, but tell us about the book.
21:31It just came out. Like, how's it going? Yeah, thanks. So the book is called Springboard, Transform Stress to Work for You. And it really is my, what I call my fearless formula, which walks you through kind of the training of a high performer. I talk a lot about how Olympic athletes aren't breaking world records during practice. They're breaking them at the peak of stress and fear and anxiety. And that we all have that capability if we shift our mindset around what stress means to us. So it walks us through the tiger stage, which is, you know, it's not a tiger. Then the transfer stage of how we utilize this energy as excitement or a productive anger.
22:08And then the trajectory phase, which is where now that I have my butterflies in alignment, like where do I point them so that it's serving me and the people around me? So that's the that's the book. And it's going great. It is it is a burden of love to put this into the world. And I'm it's incredibly hard. I haven't written a book, but I know many that have, and I know how hard it is. So congratulations on that. And I know it just launched, but I'm sure it will be a huge success. Because again, like what you're talking about, every single person in the world struggles with this. There's not one person that doesn't.
22:47I mean, they may say they don't, but they do. They're liars. Everybody has fear. Even the highest of the high, the wealthiest of the wealthy. Especially the highest of the high and the wealthiest of the wealthiest and the prettiest of the prettiest. You see the most insecurities in those positions. So, yeah. Why is that? I think in part because they have this status and they're terrified. They don't want to lose it. Gosh, everything you're saying makes sense. Well, thanks. Yeah. So, okay. I'm going to ask like maybe a more personal question. But you've done all this research. You practice being fearless, not fearless.
23:33And is there still for you like a fear that you haven't been able to overcome yourself? Like is there something that is just for you like not fixable on this front? I don't know. I mean, yes and no. I think I do have a fear that eats at me. And it's also the fear that I think pushes me and allows me to do what I do every single day. And the fear that sits in the back of my head that I wake up to every morning is, are you living your most wild and precious life? Right? Are you, are you living? I think so. And honestly, it's a day-to-day thing, Jessica, right? It is a like, can I be as authentic and honest and open and brazen in who I am and what I can bring to the world every single day?
24:21and there are moments of course that you fail, right? And then you learn and you're like, okay, cool. This is what I did. Here's what I learned. Here's how I grow. Um, yeah, I, I think that question though eats at me, that fear. Yeah. Well, I think that that's a good, that's a healthy fear to have, right? Because you're, it's around living your best authentic life. So most people, I think to go back to what we were talking about before, it's more, you're worried more about status or you're sure that that may not bring you happiness what you're what you're trying to what you're fearful of is not being happy in some sense not even happy i think um because the interesting thing that the data will say is parents this is a great example since we're talking about parenting parents aren't happier sorry you're not less happier you're a little less happy.
25:15But the trade off there is you have more meaning and purpose. Right? Stress doesn't bring you happiness. It brings you meaning. It brings you purpose. It brings you this like fulfillment. And so the question is, do you want to be happy or you want to be fulfilled? And unfortunately, there's it's a little bit of a it's a little bit of a fulfilled is a better word. I should yes. Of a seesaw there, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. this or that. So yeah, I mean, I hope, and I do find a lot of joy in the work that I'm doing, but it is challenging, right? And when you made that big shift and you like quit your job, got a divorce and all that.
25:55It was ugly. I'm sure. And I'm sure not obvious in the moment that all those decisions were the right decisions. Absolutely. But do you feel like now you have less stress in your life because you were willing to make those calls? No, I don't feel like I have less stress. I don't feel like I have less stress. I feel like I have more purpose. And I think, I think the, again, the stressors will never go away. Yeah. So that's the wrong way to think about it. Right. The stressors are different. You know, I think I would be much more stressed about the cage that I'd set for myself that I was sitting in if I hadn't made those decisions.
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26:36Right. And now I've kind of obliterated the cage of safety and I'm going, oh gosh, this is really scary out here. How do I, how do I keep this course and stay showing up every day in this scary trajectory forward? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I love your, I love your, your point. Sorry. I'm going to, you said something really, really important, which is like, I'm sure you didn't know at the time. And it's so important. No, I did not. I was terrified. I was scared. I was stressed out of my gourd. And I often will ask people to think about the most meaningful or important work that they've ever done or decision that they've made.
27:15And when they reflect back on it and they go back to when they were in the middle of that period of time, their stress levels are through the roof always. Right. And so that's, that is a really important thing to recognize when you're in it, when you're in it and you're like, how am I doing? Stay the course. Right. Well, it's just like your point about the Olympian athletes that, you know, they're during practice, they're, they're working on probably like a skill. Like I want to get better at this one thing. Right. Cause it's going to make me faster. But in the race, like they're racing, right?
27:49And they're breaking the record. That's not how they're operating all the time. And I think that there's probably a lot of stress and fear in that situation because of that. I'm sure there's some rejection that they may feel when they don't win, right? And they want to win at all costs. It's just like a competitive vein that athletes have. And we all have it, I guess, but some are stronger than others. Is that what kind of fuel, like the, when you're talking about like the fear can be fuel, is that what you mean? Yeah, it is really a mindset shift. So I want to, I want to back up to probably one of the most important research studies, because this will answer your question in a roundabout way.
28:35In 2013, again, a lot of stress research in 2013. So this was an eight year study looking at 30 ,000 Americans. And over those course of the eight years, they looked at people who had very high levels of stress and asked the question, do you believe stress is bad for your health? And I think most of us are like, yeah, duh, right? Like that's what we see. Yeah. Take it away. Right. Here's the bad news. Exactly. Here's the bad news. All right. For all of us that were like, yeah, I'm stressed out and I know it's bad for me. Those people died at incredibly high mortality rates. So 43 % higher than the controls.
29:11The good news is people that had that same very high level of stress, who simply believed that stress wasn't good for them or bad for them, that it was just energy. They died at the lowest mortality rates, lower than the people who had very little stress in their life. So what that means is that people are dying prematurely, not because of the amount of stress, but because of the belief that that stress is bad for them. And that's incredibly powerful. So like bringing it full circle around to that Olympic athlete, like when we're feeling that stress rather than going, Oh, this is really bad for me.
29:45I have to get rid of it. I got to fight against it. If we can embrace it and invite the tiger in for tea and say, Oh, hi, hi there. I see you. This feels like my body is really responding to something. What do I need to do in this moment to move through the stress so that I can get on the other side of it and recognize that like, this really is my body preparing me to meet the moment. That's a great point. Can we, um, and I'm going to try to do that now when I'm stressed out, which is often feel it. I'm going to feel, I'm going to invite the tiger for some tea and we're going to sit down together and talk about the stress that the tiger's causing me.
30:25Um, and then I'm going to work through it. But what if I'm, I don't know, what if I'm at work? Yes. Right? There's so many things going on at work. You have your boss, you have your coworkers, you have deadlines, you have money that may be at stake. You want to get a bonus. You want to get a raise. What's the, and not fix isn't the right word. I'm guessing you have to do the same thing with like the mindset and inviting the tiger, but there's so much at stake at work. There is. There is. Yeah. Yeah. So, so this is, this is to your point. Yeah. We're going to invite the tiger and we're going to feel it.
31:05We're going to go, okay, this isn't life and death, but there is a lot there. There are high stakes. There are things that I want to achieve. And in recognizing that like, here's the outcome I want. One of the hardest things for humans is realizing how little control they have over the outcome and trolling the trajectories they set towards that outcome is where we gain our agency back, where we feel like we actually have any control. So I say three minutes of screaming terror, right? So first and foremost, allow yourself to catastrophize because that's normal for humans. We're going to be like, oh my gosh, I'm going to screw this presentation up and then everybody's going to hate me and then my boss is going to reject me and I'm going to lose my job and lose my family and I'm going to die in a gutter somewhere.
31:47Great. Go there, right? Please go there. We're so horrible to ourselves. we really are this is another point that like we're the we're the only species on the planet that that creates stress with our own thoughts right no like lions fail hunting 80 of the time they fail they suck at it and they don't care they're not like oh my gosh i'm a terrible lion i can't no they take naps yeah they're like in the sun like i'll get it next time exactly exactly They don't even like, it's fine. So, yeah. I mean, first, feel it. Go through it. Don't deny yourself that this is important and meaningful. And then the piece that I think is most important is to be curious.
32:30Because curiosity and fear can't coexist. There's literally no brain mechanism that allows for that. Right? Because for 200 ,000 plus years, nobody ever had a tiger charging them and went like, huh, wonder how fast it's coming. I wonder how many stripes this guy, right? Like it didn't happen. And so when we get curious, we kick ourselves out of that fear and allow ourselves to begin thinking more strategically about what can I control? What is the smallest step that I can take right now in the fear along this trajectory of bravery? Okay. So I have, I don't so much anymore, but I used to have panic attacks, like severe ones.
33:10and I, and I wouldn't, sometimes I wouldn't even be, I didn't think I was stressed out in the moment. Like sometimes I'd be asleep and I'd wake up, you know, and like a panic attack. And it was, you know, mostly my guess is about work. I don't know. Yeah. But what, what, what about that type of level of stress? Yeah. A lot of that is unresolved anxiety, right? And the reason we have so much of this built up energy that just finds us all at once is because we're constantly pushing it aside or pushing it away or going, not now, I can't deal with this. I've got 17 other things going on. And so one of the solutions that I offer people is at night, I keep what I call a disaster diary.
33:55And before I go to sleep, I write down like all of the things that I'm stressed out about, all the things that are going to go terribly wrong. And like, here's how they're going to wrong, go wrong. This is why I'm a terrible human being and I'm lousy. And then they sit with it because, and I said, again, I said a three minute timer. I do not let this go on for more than three minutes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Right? Like the time is important. You don't do it for two hours straight. My gosh. Two hours of just beating yourself up is probably not, not recommended. Right? When the timer dings, I then play, um, play advocate and like, I pretend I'm a lawyer and I say, okay, what if these things is a story that I'm telling?
34:35And what are these things is actual fact? Like where do I actually have factual information that this is true and this is going to be the outcome? And when you do that, it's, it's pretty jarring when you realize how much, yeah, that's right. Yeah. How much is story that we create? And then in the, like every so often scenario, that one is true, then you can address it. That's right. That's right. Yeah. And, and honestly, one of the best things is looking back through that diary, you know, things that I'm like so stressed out over. I don't even remember a week later or a month later or haven't ever been a year later.
35:12Yeah. And so when you have these like panic attacks or built up anxiety, it's to your point, it's just unresolved stuff. You just haven't, you haven't addressed it or. Yeah. It's like in your research is like our bodies reacting to, I don't know. Yeah. To dysregulation. I mean, your nervous system is so dysregulated at that stage. It's going, I see something that you are not paying attention to me about, and I need you to pay attention right now. Like I am going to force you to pay attention to this thing. And so, you know, again, my mask of anybody who's experienced this, first of all, I'm not a medical doctor.
35:49Please talk to your medical doctor, right? Of course. Yeah. But also talk to people. yeah right allow yourself I think I didn't at that point yeah yeah yeah because my stress is your stress and your stress is my stress we may not be experiencing the exact same thing at the exact same moment but it's almost always relatable and the more we kind of like pull back the curtain a little bit like okay here's what's going on if you knew me you'd know I'm a stress physiologist I've got two dogs you know the basics but what we don't say is if you really knew me you'd know you I'm really scared for my dad right now who is getting older, and I don't know how I'm going to take care of him.
36:25And I'm on the road all the time. And what does this look? That slight shift, immediately, I guarantee 10 of your listeners are like, oh, gosh, I have that too. Yeah. Like, oh, wow. It's just nice to know other people are experiencing that. Yeah. You know, I was just thinking about like why in those times I didn't maybe share. I think because there was maybe a pressure I was putting on myself to have it all figured out. Like if I let somebody know that I was stressed out or something, or I didn't know that the answer, like then it would be prove everybody right that I didn't deserve to be there or something.
37:05I don't know. Massive imposter thoughts. Yeah. Massive imposter thoughts. This is such a human thing. Like we, little kids, we are all learning to ride bicycles. We're all learning all the same stuff at the same time. So we're looking around and we're like, oh, Jess is falling off of her bike. This is great. I'm falling off of my bike too. And we hit this certain age, which we've all hit. And we look around and we're like, oh my gosh, they know all the things. And I don't know how to do taxes still. I'm 42. When is somebody going to figure this out for me? When do I become the adult that everybody assumes I am?
37:37And the reality is nobody knows the things. We're all imposters in our own way. And I think there is such relief in that, that when we show up and we go, I look, I know a lot about stress, but man, I learned stuff every single day. And when we stay open to that beginner's mindset of going, I don't know, what do you think? It actually does, has the opposite effect where people trust us more and believe we actually know more when we say, I don't know, here's what's going on. I'm having a little breakdown. I need help. Yeah. But then that builds trust. But I think, I don't know, we've been to your point, like we've been taught not to admit those things.
38:16When those things actually, when you are honest about them, they build trust, they allow you to move through the stress more easily. Right? And then you're moving through it with someone you're not, you know, I don't know. Maybe it's because you, as you were talking, like, maybe it's like you feel shame or something like you should know? Absolutely. Shame drives so much of this. Shame drives so much stress. And we also fall into the space of learned helplessness, which is our, it's a misnomer, right? Helplessness isn't learned. It's our default setting. So if we believe that we don't know, we just throw our hands up.
38:54We're like, whatever. I don't know the things. I'm just dumb. We start telling stories. And the reality is, no, you just, why should you know that yet? But there's no earthly reason you should know all the things. We just, as adults, have to keep trying, have to keep taking those small steps bravely into the unknown. I mean, look, we're living in a world of AI right now. Who's done AI before? I know. And suddenly, right? We're all going, I don't know. I feel behind. What am I doing? I suck at this. No, we just, none of us have learned it. We're figuring it out together. We're all learning. Yeah.
39:27Which is a really good point. Maybe to bring it back to work a little bit, if I'm a leader and I know this, I've read your book, I'm practicing Inviting the Tiger in, what should I be doing for my team knowing this? Such a good question. Thank you. Two things. One, practice it yourself and talk to your team about this. So I often will ask people to do sort of a stress overview in their office. How often are you hearing stress being used as a negative word? like, I'm so stressed about this. Okay, how do we transform that? Like, let's audit all of the lich that we're using around stress. And then the bigger piece here is acting as if you are in this adventure with them, because humans are incredibly emotionally contagious, right?
40:15One of my favorite demos to do is to take two violins that are tuned to one another and put them in opposite corners of the room. Because when you pluck the string on one violin, the other one will play the same note. And that is perfect. Yeah, it's a perfect demonstration of human behavior. You walk into the room and people are clapping and they're dancing. You can't help but have a smile on your face. Yeah. Right? You walk into a board meeting as a leader and people are frowning and their arms are crossed and they're like, we're really scared about this thing coming up. And your heart is going to start to palpate.
40:47And you're going, oh my gosh. So in that moment, acting as if, right? Throw your shoulders back, put a smile and say, what adventure can we have in this? Hmm. Right? I love that. It's either going to be an adventure or an ordeal. So let's have an adventure. But I think there's an important thing for leaders to listen to here is that, you know, if you are stressed, outwardly stressed, and maybe there's good reason to be, I'm not saying that there's not, but that is going to impact your team as well. Right? Massively. If they walk into the team meeting and you're like, this is so horrible. Well, guess what?
41:24They're going to feel it. They're going to feel it. And so like maybe even if you feel that way, it's not to, you know, not talk about it, but to your point, shift the language of like, hey, guys, this is, I'm really stressed out about this. I can only imagine you're stressed out about it, but like, let's like work through it. What a tremendous challenge we get to go through together. Right. Like let's, this is, this is so exciting. Yeah. How are we going to move like towards this new hill that we're climbing? I mean, that is very different than coming in and going, all right, this is really scary.
41:55here are the goals that we have to reach and we got to do this by the end of the year. And I don't know how we're going to get there. Like I said the exact same thing, right? It's just, it is a completely different tone and people, I mean, look, watch a scary movie with someone. It's 10 ,000 times more scary when they're screaming and shaking. Well, you know what I hate about scary movies is one, I don't really like them, but my husband likes them. My husband likes them. I don't know why but he'll beg me to watch one with him and then fall asleep on the couch and i'm sitting there just like terrified yeah and i'm like yeah you know unacceptable hubby unacceptable so i've learned now just to turn it off like when you go and he really falls asleep within the first 15 to 20 minutes so like that's funny it's yeah so like as a leader i mean really think about what strings you're plucking for your team and what team and what strings you're allowing to be plucked on you because people are really looking to you to say, what is the feeling we should have in this moment?
42:57Yeah. I mean, you, you set the tone. That's right. You know, literally, you literally set the tone. Okay. So we are running out of time. So couple things before we go, I know, isn't it terrible? Cause I can talk to you all day. So I don't think I told you upfront, but we, we do what we call a career confession, which our listeners send in work questions and ask us for advice and then we give it to them. But before we get into the career confession, I always ask our guests to give their best advice, like a nugget of something to the listeners. And I know you've already given tons of advice in this podcast, but what's the one thing you want to leave our listeners thinking about.
43:45I want you to think about the power that stress gives you and recognize that it can be used as a competitive advantage because it truly is energy. It's not good. It's not bad. It's energy to be used for you. So that's really the big takeaway I want people to know. I got goosebumps when you said that. That was great. And I do think it's like, and I'm gonna I'm gonna think about this because I do often think about it as bad like this is bad like I'm stressed it's bad it's terrible I need to get rid of it but I think I'm gonna really try to think about it as energy not good or bad and and then try to like really discern like what's real, what's not, what's my brain telling me.
44:34Huge. Yeah. Like I'll have the tea with the tiger, whatever. And, and, and I'm going to work through it because I think again, like you, you can use this as fuel. And I, I think about the times when I look back on my career and things were the hardest, it was super stressful, like super stressful, but it was the most fun I've ever had. you know I mean and I and we did we did shit that nobody else was doing we like you know I don't know you're breaking through you're breaking through just did all kinds of stuff so yeah I I think I think that is great advice so thank you for that and thank you um for helping me because I'm gonna I'm gonna use some of this stuff after the show immediately I'm excited for it.
45:25Please report back. I want to hear all about it. Okay. I agree too. Okay. Here's our career confession. So I'll set it up with a little context and then they ask the question. So I know I'm burning out, but slowing down feels dangerous. Like everything will fall apart if I do. My body's exhausted, but my mind won't stop racing, I can feel the stress building, yet part of me needs it to feel in control. This is great for you. Question, how do I let myself rest without feeling guilty or afraid? That's so good. Okay. First of all, what you're describing is being tired, but wired, which is a huge symptom of burnout because you are not allowing your body to connect to the purpose behind your work.
46:19Burnout exists because we're running, running, running, and we're forgetting why we're running. So I want you to pause and connect why you're doing the things to some deeper purpose. That's step one. Step two is how can you really truly rest? You are a high my friend. I see you with the control. You sound like me. So here's what I want you to do. I want you to set a goal and the goal is to do nothing. And then I need you to accomplish that goal. Now here's what's going to happen. You're going to spend the first hour of that day freaking out because your brain's going, I'm doing nothing. I'm doing nothing.
47:01I'm doing. And every time you hear that. I need you to go, good, you're accomplishing the goal. Good, you're accomplishing the goal. And this will slowly, slowly get easier. But it is going, gosh, just thinking about that. It's going to suck, right? It's stressful. It's stressful. Thinking about that is giving me anxiety. I know. I can literally not do nothing. So this is really important because I think what's going to happen is you're going to go, oh, actually, I don't need to slow down. I don't need nothing. When you achieve that goal and you're like, that was horrible and I don't feel better.
47:35What's going to happen is you're going to double down onto all of the work that you're doing that brings meaning and purpose. And when you have that connection, there isn't, I'm not gonna say there's not a need for rest. There's always a need for rest. But rest comes easier, right? Rest comes easier because you're like, I did all of this. It feels good. It's like mowing the grass. You're like, oh, I see it. This is good. And you can relax into that a little bit. So I need you to try the full stop thing and go, oh gosh, this sucks. Maybe it'll work for you. My guess is it won't. I don't know if I can do that, but I think this person should.
48:10Yeah. Give it a shot. Give it a shot. And a listener, let me know how it goes because I need this report too. It's going to be horrible. Enjoy. Yes. But I think that is great advice. I think just like, as we were talking about earlier, this person being honest about that fear is also good, right? And like saying it out loud, like that's a big step in like addressing and working through the stress. Let me tell you right now, you just hit about 90 % of your listenership with that question. Like, I think we're all feeling it. We're all feeling it. So thank you. Yes. And thank you. Oh my gosh, Brooke.
48:50Thank you so much. This was so much fun. Thank you. This has been a delight. I hope we are lifelong friends forever. Will you be? Yes, please. I'm going to have a massive fear of rejection. Do you say no? First of all, I almost want to say no. So you realize that I'm not a tiger who's going to kill you, but I'm not going to because this was super fun. Yeah. Thank you. So much fun. You are such a talent and wealth of information. And I know the listeners are going to love this one. So thank you so, so much. It's truly been my honor. Yay. Thanks for listening to TruthWorks. Thank you.
From the publisher
In this episode of Truth Works, Jessica Neal sits down with stress physiologist and author Dr. Rebecca Heiss to dismantle everything you’ve been taught about stress, fear, and burnout. If you’ve ever thought, “I’m stressed, this is bad, I need to make it go away,” this conversation will flip your entire mental model.
Rebecca explains why stress is a feature, not a bug, and why the belief that stress is “killing you” is often more dangerous than the stress itself. She breaks down how our cave-brain still thinks every hard conversation at work is a tiger about to eat us, why helplessness isn’t learned – it’s our default setting, and how to “invite the tiger in for tea” instead of trying (and failing) to shut it out.
Jessica opens up about panic attacks, stage fright in front of thousands, and the pressure to always “have it figured out,” while Rebecca shows how to turn that same fear into fuel, especially at work and in leadership. They dig into:
- Why the most meaningful, purpose-filled moments of your life are also the most stressful
- How to reframe anxiety as energy and excitement, not a personal failing
- Why parents are often less happy but more fulfilled
- How social media hijacks our need for acceptance and amplifies shame
- The truth about burnout, being “tired but wired,” and Rebecca’s “disaster diary”
- What great leaders should actually do with their own stress so they don’t infect their teams
If you feel guilty for resting, terrified of slowing down, or secretly convinced you’re an imposter who should “already know all the things,” this episode will hit uncomfortably close in the best possible way. You’ll walk away with a new lens: stress as your competitive advantage, not your enemy.