When we are in a state of alertness, whether because of excitement or fear, the sympathetic division of the autonomic nervous system is at work. The role of a drenelin slash epinerin is to create agitation in the body and to create focus in the mind. And so one of the toughest things for many people is to tolerate that level of an alertness when they have to be still. When we are with trying to withhold action, but we're preparing for action, there's a lot of reverbratory, excuse me, act activity in our nervous system. And it feels like stress.
“There’s no difference between the physiological response to something that you’re excited about and something that you’re nervous about or dreading,” says Andrew Huberman, associate professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology at Stanford University. In this podcast episode, Huberman talks with host and lecturer Matt Abrahams about his research on the autonomic continuum, a spectrum between states of very high alertness or fear, all the way down to deep sleep, and shares how to better-use the system to your advantage.
“If people can conceptualize that the anxiety or stress response is the same as the excitement response, they feel different,” Huberman says.
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