Utilize Your "Fight or Flight" Response

By Gordon Dalwood

People are naturally fighters. Whatever obstacles there may be, to fight is always the first action. Life is full of challenges and circumstances that would need presence of mind and fighting spirit in order for people to overcome and survive all these. But whenever fear and negative thinking overshadowed the spirit to fight, the tendency would be to flee from challenges. To fight or flight, your decision would depend on situation.

When a challenge is calling you to fight a dangerous animal, the best thing to do is to flee from it. But this is not the only danger in life. There are lots of factors wherein we have to choose between fighting and fleeing. The fight or flight response is our ordinary response to daily circumstances in life. Good examples of this are the stress and pressures brought by the workloads at home or at the office. Another thing is the different problems we face each day such as financial incapacity, meeting deadlines, piling up of bills, and many more. All these things cause panic and anxiety to all of us.

The 'fight and flight' are the natural responses of people whenever stress is on. But aside from that, the body also responds to stress. Every time a person faces challenges in life, the hypothalamus is stimulated, causing the nerve to react. The nervous system signals the body through chemical release forcing the body to fight the danger or flee from it.

The chemicals are just adrenaline, cortisol, and noradrenaline and they are released in the blood. Also the nerve signals that are given off travel throughout our bodies. Our bodies react to this in a variety of ways.

Among the impulsive physical changes is the dilation of the pupils of the eyes, sharper eyesight, increase in breathing, and quick impulses. The blood also focuses more on the limbs and muscles area causing the body to fight or flee depending on the reaction of the body at such certain incidence. The mind might choose to fight with a physically fit and ready fighting spirit, or to flee if fighting is not the right action to take.

Responses like these may cause our nervous system to be impulsive which can lead to accidents, dangers, harming others, or to survive. This is what usually happens to each of us as we face different kinds of stress every day.

There are times the danger is only in our minds and not really happening in real life. In situation like this, instead of making use of the fight or flight response for your protection, you will end up being irrational.

It is important to understand the "fight or flight" response so we can better utilize it for our own welfare and protection. Just like how our ancestors respond to dangers in their time, we should also use these responses to save ourselves rather than create a deeper trouble or more harm to ourselves. Learning how to respond well and wisely can save our lives and lead us to a better and safer situation. - 30309

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