Chronic stress is a briar patch. Here’s how to get out.

Five simple tips for resetting your nervous system

Chronic stress is a briar patch: the deeper you go, the harder it is to climb out. It happens when your body’s stress response—the cascade of hormones like cortisol and adrenaline meant for short bursts (like running from danger)—stays activated for weeks, months, or even years.

It’s diabolical in several ways. First, it makes crappy food taste better, so you eat like crap, which makes you feel like crap. Speaking of crap, chronic stress makes you either constipated or gives you diarrhea. And given the gut-brain connection, this only intensifies the vicious cycle.

What to do?

Here are five simple moves to reset your nervous system, via mental health clinician Linda Thai:

• Wake up and feel your base. Most mornings, we pop out of bed like toast from a toaster. Instead, take a few seconds to pause and feel the mattress beneath you. Then carry that dose of grounded sanity into your day.

• Look to the horizon. Focus your gaze on the far horizon and slowly turn your head side-to-side. This relaxes tight muscles, activates deeper breathing, and helps you see the bigger picture.

• Try 4-7-8 breathing. Linda’s a fan of Dr. Andrew Weil’s technique: inhale for 4 counts, hold for 7, and exhale for 8 — four to six times. It’s a quick way to downshift your body’s stress machinery.

• Remember to remember. When stress hijacks you, pause and remind yourself: this probably isn’t life or death, even if it feels that way.

• “Never have to ask for help.” This is crucial, but a little bit confusing. What Linda means by this is that you should be regularly updating the people close to you on how you’re doing, so you never have to issue a dramatic SOS. In other words, never worry alone. Your relationships are the best barrier against chronic stress.

For more practical ways to regulate your stress response, check out today’s episode of 10% Happier with Linda, where we dig into the connection between stress and digestion, how to tell if you’re burned out, and the quick moves that can help you get back on track.

Paid subscribers also get an exclusive companion meditation from our September Teacher of the Month, Vinny Ferraro. This one’s called “Do Less” and is about hitting pause without checking out — so you're the one driving the bus, not your stress.

Sunday, September 21 from 1-5 p.m. ET, join me and Leslie Booker at the New York Insight Meditation Center in NYC as we lead a workshop titled, “Heavily Meditated – The Dharma of Depression + Anxiety.” This event is both in-person and online. Sign up here.

Finally: Jeff Warren, Sebene Selassie, Ofosu Jones-Quartey, and I are doing another version of our annual Meditation Party retreat this October 24-26. It’s at the Omega Institute in upstate NY. You should come. You can sign up here.

Episode cheatsheet

The big takeaway

Therapist and educator Linda Thai illuminates how understanding—and practically working with—your nervous system can help you move from stress, burnout, and trauma toward greater resilience and connectedness. By learning how our bodies respond to stress and applying targeted strategies for nervous system regulation, we can interrupt unhealthy cycles and build a more grounded, fulfilling life.

Reclaim your calm: Resetting your nervous system for resilience

• Nervous system know-how: Linda Thai breaks down the sympathetic (fight/flight) and parasympathetic (rest/digest) branches, revealing that each has a spectrum of responses—from productive energy to shutdown mode.

• Stress, burnout, or trauma? Linda clarifies these often-confused states, explaining how prolonged stress can morph into burnout or trauma, and how this impacts our health, digestion, and relationships.

• Why modern life fries us: Our world often traps us in chronic stress, overriding our evolutionary design for intermittent challenges and connection. This mismatch can leave us depleted, anxious, and disconnected.

• Regulation over “toughing it out”: True resilience comes not from muscling through stress alone, but from practical tools and relationships that help us reset and find balance.

6 tools to have in your nervous system toolkit: