By on July 23, 2014  The science of stressing less   Are you a
local navigating your valley at the height of the season? If so,
I don’t have to guess.  According to a survey by the American
Psychological Association, 42 percent of adults report that
their stress level has increased during the past five years.
Let’s start with the good news: your stress response evolved as
a survival mechanism, often referred to as the fight/flight
response your cave-dwelling ancestors developed to protect them
from dangers you probably don’t worry about today, like hungry
tigers. Today, that ancient response resurfaces when you are
picking the kids up from school, running late, or experiencing a
mid-summer Albertsons check-out line. Even though these are not
dangerous situations, our body responds to them as a perceived
stress and interprets them as chronic stress.   Our bodies
respond to stress a certain way thanks to our cave-dwelling
ancestors. Photo:  Having been trained in Chinese as well as
naturopathic medicine, when