Stress resets, the ultimate mental health hack | Jenny Taitz
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What causes stress to be contagious?
You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hu. Everyone, and I know fellow parents out there will relate, picture this. It's a totally normal morning, but total chaos around you. The house is a mess, and you're thinking, how did we get here before 9 a.m.?
That stress, it's a little hilarious, but mostly heartbreaking. When what we're facing feels like too much, spilled milk becomes a flood.
That's clinical psychologist Jenny Tights. In her talk, she offers a slightly different take, that stress isn't only something that happens to us, it's also something we co-create and can accidentally spread.
How can we learn to reset stress effectively?
But here's the good news. If you can create stress, you can also learn to reset it. In minutes. no long meditations, medications or martinis required. just shifts in your mind, body, and behavior.
Jenny guides us through how to implement simple actions and mindset shifts to change negative thought patterns, shift our moods, and do the exact opposite of what stress is telling us to do. Because for Jenny, it's not about eliminating it, but rather knowing we can handle it. And stick around after her talk for a brief Q&A with Ted's Joey Katona. But first, a quick break to hear from our sponsors.
And now, our TED Talk of the day.
Let me invite you into my house. It probably looks a little like yours. So one morning, rushing to feed our crying toddler, my husband Adam drops a gallon of milk. He is so mad, he starts aggressively cleaning and cuts his hand under the fridge. He's bleeding, hates blood, and we're out of bandages. So he drives to the pharmacy. On his way home, he rear-ends an Uber. All before breakfast. That's stress. It's a little hilarious, but mostly heartbreaking. When what we're facing feels like too much, spilled milk becomes a flood. A headache at work spills into heartache at home. Stress doesn't just happen. It's something we easily co-create, then spread like the flu. But here's the good news. If you can create stress, you can also learn to reset it.
In minutes. no long meditations, medications or martinis required. Just shifts in your mind, body and behavior. I call these pivots stress resets, and I love them so much, I wrote a book highlighting 75 of my favorites. We will cover them all, I wish. As a clinical psychologist, I've taught thousands of people how to ease intense emotions in crises, helping clients transform from wanting to die to building lives they cherish. And I rely on these tools myself, whether I'm trying to get my three young kids to bed, a live-action version of whack-a-mole, or when I'm struggling to find the words to write a eulogy hours after losing one of my closest friends. Of course, stressing over spilled milk isn't worrying that AI will hijack your career or facing a cancer diagnosis.
A reset won't turn awful into awesome, but it will let you ditch hopelessness and bring the best of you forward, sparking that priceless feeling of knowing you can count on yourself. The secret? Practicing stress resets in ordinary moments allows you to reach for them when life feels unbearable. You might be wondering, can you even feel better if your challenges aren't disappearing? Absolutely. Stress is less about what you're facing and more about believing you can cope. This isn't positivity, this is regulating your nervous system. Framing stress as an opportunity for growth and accepting sensations, even knots in your stomach, lowers cortisol and allows you to persevere. What moves me most is research finds even refugees and asylum seekers grappling with being forcibly displaced can improve their mental health by learning strategies similar to ones we'll cover.
If peace of mind is possible in political limbo, it's definitely possible in your daily hustle. Yet we create fender benders. Short on money, we shop online. Big deadline, we bounce between procrastination and perfectionism. Tired and lonely, we scroll at midnight. Why? because when emotions spike, clarity vanishes. We want relief now, so we turn to habits that hurt or reach for substances like alcohol, cannabis or Xanax that shrink our ability to think when we deserve to be our sharpest.
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