Stress means nervousness, lack of concentration, tiredness, mood swings - or even no longer being able to "function" at all. Do you know this feeling? The effects of stress on our well-being and health are manifold.

In the hectic world of work, we are exposed to many stress triggers. We struggle against deadline pressure, ever-increasing demands, massive information and stimulus overload, fear of failure, noise in open-plan offices and perhaps even disagreements in our private lives.

Stress in everyday life

I recently read that we now produce as much information in two days as we did from the beginning of humanity until 2003. That's amazing! The same amount in 2 days as in the entire history of mankind? Doesn't that make you feel sick to your stomach when you read it?

How can you not feel stressed?



The question now is: to what extent can your body cope with the enormous pressure of our time? Does your body have the ability to adapt to the environment? And: can you find out "how stressed" your body actually is? So in essence, the question is:

Is the stress level measurable?

Yes, stress levels can be measured. And with different methods.

One of these is called HRV (heart rate variability).

A measurement like this tells us, for example, how well your body can recover, whether it still has reserves or is already running at its limit.

Heart rate variability is the ability of the organism to change the frequency of the heart rhythm.

A regular heartbeat means stress

A healthy organism constantly adapts the heart rate to the current conditions. This is why physical exertion or mental stress usually results in an increase in heart rate. This normally decreases again when the body is relieved and relaxed. Such "stress" is accompanied by an increase in the activity of the sympathetic nervous system (active nerve).

So we can remember this: The more the heartbeat varies, the better the heart's ability to adapt to the environment and to internal stimuli. Conversely, the more regularly the heart beats, the more stress the body experiences.

A Chinese proverb even says:

"If the heartbeat becomes as regular as the knocking of the woodpecker or the dripping of rain on the roof, the patient will die within four days."
(Wang Shuhe - Chinese monk

The stress level is often objectively measured differently than it is subjectively perceived

When measuring heart rate variability, a measurement is taken over a 24-hour period that provides an image of the entire day and night.

This is because the body can also be under stress during sleep.

A special measuring device is required for this measurement, which can record electrical signals. signals of the heart. The measurement should be carried out on a day that is representative of your everyday life.

The HRV measurement evaluation report shows you exactly when your heart and your entire body were under stress. Using an activity log that you fill out, you can track which events triggered the stress situation or the relaxation situation.

An example of this: the HRV measurement showed that one customer was only relaxed for a short time on the day measured. When we compared the time of relaxation with his log, it turned out that this was the moment when he took the streetcar from one appointment to the next! He certainly wouldn't have thought of this on his own.

Interestingly, the subjective feeling of stress does not necessarily match the result of an HRV measurement. In other words, the person tested has the feeling that they are not stressed in a stressful situation and vice versa.

For whom is it worth measuring stress?

So if you sometimes feel tired, irritable and unfocused for inexplicable reasons, or if you are very slow to recover after a sporting performance or increased workload - nowadays you have the opportunity to measure your HRV with simple means and find out how high your stress level actually is and, above all, when in the course of the day you recover at all.

Consequences of constant stress

In principle, we cannot avoid stress. Up to a certain healthy and sensible level, it is part of life. However, the extent to which we recover is also important. This is because constant stress puts a strain on the entire organism and can lead to serious illnesses in many organs.

From our point of view, it is the all-important health of our gut that suffers from too much stress. The consequences can be things like constant inflammation, diarrhoea, irritable bowel syndrome, histamine intolerance or leaky gut.

However, the decision to eat healthily is also often influenced by stress. If you feel stressed, you are much more likely to make poorer or unhealthier choices regarding your daily diet. Sugar addiction, for example, is very often linked to stress.

So if you use an HRV measurement to identify the circumstances in your everyday life that lead to stress, you can avoid or at least minimize them in the future. And then the next step is to take concrete measures to reduce stress.