Stress Damages the Brain: Here’s How Floating Can Help
Floating is a natural way to lower your cortisol levels and decrease stress.
As we head into the third year of the pandemic, the incidence of stress and anxiety continues to be very high. Around 50 percent of adults in the U.S. say that stress has negatively impacted their life recently. The problem is that many people have just learned to ignore the stress because it’s such an everyday part of their life. This is unfortunate as doing so can have a significant negative impact on your life.
Chronic stress can put your mind and body at risk. This is because your body’s physiological reaction to stress is quite hard on your body. When you are stressed or anxious, the body releases a flood of hormones. Those hormones, cortisol and adrenaline, cause your breathing to quicken, heart to pound, and muscles to tense. Typically, these changes in the body disappear once the stress is gone. However, these responses stay elevated when you are under constant stress from things like financial problems or relationship issues. This results in negative impacts on your health. High levels of cortisol on a prolonged basis can damage your brain. Recent research suggests that high levels of cortisol cause changes to the brain’s structural circuity that essentially damages the hippocampus, which is responsible for memory and attention.
The good news is that you don’t have to let stress impact your health. You can fight back. Lowering cortisol levels helps your body feel more relaxed. One way to lower cortisol levels is with float therapy.
Float therapy tanks are soundproof pods filled with warm water that’s the temperature of the skin. The tanks are filled with Epsom salt, which keeps you afloat with no effort required. Floating in the tank feels weightless like you are suspended in the air. This helps the muscles relax.
Float therapy, sometimes called Restricted Environmental Stimulation Therapy (REST), has become really popular recently, with many people using it as a natural way to lower anxiety. Float therapy can help you lower anxiety without even trying. It promotes complete relaxation by lowering levels of cortisol.
How Float Tanks Help Lower Cortisol
Float therapy works by lowering levels of cortisol. According to researchers, it helps lower cortisol levels even on days when you are not floating. One study examined the effect of REST-assisted relaxation therapy on cortisol in healthy volunteers. The test group received five sessions of REST therapy. They were compared to a group that received a similar relaxation protocol but without the REST therapy. After just five sessions, the test group had significantly lower cortisol levels than the non-REST group. The researchers concluded that short, brief REST-assisted relaxation therapy sessions produce a relaxed state that is associated with lower cortisol levels.
If you’re looking for a natural way to lower cortisol levels, floatation therapy is definitely worth a try.