You’ve probably heard of the “fight/flight/freeze” stress response (or the FREAK OUT stress response 😆), but that’s not the only way we respond to stress.

Data point of the week
The lesser-known stress response, “tend and befriend,” is characterized by nurturing, caring for and protecting others. In other words, joining together in reaction to a threat, challenge, or stressful event.

Reflection
The impulse to come together in response to stress makes sense given that humans evolved as social animals largely because we’re so vulnerable to threats when we’re alone (not to mention, incapable of taking care of our own needs without help).

Back in the early days of humanity, we needed other people to successfully hunt for food and to protect us against predators. We wouldn’t have survived alone. There’s safety in numbers.

Today, we may live alone, but we’re more dependent on other people than ever, despite the lip service we pay to independence. Think about it. How many humans are involved in getting food onto your table? The production of a roof over your head? The flow of electricity to your devices, and so on? We no longer know all of these people personally, but we but we are completely reliant on each other for the day-to-day functioning of our lives.

But I digress from stress…

The tend and befriend response connects us with others, which calms the nervous system and helps us move through stress more quickly, so we don’t get stuck in that state.

Going through a shared stressful experience can bring people even closer. We feel less alone in our emotions, knowing that other people are going through the same thing. Emotionally intense experiences that are shared can generate empathy and provide common ground, something to talk about, relate to, and bond over.

Connection Skill & Action Step: Tend and befriend in response to stress
If you’re feeling stressed in response to the election (or life), try to embrace the tend and befriend response. Instead of sitting with what you’re going through alone, reach out to someone. Ask them how they’re doing. Tell them how you’re feeling. Invite them over. Hug. Commiserate. Share the stress together.

A couple caveats…

• There’s a fine line between connecting during shared stress and trauma bonding, rage bonding, etc. It may be helpful to ask yourself whether you’re sharing the stress load, or fanning the flames of fear, cynicism, and despair? Is being together helping calm your nervous system, or escalate it?

• If you’re feeling heightened levels of anxiety or fear, it’s helpful to focus the tend and befriend response on the people you’re closest to, who share your values, who you feel safe with. When we do that, it can be easy to slip into an us/them mentality. The current political divisiveness has done a great job of ramping this up. Us/them thinking is effective in bringing US closer together, but at the expense of turning THEM into the enemy, or other. It’s a temptation …. and definitely one that I’ve succumbed to. However, in the long run, if we hope to overcome the massive challenges we’re facing as a country and world, we need to remember that ultimately, “us” encompasses all of us.

Questions to reflect on or to spark conversation. Please share your responses in the comments—we love hearing from you!

How are you feeling right now? What do you need?