The Incredible Power of Stress

Stress may be the most powerful force in our lives that we still fundamentally misunderstand. While scientists have mapped the human genome and photographed black holes, the full spectrum of how stress reshapes our biology remains largely uncharted territory.

There’s still so much we don’t know understand, and that’s why we need to all become citizen scientists. I stumbled upon one such discovery recently:

A few years ago, I noticed that when I was drinking alcohol on vacation. I wouldn’t wake with a hangover. Sure I would be dehydrated or mildly fatigued. But I never had pounding headaches or had to lay in bed the entire day. But that’s what usually happened when I drank alcohol at home, on weekdays or on the weekends. I’d get a headache. So I thought to myself, I think it’s probably stress related to hangovers. Working all day at a stressful job and drinking causes some reaction in my body that doesn’t exist when I’m separated from work and in a completely new environment.

I posted this theory to Twitter, and I got back a lot of responses of people who also had the same thing happen.

And then, a few weeks ago, the New York Times did a big story on people who do not get any hangovers after drinking alcohol. The research revealed a common thread among these individuals, they reported minimal anxiety and low stress levels. The connection between stress hormones and how our bodies metabolize alcohol appears to be stronger than previously recognized.

The connection between stress and hangovers is just the beginning, though.

Humans activate full stress responses through thought alone. Unlike animals, we don’t need a physical predator, a looming deadline or unpaid bill triggers the same physiological cascade.

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Our bodies cannot distinguish between real and imagined dangers, both trigger identical hormonal surges. This keeps us in stress-response mode for days, weeks, or even years without relief.

This physiological response served our ancestors well when fleeing predators, but in our modern world of chronic, low-grade stressors, deadlines, financial worries, information overload, this persistent tension becomes destructive.

But our response to stress goes even deeper. It goes to a species level.

Stress and the Gender of Babies

Here's another hidden example of stress's far-reaching effects, emerging evidence suggests fertilization outcomes may not always be entirely random.

We’ve heard the stereotype succesful or 'masculine’ men tend to have more daughters than sons. I’ve seen it myself, with soldiers, or high level CEOs. What’s happening here?

There’s even a wikipedia article about it, it’s called the Returning Soldier Effect Men who come back from war tend to have more boys. But curiously, not during wartime.

Interestingly, in times of famine, there are more baby girls born. When the environment lacked food or was dangerous people tended to have more daughters. When they were well fed, they had more sons.

From an evolutionary standpoint, this pattern might be logical. One male can impregnate multiple females, so producing more females during stressful times helps ensure species survival if everyone around you is dying out. Does research support this? It does look like it.

• An analysis of California birth records found a notable decline in male births three months after the September 11 attacks, suggesting acute maternal stress impacts birth sex ratios.

• A study measuring salivary cortisol in 338 women before conception found those with the highest cortisol levels were significantly less likely to have male babies, indicating elevated stress might favor female offspring.

• A Danish study examining 8,719 births discovered women who faced significant life stressors, like the death of a close relative around conception, also had fewer male births.

If stress can influence something as fundamental as the gender of our children, this raises profound questions about the mechanisms at work. Is it the cortisol specifically that triggers this biological response, or some other stress hormone? Does the body have an evolutionary "sensing mechanism" that detects environmental conditions and adjusts reproductive strategies accordingly?

Some researchers theorize that elevated maternal cortisol might create conditions in the uterus that favor the survival of female embryos over male ones, rather than altering conception itself. Others suggest stress could influence the viability of X versus Y chromosome-carrying sperm. The exact biological pathways remain unclear.

It’s a reminder that we don’t completely know the effects of stress. But we know it is very important.

Stress Tolerance is a Rare Trait

If you had to choose one 'superpower' that predicts success in America, I wouldn't point to IQ. While intelligence certainly matters, our society is filled with brilliant people who never reach their potential.

What truly separates extraordinary achievers, whether they're climbing corporate ladders or building businesses, is an exceptional capacity to function under pressure. Not just acute pressure, but background pressure as well. Urgent emails sitting in inboxes, calls not returned, Teams message notifications. No possible way to take a vacation from it. Always “ON”

Real stress tolerance is perhaps the rarest and most valuable trait in today's high-pressure world.

Some high achievers aren’t 'resilient', they’re neurologically immune to stress. Studies suggest sociopaths have dampened amygdala responses, while ADHD brains thrive under deadline pressure. For the rest of us, stress isn’t a fuel; it’s a slow burn.

To be fair, a lot of it is genetic. Some of them don’t feel stress at all, and have some sort of psychological numbness that regular people don’t have. It's not "stress tolerance" as we mean it, they simply are sociopaths who do not find any issue in lying, cheating, stealing, and all the things that give stress to us normal people. Call it sociopathy or whatever. They are just born with it and I doubt a regular person can even access that type of numbness to stress.

It doesn’t have to be sociopathy though. It could also be being born with ADHD.

There are certain strains, not all of them though, where people of ADHD where people thrive in periods of stress. ADHD brains often process stress differently. Many people with ADHD experience enhanced productivity during genuine pressure situations. When fight-or-flight kicks in, the surge of adrenaline and dopamine bridges executive function gaps, making focus possible.

I've noticed this pattern myself. I hyperfocus effortlessly on interesting topics but struggle to start tasks without deadlines. As real deadlines approach, those with actual consequences, I cross a threshold where urgency transforms into productivity. My brain, which couldn't begin the task for weeks, suddenly locks in with laser focus.

This only works with genuine pressure. My brain distinguishes between real deadlines and artificial ones, ignoring manufactured stress for projects that lack meaningful consequences. The ADHD mind recognizes the difference, responding productively only to authentic urgency.

For normal people, it’s just a matter of time until the stress gets them. It’s a ticking clock. How long can you last until you burn out. How long can you take the pressure from upper management, or keeping your company stay alive.

This phenomenon helps explain why many Americans report increasing difficulty in daily life despite rising living standards. We experience a pervasive, undefined stress burden that intensifies even as material conditions improve.

The good news is there are ways to improve stress tolerance for normal people. It’s a muscle that can be exercised…

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