Being productive is a brain exercise. The doctor explains how it works and how it responds in your body.

Many people face chronic stress in completing their daily activities, which refurbishes the brain.

People face an endless number of health issues, not only physically but also mentally. These have a major impact on their behaviour and working skills. We notice people face a lot of chronic stress, regarding doing something productive, completing their tasks efficiently, or being guilty of not being able to live up to their own expectations, which directly leads to chronic stress. Chronic stress can keep the brain locked in survival mode, conditioning it to associate constant activity with safety and making rest feel eccentrically scratchy.

Health expert Dr Kunal Sood is an anaesthesiologist and interventional pain medicine physician. Shared an informative video on 21 June on Instagram, and is breaking down how chronic stress can restructure the brain’s response to rest, making periods of idleness feel uncomfortable or even threatening.

If you continually feel the desire to complete tasks and periods of inactivity terrify you, this thinking or behaviour might reflect chronic stress.

People know this as a hustle culture. Early mornings, staying busy, chasing goals, and never stopping the grind. But if the thought of doing nothing makes you restless or guilty, here may be something additional at play than ambition. Chronic stress helps keep the brain locked in survival mode, conditioning it to associate continuous activity with shelter and to make rest feel strangely uncomfortable.

Chronic stress can keep the brain in a state of alertness

According to Dr Sood, the compassionate nervous system and the HPA axis release stress hormones that amplify attentiveness and prepare the body to respond to perceived threats. But when these systems remain activated for prolonged periods.

The doctor explains, “The sympathetic nervous system and HPA axis release stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol that increase alertness and readiness for action. When these systems stay activated too long, the brain may begin treating our daily life as if the threat never fully ended.”