From the Cover: Suzy Butz On The Stress Paradox, Why Stress Might Be the Secret to Your Growth

Picture this: you’re sixteen, standing behind a supermarket checkout, hands trembling as you try to scan a tin of beans while a queue of impatient customers watches your every fumbling move. Your heart pounds, your voice barely rises above a whisper, and you can’t bring yourself to make eye contact with anyone.

This was me, decades ago, learning one of life’s most counterintuitive lessons: the very thing that terrified me would become the foundation of my growth. That trembling teenager had no idea she was about to discover something revolutionary about how we’re meant to navigate challenge—something that would eventually reshape her entire understanding of what it means to be resilient.

We’ve Been Asking the Wrong Question

We live in an age where stress elimination has become the holy grail of wellness. There’s an entire industry built around helping us find instant serenity, perfect work–life balance, and cortisol-free living. These approaches often come from a place of genuine care—wanting to help people feel better and live more peacefully.

But what if we’ve got it completely backwards? What if stress isn’t the villain in our story, but rather the most essential character in our personal growth? What if the very thing we’re trying to escape is actually the key to becoming everything we’re capable of being?

Here’s a truth that might surprise you: there’s no such thing as “good stress” and “bad stress”—there’s just stress. It’s how we respond and, crucially, how we allow that response to complete that creates either growth or stagnation in our lives.

Your Body’s Brilliant Survival System

Our bodies, minds, and spirits have evolved intricate systems specifically designed to handle stress, not avoid it entirely. Think of your nervous system as the ultimate multitool—a Swiss Army knife of survival that deploys different strategies depending on what you’re facing.

Social engagement is your first line of response—connection through a smile, conversation, seeking support. This “tend and befriend” approach uses minimal energy while potentially resolving the stressor through relationship.

Fight or flight kicks in when social solutions aren’t sufficient. As civilised humans, we’ve transformed fight into assertive communication, while flight becomes strategic withdrawal or seeking alternatives.

Freeze engages when other options feel impossible. We’ve turned this into sophisticated coping mechanisms that help us survive overwhelming situations.

The genius lies in efficiency—your nervous system always seeks the least energy-intensive solution that effectively addresses the challenge. But here’s where we humans have created our own predicament.

The Completion Gap: Where Everything Goes Wrong

Unlike every other animal on the planet, we interrupt our natural stress cycles. Picture a gazelle that’s just escaped a lion. It doesn’t immediately return to grazing while muttering, “I’m fine, that’s over now.” Instead, it literally shakes—trembling, breathing deeply, allowing its nervous system to discharge the activation energy. Only then does it return to peaceful grazing.

But us? We declare ourselves “fine” the moment the external threat passes, leaving our bodies holding unfinished stress energy. We tell our children to stop crying because we’re uncomfortable with their natural stress down-regulation. Our clever minds say, “Right, that’s sorted. Let’s move on,” while our nervous systems are still buzzing with unprocessed activation.

This interruption has profound consequences. We’re the only species that consistently develops trauma responses precisely because we don’t allow our stress cycles to complete their natural course.

When I Discovered My Superpower

Back to that supermarket checkout. Week by week, something remarkable happened. The stress that once paralysed me became the very force that empowered me. I developed skills, confidence grew, and what began as an ordeal transformed into genuine enjoyment.

Crucially, I was unknowingly allowing my stress responses to complete naturally—each challenging interaction followed by moments of recovery, each small victory building resilience for the next challenge. There were often tears before bedtime, and a lot of laughing on the job. My body was doing exactly what it was designed to do.

I didn’t just survive my supermarket job; I developed social skills and confidence that served me throughout my life. The teenager trembling at that checkout counter couldn’t have imagined that her terror would become her teacher. But that’s exactly what happened when she stayed present with the discomfort long enough to discover what lay on the other side.

The Choice That Changes Everything

This brings us to a crucial decision point in every challenging moment: do we contract or expand? Do we view ourselves as victims of circumstance or as active participants in our own development?

The wounded child within us may want to retreat, but the empowered woman recognises that discomfort often signals growth opportunities knocking at our door. We get to choose: do we want to remain stuck in patterns that keep us small, or develop the capacity to move through challenges with grace?

Each challenge follows the same transformative pattern: initial discomfort, sustained engagement, natural completion of the stress response, and adaptation leading to mastery. Public-speaking terror transforms into confident communication only when we allow our bodies to process the full cycle—activation, engagement, and recovery.

Rewiring Your Relationship with Stress

The goal isn’t to eliminate stress but to develop a healthy relationship with it. This means learning to recognise when stress calls us towards growth versus genuine danger. Most importantly, it means allowing our nervous system to finish what it started—to shake, breathe, laugh, cry, and release each experience fully.

Rather than asking, “How can I avoid stress?”, perhaps we should ask, “How can I relate to stress in ways that serve my growth?” The answer lies in building our capacity to stay present with discomfort, to trust that our nervous system knows how to navigate difficulty—and crucially, to let each stress cycle complete before moving to the next challenge.

We are, indeed, designed for stress. The question isn’t whether we’ll encounter it—we will. The question is whether we’ll let it strengthen us or diminish us.

Your Invitation to Grow

Your stress is not your enemy. It’s your invitation to become everything you’re capable of being. Every challenge you face contains within it the seeds of your next level of strength, wisdom, and capability.

The next time you feel that familiar flutter of activation in your chest—that quickening of your pulse—remember: your body isn’t betraying you. It’s preparing you. The question isn’t how to make the feeling go away—it’s how to let it do its work and then complete its cycle.

We are meant to be moving beings—physically, emotionally, intellectually, and spiritually. Growth requires the friction of challenge, the pressure that transforms carbon into diamonds, and the completion that allows integration.

Your stress is calling you home to your own strength. Are you ready to answer?