Why YSK: There is a lot of cortisol going on right now. A lot of people are stressed, angry, and afraid. Those emotions all deserve to be felt, but over time, cortisol becomes neurotoxic (inflicting permanent damage on the hippocampus).
Oxytocin (responsible for feelings of love, attraction, affection, etc) is a perfect foil to cortisol. If you notice yourself feeling angry or afraid for an amount of time that bothers you, adding some oxytocin to the situation might be helpful.
Luckily for us, our biology makes oxytocin pretty easy to come across. Different activities work better for different people, but cuddling with a pet or loved one, watching cute cat videos, or having sex work for a lot of people.
Here are a few interesting sources for further reading, if you are curious.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33632072/ https://www.nature.com/articles/srep30187 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5619133/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33632072/
This post is basically “there’s a lot of stress and anxiety right now. try feeling good”
No shit
Awareness of the process can sometimes be helpful, especially if it catches people in the middle of a doomscroll.
I’ve only ever heard people saying these kinds of posts make them feel worse, rather than being helpful.
It makes it seem like “it’s so simple, just be happy and the stress will go away” while they, obviously, already want that but it feels unattainable to them. Thus making them feel even more like there’s something wrong with them because they can’t achieve something that is portrayed as a simple thing.
I get the intent of this post is in the right place, but in this case the execution is done poorly. It’s best to leave this sort of thing to people more skilled and knowledgeable in the very important nuances of this kind of communication.