#Oxytocin is stress hormone. Your pituitary gland pumps this stuff out as part of the stress response. But it also fine-tunes your brain's social instincts. It makes you crave physical contact with your friends and family. It enhances your empathy. It even makes you more willing to help and support the people you care about. And when oxytocin is released in the stress response, it is motivating you to seek support. Your biological stress response is nudging you to tell someone how you feel, instead of bottling it up. Your stress response wants to make sure you notice when someone else in your life is struggling so that you can support each other.
And all of these benefits of oxytocin are enhanced by social contact and social support. So when you reach out to others under stress, either to seek support or to help someone else, you release more of this hormone, your stress response becomes healthier, and you actually recover faster from stress
Oxytocin doesn't only act on your brain. It also acts on your body. This stress hormone strengthens your heart.Your heart has receptors for this hormone, and oxytocin helps heart cells regenerate and heal from any stress-induced damage
That pounding heart is preparing you for action. If you're breathing faster,it's getting more oxygen to your brain. And those who learned to view the stress response as helpful for their performance, they were less stressed out, less anxious, more confident.
Chasing meaning is better for your health than trying to avoid discomfort. So the best way to make decisions, is go after what it is that creates meaning in your life and then trust yourself to handle the stress that follows.