The topic of this story was provided by our review partner, Originated Media; SagaCity Media has editorial oversight over specific content.

Here’s a data-driven assertion for you: Oregonians need to stop stressing. According to a recent study examining millions of tweets from around the country, we’re the third most stressed-out state in the union (and we top the charts in news-related stress—a timely reminder for those of us who navigated here mid-doom-scroll). But the laundry list of reasons to make stress management a priority might be a little less Captain Obvious than it seems at first blush.

How Does Stress Impact Longevity?

Stress doesn’t just affect the way that we feel as we move, and tweet, our way through the world—it can also have a serious impact on our long-term health. According to Dr. Suzanne Segerstrom, director for the Center for Healthy Aging Research at Oregon State University, “everything that’s going on in your mind is instantiated somewhere in your body.” In other words, stress is never completely isolated to the brain.

People who are under chronic stress, for example, may make more inflammatory proteins than their more carefree counterparts, Segerstrom says. Given the documented connection between inflammation and most chronic diseases, including cancer, heart disease, and Alzheimer’s, that means long-term stress could come with some major health implications.

Those implications are borne out in other scientific literature, too. According to an Oregon State University study, older men who experience chronic stress aren’t likely to live as long as their peers. The study found that both everyday stressors—a painful commute, for example, or interpersonal strife—and major life events, like losing a family member or a job, impacted men’s lifespan. It follows, then, that we should strive not only to minimize stressors in our lives but also to learn to cope with the stressors we inevitably face.

What Are the Health Benefits of Stress Management?

Many who suffer from stress turn to mindfulness practices, like meditation, to mitigate that stress. The potential impact of those practices on the more direct physical manifestations of stress—think high blood pressure, insomnia, and Irritable Bowel Syndrome—won’t come as much of a surprise to most.

But mindfulness methods can have impressive results for other health concerns, too. “Mindfulness is a powerful complementary treatment for a wide variety of physical and psychological conditions,” according to experts at Oregon Health and Science University, who cite the documented impact of mindfulness interventions on patients suffering from a surprisingly diverse array of ailments—including epilepsy, breast cancer, and fibromyalgia, to name a few.

How Can You Reduce Stress as You Age?

Think Positive Thoughts
Does that sound a bit cliché? Researchers at Oregon State University have found that people with more positive self-perceptions about aging—people who are less likely to agree with statements like “As you get older, you are less useful,” for example—experience fewer physical symptoms of stress. “Our self-perceptions of aging could be a modifiable resilience factor shaping our physical and mental health in later life,” says Karen Hooker, study co-author and professor at Oregon State University’s College of Health.

Commune with Nature
“People are often counting steps, and trying to get to 10,000 per day,” says Chris Minson, a human physiology professor at the University of Oregon and founder of NatureQuant, the technology and research company behind an app that helps users set goals and track progress toward a deeper relationship with the great outdoors. “We believe where you take those steps is just as important.” Slow walks in nature, bird-watching on a park bench, and other low-impact activities can also be effective methods of stress reduction.

Practice Mindfulness
Resources and inspiration for starting a meditation practice abound online. This series of videos from Oregon Health and Science University, covering body scan meditation, breathwork, and more, is a good place to start. Or consider listening to this mindfulness meditation podcast, complete with nature sounds recorded in Oregon’s Basque Hills.