Doctor explains how cortisol actually works (and how to manage it)

Added: 2026-05-23

[00:00:00]Patty told me that she just recently has been told that she has high cortisol levels. And I was like, well, this is a good teaching moment for everybody because a lot of you guys have high cortisol levels cuz you're stressed out so much all day. But, one thing I want to emphasize is that cortisol is simply a response, right?

[00:00:19]It's a hormone that responds to the way your body feels in that moment in time.

[00:00:25]And typically, there's three main things that elevate your cortisol levels.

[00:00:30]Number one, bad movement, right? If your joints don't move that well, then all other type of movements you do, your body feels it's unsafe, right? Because of all the compensation that it has to do. Then the second reason that you can have high cortisol levels is the way you eat, right? So, blood sugar in particular. So, this is why I'm big on intermittent fasting because you give yourself a window that you eat that you know you will never really have irregular kind of eating happening, right? So, for people, sometimes you might eat in the morning, afternoon, night, then you get so busy, you skip eating in the morning and maybe the afternoon. Now, your body spiked the cortisol because it's like, "Hey, what's going on here?" Right? But when you give yourself a window, that's an excellent way to help control the cortisol levels.

[00:01:25]One more that tends to cause high cortisol levels, pretty much the nervous system, right? Which the other two play a role in. So, your nervous system, you have something called your fight or flight um part of your nervous system.

[00:01:39]Then you have your rest and digest, what we call it. So, a lot of people are stuck in fight or flight mode, right?

[00:01:46]Because of the other two things that I had mentioned. So, what you need to do is is more than just simply telling you to relax. You need to give your body a way to tell it that it's safe, right?

[00:01:59]And one thing that I typically tell my patients to do that I'm going to have Patty demonstrate is just deep breathing, right? Breathing in through your nose and slowly out through your mouth, right? Super simple. You guys have heard that and seen it all the time.

[00:02:14]It's the perfect reset for your body to feel safe in that current moment of crisis. So, Patty, go ahead and demonstrate this, you know, while you're in this relaxed position. You're just going to breathe in through the nose here, straight through your diaphragm. I love that. And nice and slow exhale. I want that exhale to be literally four times longer than your inhale. Really control that exhale as you're breathing outward. And guys, you do this like four or five times. That's the easy way to to to to tell your nervous system that you feel safe and reduce the cortisol levels from the elevated point that it's at typically during a regular