Can Stress Ever Be A Good Thing? Yes—Meet Eustress

The narrative around stress is often about how harmful it can be for mental and physical health. While that's true, in some cases stress can have a neutral—and even positive—effect on our overall well-being. This type of "good" stress is often referred to as eustress.

Eustress is a positive form of stress that we feel in the face of a goal or challenge. From the Greek word eu, meaning good, and stress, eustress is just that: a good stress that can boost our motivation, focus, and drive.

"It typically occurs when we are reaching toward something we have not yet achieved, coupled with the mindset of, 'I can get there, this challenge feels exciting to me,' rather than 'I'm falling short, this challenge feels scary to me,'" explains Lindsey Pratt, LMHC, an NYC-based psychotherapist.

Compared to negative forms of stress, eustress feels different in the body. While anxiousness can lead to gastrointestinal discomfort, sleeping issues, and an inability to control one's thoughts, eustress is far more manageable.

"With eustress, the stressor involved is going to lead to increased feelings of happiness and pride," explains Amber Trueblood, MFT, a marriage and family therapist based in San Diego, California. "You feel energized from it rather than depleted.”

Even eustress can become a problem if you have too much of it. It's important to give yourself occasional mental breaks so it doesn't transform into chronic stress or anxiety over time.

"If you're under a huge amount of [any type of] stress and it's unrelenting, then you're going to have psychological and emotional damage as a result," says Trueblood. "It's important to purposely give yourself breaks and distractions—like phoning a friend or going for a run—so that the stress stays at an intermittent level and doesn't creep up into higher, chronic types of stress."