“Just breathe.” It’s a phrase I’ve uttered to myself hundreds of times—on turbulent flights, before stressful meetings, and now, while reclined and hooked up to a device measuring my heart rate variability.
I’m being guided through a series of breathing exercises designed to calm the nervous system. First, imagining my inhales and exhales as rolling hills, then picturing a ball expanding in my diaphragm, and finally, focusing on moments of gratitude as my heart rate slows.
Here on Mexico’s Baja Peninsula, it’s easy to be thankful. Sunlight glints off the Sea of Cortez, where whales appear as if on cue and birds flutter around giant cacti. If there’s any place to relax, it’s here at Zadún, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve in Los Cabos. But I didn’t come just for poolside lounging and winter whale-watching. I’m here for the property’s new Sensei Rest and Reset Program, a data-driven wellness retreat designed to reduce stress and improve sleep.
The five-night program includes one-on-one coaching with a mindset guide, classes ranging from yoga to functional fascia work, spa treatments, and biofeedback tools to explore your body’s stress responses—hence the EmWave sensor clipped to my ear.
It’s one of the many personalized wellness retreats aiming to help frazzled travelers decompress. And with “cortisol face”—the idea that elevated stress levels can cause everything from bloating to premature aging—regularly flooding my feed at 3 a.m. when I can’t sleep, I’m guessing I’m a prime candidate.
With everything going on in the world, I’m hardly alone. Anxiety rates have been rising in recent decades, with research linking chronic stress to inflammation and accelerated cognitive decline. It’s no surprise that cortisol—a hormone that helps regulate our circadian rhythms and stress response—has become a fixation for many. While doctors say that severe problems related to cortisol are rare, stress management is critical for those who feel stuck in fight-or-flight mode.
“While our cortisol system evolved to deal with physical threats, psychological stress like a toxic job situation or a sick family member, also triggers cortisol production,” says Gillian Goddard, MD, an endocrinologist and adjunct assistant professor of medicine at New York University. “In the short term, it can be helpful to have increased focus and higher blood sugar levels to fuel our brain and muscles, but over long stretches of time, higher cortisol levels triggered by stress can increase insulin resistance, leading to weight gain. It can also disrupt sleep and lead to anxiety and depression, all of which can then trigger more cortisol production.”