Embracing Stress as Opportunity
Guest: Dr. Priyanka Upadhyaya
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This week on The Gift Exchange, we explore stress — not simply as something to manage, but as an opportunity for growth and transformation.
My guest is Dr. Priyanka Upadhyaya, a licensed psychologist based in New York City whose work focuses on helping people transform stress into thriving.
Two aspects of Priyanka’s approach stand out. First, she integrates modern psychology with Eastern wisdom and practices. Through her own experience navigating stress and health challenges, she discovered that traditional talk therapy alone was not enough. Her healing deepened when she began incorporating practices such as yoga, mindfulness meditation and pranayama (yogic breathing exercises). Her work reflects the understanding that stress is not only mental, but physical as well. Stress is a physical phenomenon. Priyanka’s approach is comprehensive - she blends talk therapy with mind-body techniques and creative action. By combining talk therapy with mind-body practices and creative action, she offers a more holistic approach to managing stress and healing.
Second, Priyanka challenges the way we typically think about stress. Rather than viewing stress solely as something negative to eliminate or avoid, she sees it as information — a signal connected to what matters most to us and an invitation to grow. She encourages a growth-oriented perspective that asks not only how to cope with stress, but how to work with it in a way that actualizes more of our potential. In this framework, transforming stress becomes part of transforming ourselves.
As someone who has lived between cultures, Priyanka also brings valuable insight into the stress of acculturation and navigating multiple worlds.
Stress is a part of life, taking many forms—financial, work-related, relational, health-related and so on. Yet our relationship with stress is often unexamined. When we begin to see stress as an opportunity for growth, we can expand through it rather than collapse under it. Listen to this episode if you’re ready to do just that.
In this episode
Sources of stress and what it means to take a holistic approach when working with stress [01:16]
Going beyond talk therapy and incorporating Eastern wisdom, mindfulness meditation and yogic breathing into therapy [4:02]
Stress lives in your mindset and in your body [06:14]
Working with your body and physical experience to rework your relationship to stress [07:25]
Fixing vs transforming your stress [08:48]
The upside of hard wired stress responses [09:40]
Managing work related stressors by focusing on core values and listening to the language of stress [11:33]
How Priyanka helps clients transform work-life balance [17:33]
Related links
Priyanka’s profile on Psychology Today
Pryianka’s website - you can message her directly through this contact form
Her business phone: (646) 846-1616 and email: drpriyanka@thrivewm.net
The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You, and How to Get Good at It by Kelly McGonigal
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