 Here's another thing. Stress. High blood pressure can be an adaptation to stress. Imagine you're in a situation like running for your life from a rabid bear. Your body's going to increase your heart rate and increase your blood rate, and it's going to need to pump more nutrients to your brains and muscles so you can be in a fight or flight state. So what happens is in the short term, you need the high blood pressure. You can't physically live without it.