Every stretch is the result of a stress, but not all stresses result in a stretch. Indeed your muscles are being stretched
and stressed sometimes, and this is not wrong. Muscles are designed to stretch: they can lengthen in some cases 50% before being torn. Ligaments on the other hand don’t like to stretch, not very much anyway. Depending upon which ligament and where, most ligaments if stretched beyond 4~10% will stay stretched. Unlike muscles, ligaments are more plastic and don’t snap back to their original lengths like the elastic muscles do. However, ligaments, fascia and joint capsules still need to be
stressed to be healthy. So, here we see that stress is not the same as stretched. We want to stress our tissues: sometimes this results in a stretch (good for muscles) but not always (bad for ligaments.)
Regarding whether the muscles can “steal” the stress away from ligaments if they are not relaxed or cold, read my article on
Hot Yin.
I hope this helps.
Cheers
Bernie