3 Steps for Quick Stress Release
Life is stressful. Always.
If you pause for a moment, you’ll see there is always something stressful happening. It might be mild, like when you’re running a bit late for an appointment. Or significant, like dealing with a major loss or facing a radical change in your life. If there’s a weather disaster, a country in disarray, or a threat to your livelihood, the stress meter goes way up.
Exciting, wonderful events like moving into a new home, getting married, and heading out for that awesome vacation also bring their dose of tension. It’s natural.
When you’re challenging yourself during a workout, preparing for your college test, or going for a job promotion, you’re activating the stress response. When you’re wandering around your kitchen, making yourself a cup of tea, and kindly inviting yourself to take a break, you’re also inviting the stress response system to fire up. There are lots of ways to respond to external and internal stressors.
Learn more about the 3 types of stress response in my Self Soothe Strategy PlayBook. Then practice what you learn with the downloadable audio meditation. Both available on my Free Resources page.
The trick is to see that while stress is a part of life, you can choose how you live in those moments of hardship or excitement.
Every week, I listen to a lot of stories about stress. Real life things happening that range from downright silly to situations that pull the proverbial rug out from under you. Even when you see your circumstance as manageable or not so bad compared to what it could be, you still feel the stress. That’s natural.
It’s important to get clear about a simple, immediate approach for dealing with tension as soon as you notice it. Otherwise, stress hijacks your interrelated mind-body-energy system. Once you’re revved up, it’s harder to calm down.
There’s a simple formula for disrupting rising tension before it destabilizes you.
Stay aware. Intervene quickly. Sustain calm focus.
Try this 3 STEP technique for lowering tension and cultivating a calm approach to life’s ups and downs.
There is room for choice and flexible application, so you decide what works for you. Remember that each stressful event may activate a different function of your stress response system. Choosing what works for you in each situation is wise. That’s what your body is trying to do unless it gets too bogged down with unprocessed stressful energy.
STEP 1. Engage the Pause and Take a Breath.
Unless you’re facing immediate danger (eg, house on fire, car hurtling through intersection toward you), you’ve got a minute to pause and breathe. One minute is 60 seconds. Imagine the power of pausing for a minute whenever your feel your tension rise. That’s a game changer and so simple to execute.
When revved up, breathe in slow and deep. Breathe out even slower.
The intent is to slow the breathing, get the oxygen flowing, and inform the nervous system and your mind that things are calming down. The long exhale activates the parasympathetic nervous system (think brake on that runaway stress train). Slow in and even slower out. To keep your mind from racing ahead of your breath, try counting to give the mind something to do. Breathe in for a count of 4. Breathe out for a count of 7. You can adjust your numbers, just don’t rush through this or you’ll defeat the calming effect.
Once you’ve interrupted a more rapid breathing pattern (feeding AND fed by your rapid thought pattern), you can change it up.
Box Breathing (or Square Breathing) invites you to breathe in for a count of 4 (or your #), hold for a count of 4, breathe out for a count of 4, and hold for a count of 4.
Once calm, you can smooth out the count of the breath in and out. Breathing in for a slow count which leads to an exhale for the same number. This nice even breath is great to practice whenever you are calmly walking around your home, driving to work, running a meeting, or talking to your teenager.
Breath has power and you’re the curator of your own breathing patterns. A 60 second pause multiple times throughout each day changes your stress/calm habit.
STEP 2. Interrupt yourself. Risk being rude to your mind as you swiftly disrupt the narrative that accompanies the rise in tension.
You know how that dialogue goes … “Oh no! I’m late again! Why didn’t I leave earlier? I know better! Now I’ll be late for my meeting and my boss will notice. Ack! Traffic! I’m so mad at myself.” This activates more stress chemicals, jazzes up your physiology, and quickens your breath.
When you catch this happening, interrupt yourself, and apply the Pause and Breathe practice.
The faster you act and slower you breathe, the better you’ll feel as you calmly navigate traffic and arrive ready to contribute to your meeting. Once you’ve done STEP 1, you can then choose a kind, encouraging self-dialogue or spend time looking for beauty in your surroundings.
Whether you are in your home, office, commuting, or within a crowded place, you can breathe and seek the beauty in and around you.
Not only does this focus on beauty (or choose gratitude) distract from the scary story, it holds an organizing energy and supports the regulation of your mind-body-energy system. This beats the disarray of a stressed and scattered mind any day.
STEP 3. Move! Take that minute break and let your body move.
Movement helps you shift your state from passively stressed to actively engaging your nervous system to produce feel good chemicals (rather than more cortisol or adrenaline). How you move is up to you. While you breathe and speak kindly to yourself, bust a dance move or take a walk to the proverbial water cooler. Shake the tension out of your body, do 10 squats, jump in a puddle, or gently stretch your tense, tight body.
Depending upon where you are in the moment and who you are with, you can be endlessly creative with the type of enjoyable and helpful movement you choose.
While you may not want to add 10 jumping jacks to the meeting agenda, you can get up to get a tissue or go to the “rest” room. If you’re around kids or pets, play a quick game or take a walk. If you can take a break and head into nature, take a dance class, or stretch your way into a bubble bath, even better.
Pause with awareness. Breathe with the intent to soothe your stress.
Rapidly interrupt your reactive mind, offer encouraging words, and seek beauty.
Enjoy the creative play of movement. Inhabit your body and let it release the tension for you.
Stress happens. It takes a lot of awareness and plenty of practice to replace a stress habit with a calm habit. You decide if you’ll invest time and attention to cultivate a calm, steady approach to whatever life brings. If you think it’s a good idea, why not start now. You’ve got 60 seconds.
Remember. It’s not just a good habit, it’s a super power.
Peace be with you and with all. No exceptions.
HeartWarming
News
Exercise is a form of physical stress. Yet, it helps not only helps relieve stress by reducing stress hormones such as cortisol and adrenaline, it stimulates the body’s natural painkillers and mood boosters known as endorphins. Studies have found improvement in mood, self-image, energy, and discipline. It has been found to improve resilience in the face of challenge. Movement or exercise that is enjoyable is more likely to become a habit and offer sustainable positive benefits throughout the lifespan.
