You live in a very fast paced world and have a number of responsibilities. You’re likely still young, but you’re starting to feel like your stress is taking over, slowly but surely. When you get home, you don’t know how to relax anymore like I used to. Your mind goes crazy from one problem to the next.
You have likely already cut down or completely eliminated other unhelpful habits. But you want more. Here’s a couple to try that you have read about before. This is me nudging you to try one and make it a habit:
Yoga
This article looks at self-regulation as a result of yoga and breathing practices. My go-to yoga practice is Yoga with Adriene (and Benji, her sweet dog). She’s especially great if you are new to yoga as a whole. Any yoga will work – even if it’s just for 5 minutes a day.
Mindfulness
Before you roll your eyes – because I already know you are halfway there – remember that your body knows that on-edge feeling all too well. Feeling overwhelmed with a fast-beating heart rate is your default. It is not healthy to constantly feel this way. You want to roll your eyes because mindfulness is actually hard to do. It’s easier to say it doesn’t work. Mindfulness is simple but most definitely not easy.
It’s especially hard because your amygdala will wonder why on earth you are moving so slowly when it is telling you that you are in danger, and you should be running for your life. That’s why it is hard to stick with. Mindfulness can be meditation, but it doesn’t need to be meditation. Think of the thing that slows you down the most – golf, being on the beach, riding your bike, music – and do more of that. That is how you are most mindful and we want you to do more of that.
Breathing
You can’t control when you feel fired up. Sometimes this is because your body and brain pick up on conscious and/or subconscious cues in your environment (and inside your body too) that register as a threat in your brain. It’s an automatic thing that you can’t control. But you can control when you activate your parasympathetic nervous system. You can do this simply by breathing. Again, it’s simple but that doesn’t make it easy to do. You are helping your brain to register a safe internal world by regulating your breathing. Do this by breathing out for longer than you breathe in – this is where the magic is.
Breathe in for a count of 4, hold for a count of 5 and breathe out for a count of 6.
How can you slow down this week? Where do you tend to rush the most and how can you take it down one speed? What can you do to renew today? Think of your morning and evening routine and how it can best help you start your day and end your day. Maybe you don’t have a routine and now is the time to start building it.
Choose just one thing, and start doing that one thing every day.
