In these very stressful times, many of us are experiencing high levels of stress and anxiety. Here is a simple but very effective exercise you can do any time and anywhere. It helps immediately to reduce the level of adrenaline and other stress hormones in your system and brings an immediate sense of relief.
The moment you experience any of the stress symptoms and/or have an anxiety attack and/or experience anxiety symptoms such as:
- A fear flash
- An electric jolt through your body
- A heat flash (feeling suddenly very hot)
- Heart beating rapidly (heart palpitations)
- Heart pounding forcefully
- That trembly-shaky feeling
- Feeling that the body goes weak
- Weak, shaky legs
- Chest pains (muscular tension)
- Muscular tension
- Tension in neck and shoulders
- Feeling unsteady or unbalanced
- Nausea
- Stomach discomfort (churning stomach)
- Feeling muzzy headed (feel foggy in your head)
- Feeling a sense of unreality
Here’s what to do:
- Stop up immediately and take a deep breath
- Breathe out slowly
- Let your whole body slacken, slump and sag
- Let everything become loose (let all your muscles relax)
- Focus on where you are
- Take another deep breath
- Breathe out slowly
- And then go on with what you are doing regardless of how you are feeling instead of recoiling in fear and tensing up and resisting how you feel
- Float forward with whatever you are doing
- It’s okay to move forward slowly, but move forward
- Slacken those reins, don’t try to stop yourself from feeling what you are feeling
- Move forward slowly with as little muscular tension and resistance as possible
- No need to rush, take it slow and easy
- If necessary, take some more deep breaths and continue to slacken and loosen your muscles
Repeat this exercise as often as you need to during the course of your day. Relaxing and letting go are an actual physiological process which sooner or later calms the body because when you don’t resist the stress or anxiety symptoms (such as the fear flashes), the body stops secreting more adrenaline into the system and eventually calms down. But it is important to understand that this calming effect may not happen immediately if your body is really stressed and sensitized (hypervigilant), so you have to keep practicing this Right Reaction exercise for a while until you really feel the full results.
So many of my clients tell me this exercise really helps. So please give it a try.
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