A Stress Tip

June 1, 2006

A Stress Tip

In Katherine Gordy Levine's book "Parents Are People Too:

An Emotional Fitness Program for Parents," she talks

about doing a body scan a few times a day so you make

yourself aware of the physical changes your body goes

through on the way to feeling stressed.

You imagine a scanner taking a look at your body from

head to toe. For example, sitting here now I have a

slight ache in my temples, my mouth is dry and the middle

of my back is vaguely uncomfortable. Been at the keyboard

for too long and the water jug ran out an hour or so

back. Easily remedied.

If I was to do the scan when I was starting to feel

stressed it would be something like this: my breathing

would be faster, my heartbeat would be a bit quicker and stronger, there would be a tight feeling across my shoulders and my jaw would be a little tighter.

Try it a few times a day and soon you will be able to

recognise those changes that occur in your body as the

stress starts to build. Pick up on the early signs and

use some breathing or similar techniques to avoid the fire-breathing monster appearing.

When it comes to breathing practice, we have the basic

ten minute trainer for re-learning diaphragmatic

breathing in the library, and this is worth it’s weight

in gold if you are stressed, a worrier, your energy

levels are low, or even going through a spell of feeling depressed. Once you have done this practice for a variable period, you’ll discover how the benefits spill out throughout your day and evenings too. Oxygen is a multi-purpose drug that can relax you better than any medication, and energise you better than any medication.

But let’s assume that you have done sufficient practice

to be able to recognise when your breathing rate has

speeded up, or you have tripped back into upper chest breathing. Now you can correct it by simply slowing and deepening your breathing wherever you are, standing, sitting or lying.

Now you are competent, why leave it at that? You can add

other modules to breathing that will enhance it, and

allow you to use your normal breathing for a huge range

of other purposes. One simple example is using breathing

to relax down, by blocking off monkey mind chatter – the conscious mind traffic – by slotting in a very simple seesaw mantra. As you breathe in think "re" to yourself but stretch it like elastic to fill the span of the inhalation and as you breathe out stretch "-lax" in the same manner. It becomes a specific instruction to subconscious as well as a means of blocking out the racing and distracting thoughts that keep restressing you just at the moment you want to unwind.

Or you can become ultra playful and add in sounds and

pictures and just about anything else that works for you.

Here are a few simple ideas:

If traffic problems cause you to be stressed, then try

this:

Breathe in calm

Breathe out tension

Troubled by information overload:

Breathe in order

Breathe out chaos

Not feeling well?

Breathe in healing

Breathe out disease

Simply construct an image or sound or feeling that

matches your need and test it out. If it doesn’t work immediately, don’t give up but try adjusting your construct to see what happens. I know that if I get the sort of tension, I’m experiencing now from sitting too long at a screen, I can deal with it in under three minutes by using colour and temperature, and breathing cool ice blue into my skull, and dirty warmed murky blue out.

Find a purpose and experiment. You can’t do any harm so

let yourself stretch your spirit of adventure and

exploration.

Keep your thoughts positive, because your thoughts become your words.Keep your words positive, because your words become your behavior.Keep your behavior positive, because your behavior becomes your habits.Keep your habits positive, because your habits become your values.Keep your values positive, because your values become your destiny.

- Mahatma Gandhi

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