Stress often gets a bad rap for being a negative experience, but it actually a very healthy body response to adapting to out of the ordinary, or uncomfortable, experiences. Stress is experienced differently by everyone. Constipation, headaches, and insomnia are all physical representations of stress being experienced by your body. Emotionally it can involve feelings of restlessness, agitation, anger, nightmares, and even depression. How are you coping with the stress in your body? Here are some simple activities to help your body decompress and do what biologists refer to as “down-regulate your nervous system” from feeling agitated to feeling calmer.

1. Take deep, deep breaths. Anxiety and stress often cause us to only breathe as deep as our chest, but deep breaths involve stomach based, longer inhales. A common exercise to ensure you are breathing deeply is to put one hand on your chest and another on your stomach. Take a breath, is your chest hand rising first and your stomach hand rising second? Or is the only hand rising your chest hand? Try to get both hands to move up and down as you take a breath. Doing this for 60 seconds can have immediate benefits to your sense of calm. Read more on diaphragmatic breathing: CLICK HERE
2.  Once you master a deep breath from your diaphragm, see if you can slow your breath down and only take 4-5 breaths in a minute. Did you know its physiologically impossible to have a panic attack when you are taking 4-5 breaths a minute? This is a great strategy for people who suffer from panic disorder and need something to help calm them in moments of real arousal and fear. See more on slower breathing: CLICK HERE
3. Taking time to clean out the areas you spend the most time in is a great way to ‘detox’ your environment from the stress in your body. Moving away from meditation, what are other ways you can engage in relaxing your body and mind? Have you tried to clean a drawer? Or the front seat of your car? There is nothing like waking up in a clean bed and clean room to start the day in a relaxed way, right? But don’t get overwhelmed if you have neglected your living spaces for a while. Just start small. There are great guides on how to get started slowly, like this one: CLICK HERE 
4. Create a to do list that is reasonable with expectations.  As the world picks up pace once again from the global slow down, our bodies are adjusting too. Some people are noticing their “social battery” isn’t what it once was, and they feel less productive overall in their life. Providing some mindful attention to your day to day habits can help to assist you in feeling more productive and aware of how much you likely do already. Generally, we can only truly concentrate in 10-20 minute increments, so give yourself lots of breaks and even a reward when you finish a project. Here are some tips on being more productive if you need them: CLICK HERE
5. Spend quality time with loved ones. Who do you really love being around? Are there people in your life you haven’t connected with in a while? As you recharge that social battery that used to have a longer social life, think about the important people in your life that naturally reinvigorate your energy and feeling of connectedness.  Reconnect with an old high school friend you have only kept up with on Facebook and relive some memories from your past. Have you cooked dinner with someone recently? As Spring arrives, focus on outdoor and sun immersed activities like walking, outdoor activities, picnics in the park, and outdoor concerts. Find someone you care about and discover a new way to spend time with them.
6. Animal Assistance Therapy. Do you love animals but haven’t had time to commit to one yourself? Now that you are home more than ever, animal shelters are looking for volunteers to temporarily house a dog or cat for the next few weeks. Spending time with animals has been found to be very beneficial for stress relief and even decreasing feelings of isolation and loneliness. Lots of animal shelters are in need of volunteers!
7. Seek Professional Help. If stress is interfering with your ability to function, it’s important to seek professional help. A therapist or counselor can help you develop coping strategies and provide support. They can also help identify any underlying issues that may be contributing to your stress and develop a treatment plan to address them.