Tag: Stress relief

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Aerial photography Anxiety Dealing with a Crisis Distress Tolerance letting go of fear Stress

7 Anxiety Relief Techniques That Work

Reduce stress and anxiety to stay calm and maintain mental health and well being during change and uncertainty

How to Quickly Reduce Stress in a Crisis

Take a moment to look at situations in a stable, rational way and adjust your perspective. Instead of investing your emotions in anxiety and stress, stop, pause and direct your responses to be calm and solution focused. Accept reality without fatiguing or exasperating yourself. Radical Acceptance is an anxiety relief technique to accept reality, even when it’s challenging and downright painful. During my work as a Registered Psychiatric Nurse and Counsellor, I teach others to learn necessary habits needed to relieve stress and anxiety, and maintain healthy mental health habits. The human condition has an ability for joy, love and happiness, but we all face challenges, disappointments and uncertainty along the way as a part of our life journey.

Take Charge and Shift Your Mindset

In this complex and unstable world we need to have tools. Our prehistoric brain highlights fear, anxiety and negativity and works against us. Take charge through daily practice of re-framing thoughts and shift your mindset. Productive thinking boosts self-esteem and puts the clutter of negative thoughts in the trash where they belong. Our primal survival instincts get triggered, scanning in our environment for danger. Then we scare ourselves with irrational fear thoughts such as if the worst came true we would fall apart. We think when we go through a trauma or loss we are alone, but this is not true, our primal nature is to support one another with compassion. Use that same skill to have self compassion towards yourself. This lowers cortisol the stress hormone, and increases resilience during stressful events.

Acknowledge Painful Feelings

Recognize fear thoughts and replace them with safe and comforting thoughts by firmly directing your mind. Change and loss is natural and can lead to personal growth. Uncertainty can mean you’re on the right track and are opening yourself to new opportunities. When you use your imagination during a tough change or painful event to see the good and imagine that you’re creating something better in that space, you are changing the neural pathways in your brain. Acknowledge difficult and painful feelings as they come up and know this will change.

“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where stands in times of challenge and controversy” Martin Luther King

Focus on How This Change Brings You a New Perspective

A challenge is an opportunity when you look at it with a brand new perspective. If you are going through a tough change, find the good that came from it. When you visualize a positive outcome and move forward, it does not mean you erase the memory from your mind. You are now focusing on how this change brings alternative possibilities. It may have given you the gift of wisdom, knowing you’re resilient or an increased understanding of yourself. Acknowledge the fear and the courage it took to move forward. Looking for the good does not negate what happened to you. With your eye on a positive outcome you can gain perspective, and this will shift you into a better state of mind.

Develop True Grit During Tough Situations

When you put pressure on yourself to achieve a goal, your brain does its best to step up to the changing conditions. By changing habits, for example, you are perturbing the equilibrium of what was normal. Instead of going into high anxiety after a change, practice calming skills such as deep breathing, which connects you with your vagus nerve. Your reactive brain wants to go back to being the same and fear drives it. Welcome personal growth challenges under pressure to develop resiliency and develop a sense of true grit when the going gets tough. Train yourself to stay calm with forward moving energy. This provides stability during a sudden change or threat in your environment. You can learn how to be productive even during a crisis. This is something that takes practice as our brain is reactive. If you allow it to overreact with challenges, the flood of cortisol and adrenaline can deplete your energy. 

Put the Challenge into Perspective with Others

As humans, we can reassure and support others. Engage your community with empathy by putting things in perspective, as this regulates emotions. Respond compassionately to somebody in distress. Without getting anxious with them respond with caring and connection. If you dive right in and become upset with them experiencing negative emotions, this can cause overwhelm. Respond with genuine warmth and concern expressing compassion. Sometimes bearing witness to their pain with empathy is all that someone needs. Put the challenge into perspective and offer decision-making skills. With practice you can nurture other people in their time of need by offering them the gift of your wise self with your supportive words. Helping others with warmth and compassion releases the neurotransmitter oxytocin, which is a hormone that promotes feelings of love, bonding and well-being. 

Persistence,Courage and Strength

We need determination and endurance in life. Sometimes we need to tolerate pain and frustration, and during this time we need persistence and courage. Practice feeling strong by ignoring past hurt, perceived failures and let downs. Forge ahead and stop giving power to the past. Redirect yourself and focus only on the positive goal you wish to accomplish.

The Heart is the CEO

Remember that the heart is the CEO, and can quickly bring you to a state of ease. Instead of trying to master your worry thoughts ruled by the cognitive part of your brain, learn to re-calibrate to a belief of safety and refuge through regulating your heart rhythm. In my experience, this is the deepest and most permanent way to feel better. When you do heart focused breathing, you put your heart in a coherent state with thoughts of joy, love, appreciation, gratitude, compassion and forgiveness. This is a higher level of thinking which puts your heart rhythm in a smooth even wave. If you stay in a lower level state of anger, despair and anxiety your heart rhythm is in an incoherent state or in a jagged wave which can cause stress-related disorders.

Shift Out of Your Primal Fear State

At any point in time we are in our primal fear state which is the fight flight zone of the sympathetic nervous system or we are in the healing and powerful state of the parasympathetic zone of the nervous system. This means we connect with the benefit of the restorative vagus nerve. Our primal brain limits us with fear, insecurities, doubts, worries and anxieties, as this is the cognitive part of our brain which is a lower level state. When we are overthinking things and getting into a worry loop, this can be mentally draining and effect health. At any point in time we have the choice to shift out of this primal fear state into the higher and healthier state of our heart’s intelligence, connecting with joy, creativity and inspiration.

Call to Action

1) Make it your personal challenge to stay calm despite misfortune and set an intention that you are strong and serene. This prevents our amygdala or our emotion centre from irrational over response. Accept life’s uncertainty and develop a calm response pattern overtime. Stay solution focused and calm when waters get turbulent in life. Equanimity takes training and practice, as our primal brain is normally reactive to keep us safe from harm.

2) Find music with a strong rhythmic beat. Music is a right-brain exercise, where nonverbal creativity, intuition, and perception live. Immerse yourself in a challenging and creative project. Distress and stress are a left-brain activity with solving mental tasks, problem solving and analyzing. The left brain can get fatigued, stressed, and strained. Engage your right brain with creativity to relieve distress.

3) Have compassion for others and use this same skill to have self compassion towards yourself. Treat yourself with kindness and understanding. This lowers cortisol the stress hormone, and increases resilience during stressful events. Compassion releases the neurotransmitter oxytocin, which is a hormone that increases well-being.

4) Sit where you can be uninterrupted for 3 minutes. Close your eyes and visualize yourself calm through mental rehearsal. Imagine what a composed person looks like and have an image of yourself as calm. The breath has both emotional and physical benefits. Oriental meditators believe breathing is the secret to longevity as it eases the strain on both the heart and vital organs. Learn to breathe and stay composed during unpleasant events and emotional upset. Easy, rhythmic breathing patterns can get you through challenging times.

5) Ride the wave with 4×4 breathing until the distress has passed. Breathe in for the count of 4, hold for the count of 4, exhale for the count of 4, hold for 4. Comparable to a wave, the emotion will appear intense, reach its peak, then pass and dissipate. 

6) Seek and find positive experiences for brain health, even in the middle of hardship and pain. Wonderful facts are still around you, even when life is difficult. With practice this builds strength, resilience, and boosts feel good brain chemistry such as serotonin. This benefits brain structure and health.

7) Whenever you are in your monkey mind with your thoughts are racing out of control understand that you are in a primal state and notice your negative inner dialogue. Say to yourself “OK, I am in a primal unhealthy state and I am now going to my powerful higher level state.” Put your hand on your heart, do heart focused breathing and know that your higher level of intelligence lies in the intuitive voice of your heart. Remember, your heart provides wiser counsel than the inaccurate primal chatter of the brain when under stress.

About the Author

Kim co authored the #1 Bestselling book Emotional Intelligence: Mental Health Matters, which provides a set of supportive tools and inspiring stories to help women conquer negative influences, harness the power of psychological wellness and thrive emotionally.For more information go to:

https://www.awomanofworth.com/kim-mowatt

Categories
anger Anxiety assertiveness Conflict resolution Dealing with a Crisis Distress Tolerance happiness letting go of fear

Reset Your Anger and be a Class Act With These 6 Skills

Gabe had a history of angry outbursts, and was staring at the smoking ruins of his marriage. He was a foreman for a large construction company, and his blind irrational fury with his employees, resulted with a large group of them quitting. When I met him, Gabe and his wife were separated as a result of his out of control anger issues, and he was well known for his yellow jacket temper. He had become addicted to rage, and it flared swiftly like a twister cloud. He blamed everyone around him for his state of mind. It’s safe to say I was meeting Gabe at his lowest of lows, and he was seeking Anger Management exercises. His doctor told him he had high blood pressure and if he didn’t manage his anger, he would be on his way to coronary artery disease.


“Hello Gabe,” I said with a warm smile, motioning him to a chair near the window.

“Very often in everyday life one sees that by losing ones’s temper with someone who has already lost his, one does not gain anything but only sets out upon the path of stupidity. He who has enough self control to stand firm at the moment when the other person is in a temper wins in the end” Hazrat Inayat Khan author of Mastery Through Accomplishment


He glowered at me, his fists were clenched. I didn’t need to guess what his feelings were as they were written all over his face. He crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair looking at me sideways. “I don’t know why I need therapy, it’s those guys that need their head fixed!” he growled. Immediately, he launched into a tirade of complaints about his employees. By this point he’d already been to traditional Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for several years. He knew his way around the therapy block, but something wasn’t working for him, this was evident. His quick temper always rebounded without improvement. Anger always been his primary addiction, and it swung around him in drunken circles.


“What are you going to tell me that I don’t already know?” he snarled, the slow glow of anger working up from his collar to his face.

An Effective Alternative to Cognitive Behaviour Therapy

“It’s what I will show you,” I said, as I organized the power points and biofeedback screen on my computer. 

The Science of the Heart by Doc Childre is an evidence-based approach used by the HeartMath Institute in which researchers study human thoughts, emotions, and behaviours through studying the heart rhythm. I showed him diagrams of the science of the heart and brain and nervous system and explained what anger did to his heart rhythm and biochemistry. I then showed him his heart rhythm on the computer biofeedback screen, and showed him how he could change his chaotic rhythm to a smooth even wave, and improve his health. Towards the end of the counselling session with Gabe, after utilizing heart focused breathing, his facial expressions and posture changed drastically. One month later, after a combined effort of Biofeedback combined with my shortened version of Mindfulness Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, Gabe’s wife approached me in my office.

“What did you say to my husband?” she exclaimed as she peered in the door.

I paused, and took in a breath my eyes wide open, scanning my mind.

“He has changed and is cheerful and actually smiling! I’ve really never seen him happy!” she said.

Gabe was now able to understand how his anger was affecting him emotionally and physically, causing his life to spiral out of control. Learning Anger Management Skills helped Gabe quickly gain control of his anger giving him tools to put things in proper perspective when faced with daily triggers. Having experienced benefits from these techniques, he continued with counselling and reunited with his wife. “I feel a freedom, I was not expecting”, he said matter of factly with a smile. 

“Anger…it’s a paralyzing emotion..you can’t get anything done.People sort of think it’s an interesting, passionate, and igniting feeling — I don’t think it’s any of that — it’s helpless … it’s absence of control — and I need all of my skills, all of the control, all of my powers … and anger doesn’t provide any of that — I have no use for it whatsoever.” Interview with CBS radio host Don Swaim

Anger is a Signal You Need a Course Correction

 Anger is a natural part of being human and is a signal that you need a course correction. It is a temporary emotion usually with the original intention to seek a solution not just to lose control and express angst. You can learn to deal with anger and problem solve without hurting others. When you practice anger management skills you are taking responsibility for your health and communication in your relationships. It is important to let go of anger instead of hanging onto it once the problem is over and done. Anger can be addicting and habit forming and this becomes unhealthy for heart health and relationships. You don’t want to hide or ignore your anger however you want to recognize it as part of your human nature and that it can be handled skillfully. There are many ways that people express anger which can become habit forming.

Anger Issues Affect Heart Health

If you go off the handle and go from 0 to 60 really quickly and stay angry for a period you should understand it is detrimental to heart health. When you avoid your anger it can also take its toll on physical and emotional well-being. Instead of avoiding anger you can learn healthy skills and use it as a useful tool for assertively standing up for yourself. Angry emotion affects the heart putting it into a chaotic rhythm. It also drains energy, so it is important to learn useful anger skills that are effective. Conflict can improve relationships when it is handled well, it is only a signal that things need attention and they need to be dealt with in an honest and open way. When anger is avoided, it can be turned inward with self criticism or self harm. Don’t be afraid of your anger as it is a human emotion that gives you an opportunity to set boundaries for safety. It is important to stand up for yourself if you feel pushed around or disrespected. Courageously stand up for yourself, take charge and say no to what you don’t want. Practice being very clear when you mean yes and when you mean no., This takes courage to be honest and open about what you want and what you don’t want. You don’t have to light up quickly with rage to get what you need. You can be quietly and assertively effective. Be wise. If you go off like guns blazing, and angry your defensive actions make you less credible and you could end up not being listened to.


Call to Action:


1)Tell the other person specifically what you want by naming the specific behaviour.
Tell them how you felt.
Tell them specifically what you would like to see as the outcome in the relationship.
Do this in a calm tone of voice. If you cannot, take a break, go for a walk, and come back when you are relaxed.


2)Learn to be clear when you mean yes and when you mean no. If you’re not sure, give yourself time to think about it, and come back to the conversation later.


3)The next time you feel furious, instead of lighting up quickly realize the emotion you are experiencing, take a deep breath, and take a pause to give yourself that space to look at it rationally. If you need to apologize with your part in the disagreement, don’t wait, and speak from the heart.


4)Look for the warning signs when tension is rising. Stop ignoring the signs that anger is building and recognize when you are impatient and frustrated. When you ventilate in a sudden explosion, it rarely solves the problem and has you feeling worse as well as the other person feeling upset. Anger can be addicting due to the rush of adrenaline and every time you light up quickly you are training your brain to do it again.


5)When you feel these warning signs it’s time to take a time out and go for a walk, relax and let go of the physical and emotional tension. Breath in deeply, and do a long exhale as though letting go of the steam. Come back to the situation when you are calm, willing to talk quietly, slowly, and listen to what others have to say. With practice this gets easier and easier overtime.


6)Give yourself a chance to reclaim your emotions and accept that you are human. Make a commitment to notice anger and trust that you can deal with anger in a rational, healthy and assertive way.



About the blog author:
Kim co authored the #1 Bestselling book Emotional Intelligence: Mental Health Matters, which provides a set of supportive tools and inspiring stories to help women conquer negative influences, harness the power of psychological wellness and thrive emotionally.For more information go to:
https://www.awomanofworth.com/kim-mowatt
Categories
anger Anxiety assertiveness Conflict resolution Counselling Stress

How to Deal With Difficult People With These 5 Simple Steps

How to deal with difficult people and manage anger

Difficult people will challenge you with their judgments, old behaviours and patterns along with projecting their opinions. If you’re not grounded in confidence, clear and strong within yourself, you may be triggered, prodded and poked with your emotions in every direction, until you find yourself stewing in an angry reactive emotion. This can be stressful, physically exhausting and wreak havoc with your nervous system.

Anger Can Drain Our Energy Quickly

Reactive angry emotions can drain our energy extremely quickly. Let’s look at ways that we can release this old familiar pattern that is reactive, and drawn into people’s drama. You can learn ways of thriving in every situation, joyfully without fear and create a different perspective. You have everything you need to experience life with your feet planted firmly on solid ground, without being tossed and pushed around by circumstance, people’s negativity and your own thoughts.

Reacting to a Negative Event Causes a Chaotic Heart Rhythm

If you go over and over in your mind about a negative incident that happened after being harmed emotionally, you are adding more pain to the already traumatizing event. Ruminating of how things could have gone differently in an interaction, is illogical, as no amount of thinking about it changes the facts it is a past event. The sooner you let go of it, the better it is for your health. Reacting to a negative event causes a chaotic heart rhythm, as well as a flood of the stress hormones cortisol and adrenaline, which can lead to stress-related disorders such as heart disease, anxiety, depression, insomnia and weight gain. Some people are bad for our health.

Learn The Fine Art Of Bold Communication Skills


Associate with people who are positive and supportive and if it is possible, let go, modify contact, or assert yourself with critical and negative people. Think of this as a step you take for your physical and mental well-being. It is important to identify who these people are and take action. Setting clear boundaries can improve your relationship with them. By learning the skill of assertiveness, you are saying to yourself and others that you value yourself, and it will set the tone for mutual respect. With practice, you can learn the fine art of bold communication skills, and this will help you set clear boundaries.

Quick Emergency Exercise After An Argument

1) Imagine that there is a drain  at the bottom of your feet.

2) Exhale out any negativity and see it disappear outside of yourself as it goes out of the drain at the bottom of your feet.

3) Inhale again breathing in fresh clean air and white light.

4) Keep exhaling negative material out of the drain and inhaling the clean white light until you feel clean, clear, and lighter.

5) Stay there for one minute and notice the peaceful and clear feeling you have. 

Through repetition, you become skilled with developing a filter that allows things in that make you feel good, and filtering out what is harming you, or could cause you harm. By taking on another’s negativity you’re harming yourself. Pay attention to how good it feels to have a peaceful feeling that is strong and wise. Each interaction in your life is teaching you valuable life lessons. Protect your well- being like gold.

I invite you to share with me your wisdom, experiences and insights.

Kim co authored the #1 Bestselling book Emotional Intelligence: Mental Health Matters,which provides a set of supportive tools and inspiring stories to help women conquer negative influences, harness the power of psychological wellness and thrive emotionally.For more information go to:
https://www.awomanofworth.com/kim-mowatt

Categories
Anti-Aging Costa Rica happiness Healing Stress visualization

Try This Simple Two Minute Fast and Effective Technique For Stress Relief

Learn to stay calming reduce anxiety and fear to maintain mental health and well being during stress, change and uncertainty.
Train yourself to stay calm during a crisis instead of reacting with stress and anxiety during a change.

Train Yourself to Become Calm during a Crisis

President Harry Truman dealt with stress remarkably well during World War II. His stressful job did not appear to have aged him, and he still had a youthful vitality. When asked how he did it, he stated “I have a foxhole in my mind.” His explanation was, that as a soldier needs recuperation and rest in a foxhole, he needed a retreat into his imagination to recover and rejuvenate from pressure.

When Mentally Exhausted Create a Foxhole in Your Mind

We can create this foxhole in our minds when mentally exhausted and drained by redirecting our thoughts into a movie of our own making. As your nervous system does not know the difference between a real or imagined experience, you can release yourself from worry and strain, with a two minute mental vacation.  

“I promise you nothing is as chaotic as it seems. Nothing is worth diminishing your health. Nothing is worth poisoning yourself into stress, anxiety, and fear.” 

Steve Maraboli; Author of Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience

Stop,Pause and Recognize Your Stress

My forehead quilted in the tension,and I took a deep inhale after a stressful staff meeting. I went for a coffee break, in a quagmire of baffled cerebral congestion. While listening to the familiar, comforting slapping of Marlie’s clogs down the hallway, my mind is now travelling.

In times where everything I’ve known crumbles away, giving way to disorder and chaos, I remind myself of a distant memory; one I carry along with me on my mental journeys. A memory of a place untampered by civilization. An island away from the rest of the world.

This place was a secluded beach I and Glenn had found, close to Cabuya, Costa Rica. We were the only souls there, besides the creatures that held us in wonderment.

There was a vast stretch of white untampered sand, strewn with stones and adorned with seashells, the lapping waves washed the pebbled shores a crystal white, and the weeping jungle reached out from the tree line towards the sea, with howling monkeys dangling from its lean branches. Parakeets hopped along on the higher branches, quickly scurrying away when the capuchins neared them. The Capuchins were smaller monkeys than the howler monkeys and a native to the area. My curiosity led me to them, but I stopped short when the nearest one bared vicious canines at me.

Across the sand, crawling creatures emerged to witness us. Iguanas skittered away as we crossed the girth, bobbing their heads in mutual curiosity at us, and skittering further away when we neared them. Out in the distance, across the waters, massive aerial harpoons descended from the skies, pelicans aimed for prey. The minute display spun my mind.

This place is away from the rest of the world, a part of the earth allowed to grow untamed, closed off by nature itself, its thick vegetative arms cradled the bay, and stretched as far as vision carried till it transcended to jutting rocks that rose high into steep terrifying cliffs, a home to a diverse array of fauna and animals. The shrill calls of life from the trees were almost lost to the rushing roars of crashing waves, and the gentle stroking of cool and whistling salt breeze.

In my mind, this place is wild and far-reaching, unbridled in it’s growth, reminding me of how unruly and untamed our minds can be. Every time I find myself with cluttered thoughts, I’m reminded of this place and of the essence in practicing steadiness of mind daily. Bring your mind gently back to a peaceful place when it gets lost in a swirl of thought and worry.

By finding a peaceful and quiet sanctuary in your imagination you positively shift both your neurochemistry and heart rhythm which benefits health. Our life is a work of art, and we can become the masters of directing and creating our story. 

Whenever you feel tension mounting, give your mind the break that it deserves with beautiful memories. Create a two-minute experience to boost your brain chemistry, and practice it regularly. Studies show this can increase your productivity and effectiveness at work by reducing stress. I invite you to share with me your thoughts in the comments below. Where will you go on your next vacation?