It happens that we are looking for complex recipes to improve the quality of life. We think: “If I go to yoga, I’ll immediately become calmer.” And of course, we don’t go to yoga. And we have a heartfelt excuse - why do we feel so bad? There is no good yoga in the area! Sadly...
And yet, there are primitive quick-fix self-help remedies that have been used for centuries in cases of stress, irritation, frustration, in a situation where someone or something is eating your brain out.
They were used for recommendations by general practitioners (and not only) of the old school. One of those who took the patient by the hand, and this already made him feel better. Self-help tips were taught by physical therapists, massage therapists, and athletic trainers. Now advice is more expensive and more difficult to formulate. Self-help is suppressed, this is not a market approach.
And we'll go back to the good old days when self-help was encouraged.
Method 1: Get distracted by something
This method of relieving emotional stress is suitable in cases where you are trapped, driven into a corner and cannot escape anywhere. For example, sit at a planning meeting and listen to your boss, internally boiling. You can’t escape, but... Distraction at the same time by contemplating something extraneous, neutral and being carried away by this extraneous thing is the best way not to overthink yourself over trifles.
For example: “However, what is Masha’s manicure like... I wonder how she did it?”
This only works if you yourself understand the benefits of such a strategy - don’t look at the nasty, don’t listen to the nasty. If you like to fume and get into arguments, that’s your right.
Method 2 Leave an annoying situation (aka emotional zone)
Did something make you sad at someone else's birthday? On a picnic? Do you hate some group, public page, or page on a social network? Do you dream of removing an unpleasant person from your friends list?
So, we quickly left the group forever. They banned an argumentative provocateur, a troll, a boor, a fool. Deleted your profile, if that happens.
Quickly call a taxi (don’t squeeze, don’t squeeze), kiss the hostess and rush home - away from the party, away from the barbecue, away from the irritating, emotional zone.
Method 3 Drink some water
This is already the signature recipe of all brilliant therapists who do not sell dietary supplements from pharmaceutical corporations.
A glass of water, drunk slowly, stops all attacks known to science. The first thing they offer a person who has suffered something terrible is a glass of water. Drinking water triggers the body's self-rehabilitation mechanism. Most often, people feel ill for two reasons:
- hysteria (sympatho-adrenal crisis in another way),
- dehydration of the body that was not noticed in time.
Since we don’t listen to our body and don’t teach healthy lifestyle, we drink tea, coffee and soda all day - we all have dehydration, and you have it too. Go drink a glass of water right now, and then read on.
Method 4 Get involved in an exciting, interesting activity
This method is suitable in a situation where you cannot be “let go.” You need to break the stuckness of chewing “And they, And I, And fuck them all” with something cool, even if it’s stupid and tasteless. Reading a detective story. Computer game. Hunting and gathering. Surveillance and tracking. An attempt to reveal someone's secret. Even by spying and eavesdropping, damn it.
You must be involved in the intrigue, in the detective story, in the rapid development of events, in the hunt, in the game, in courage, in flight.
Your ears should lift and your tail should twitch.
You yourself know what can captivate and amuse you. Everyone has their own, individual thing. Just don't get carried away with this surveillance. Don't harm anyone.
Method 5 Physical discharge
Everyone is familiar with this method firsthand, but, as usual, no one cares. And I remind you once again that rapid physical discharge, which includes:
- walking,
- swim,
- general cleaning of the apartment (possibly someone else’s),
- sex,
- destruction of trash,
- work in the garden,
- dance,
- mopping floors and washing by hand
relaxes twisted muscles and relieves stress and frustration fantastically effectively. General washing by hand even helps to cope with grief - again the advice of the old doctor, which I share with you.
Method 6 Come into contact with water
Washing dishes is a free session of hypno-psychotherapy. The sound of clean running running water relieves our fatigue and takes away with it all the “dirt,” not just household dirt.
In addition to washing dishes, there is a well-known classic: take a bath, take a shower, go to the sauna, go early in the morning or in the evening - swim in the sea, in the river, in the lake, in the spring. Refresh yourself, in short.
Method 7 Positive reframing of a stressful event
So much has been written about positive reframing (including by me) that I don’t want to repeat myself. I'll just give an example:
“It’s so good that it turned out that I won’t go anywhere this summer! Finally, I’m taking English courses, fitness classes, and even self-development courses! When else would I allow myself such a “useless” luxury? And in the summer there is low season everywhere and there are only discounts around. So I’ll save money too!”
Method 8 It could have been worse, it was even harder for others
Are you not satisfied with the outcome of the event? Imagine that there could have been a worse outcome. Imagine how bad it is for some people around you. If you master this art and stop turning your nose up at this strategy, then you will not need any psychotherapy at all.
Method 9 Laughter kills everything scary and terribly important
Ridiculing, reducing, vulgarizing something inflated and important is an ancient recipe of human culture, dating back to the Neolithic. Thanks to grandfather Bakhtin for his term “carnival-laughter culture.” Read it, take an interest.
Or watch one episode about the adventures of SpongeBob SquarePants. When he was terrified of speaking at a school seminar, a smart squirrel gave him super glasses. Wearing these glasses, SpongeBob saw all the students and the teacher... in their underpants. That was funny! True, out of laughter, he never read out his report. And what kind of panties did the teacher have... Mmm...
Method 10 Counting to 10
Just read until ten. Slowly. Controlling your inhalations and exhalations. To myself, not out loud. This is the recommendation of doctors and sports trainers.
Method 11 Cry
Crying relieves stress. With the tear fluid, the body leaves the toxic substances that are formed under the influence of stress hormones. If you can’t cry about your own things, come up with a pitiful topic and specifically cry over it.
Method 12 Verbalization of everything that is on your soul
Pronunciation or verbalization is putting a vague “something” into clear words. However, great thing. Or better yet, write it all down on paper, write a long letter.
Just don’t send it anywhere!
Here are 12 tips for dealing with stress and the diseases that stress then causes.
These 12 are those that help us and do not require money for it. And the rest is expensive and from charlatans.
Any manifestation of the external and internal world finds a response in a person in the form of emotions. Our health directly depends on what they are, negative or positive, strong or not. This article is about the signs of nervousness and its causes. .
People at any age experience mental stress. If a child can laugh with tears in his eyes, and a teenager forgets about unhappy love after 3-4 days, then an adult worries about any reason, and scrolls through unpleasant thoughts in his memory for a long time, cherishing them inside himself, thereby driving his psyche into a state of stress.
This is explained by the fact that with age, immune defense decreases, hormonal levels change and a person becomes more and more prone to a negative perception of reality. And there are plenty of reasons to be nervous in the modern world - excessive haste, daily stress at home and at work, hard work, social vulnerability, etc.
Why are we nervous?
Objective reasons
- The human condition has changed as a biological species. At the beginning of evolution, man led a natural lifestyle: the level of physical activity and the neuropsychic stress necessary for survival corresponded to each other. The habitat was environmentally friendly, and if it became unsuitable, then a community of people changed it for another without trying to change itb.
- The information environment has changed. Every decade the amount of information accumulated before doubles. Scientific and technological progress has a tremendous impact on the brain: the speed of information receipt does not correspond to the biological capabilities of its assimilation, which is aggravated by a lack of time.
Children at school, especially diligent ones, experience information overload: the mental state of a first-grader when writing tests and the state of an astronaut at the moment of take-off of the spacecraft are comparable.
Many professions also create information loads: an air traffic controller, for example, must simultaneously control up to two dozen aircraft, and a teacher must pay enough attention to dozens of students.
- Urban population growth increased the density of human contacts and the degree of tension between people. The number of unpleasant and unavoidable relationships has increased in public transport, in queues, in stores. At the same time, beneficial contacts (for example, family contacts) have decreased and take only about 30 minutes per day.
- Increased noise level, especially in cities, exceeds natural norms and has a negative impact on our psyche and the body as a whole: blood pressure and respiratory rate changes, sleep and dream patterns are disturbed, and other unfavorable symptoms. We are exposed to noise almost constantly, sometimes without noticing it (TV, radio).
- Bad ecology also has an indirect effect on the brain and psyche. High levels of carbon monoxide in the air we breathe reduce gas exchange in the brain and its performance. Sulfur and nitrogen oxides disrupt brain metabolism.
Radioactive contamination occupies a special place in the deterioration of mental functioning: our nervous system suffers greatly from its high level. The psychological impact of this factor aggravates the harmful effect, generating fear.
- Scientific and technological revolution improved the material conditions of human habitation, but at the same time significantly reduced its margin of safety. A decrease in physical activity has led to disruption of the biological mechanisms of the human body.
Subjective reasons
Strong emotions are usually a defensive reaction to manifestations of the outside world. We get nervous if we are not confident in ourselves, in our present, we experience fear of the future, dissatisfaction with ourselves and others.
Any living organism, in the presence of a threat, responds with compression (muscle tension) - to become invisible, to hide so that the “predator” does not notice or eat. In the modern world, this “predator” has been transformed into different images of the social and public environment: level of well-being, relationships with superiors, fear of responsibility, fear of criticism and condemnation, small pension, impending poor old age, etc.
These social “predators” scare us, we want to hide and not think about them, but our thoughts always return to unpleasant things willingly and spontaneously. From here, nervous tension arises again and again, which means the body instinctively contracts.
What happens to the body during nervous tension
Strong and prolonged emotions plunge the body into a state of stress: muscle tone increases, heart rate accelerates, digestion slows down, the stress hormone cortisol and the action and anxiety hormone adrenaline are released into the blood.
All internal resources are mobilized to overcome danger, the body is ready for quick action.
Such a defensive reaction is an ancient form of response, genetically determined and necessary for the survival of humans as a biological species. It involves physical activity, the body must work off “adrenaline”. And that is why physical activity helps with nervous tension.
Thus, Nervous tension is always accompanied by unconscious muscle tension . With constant nervousness and a sedentary lifestyle, muscle tone becomes chronic. A person seems to be encased in a muscular shell; movement within it requires enormous energy expenditure. Therefore, fatigue is a faithful companion to nervous states.
Due to constant muscle tension, performance decreases, irritability appears, and the functions of the digestive, cardiovascular and other systems and organs are disrupted.
Signs of nervous tension. How to help yourself
Nagging pain in the back, lower back, neck, shoulder girdle. With any nervous overload, the tension of the skeletal muscles increases, while the muscles of the neck, shoulder blades and biceps bear increased load.
Bring your index finger and thumb together and clasp them tightly on both hands.
Do stretching exercises for the whole body and different muscle groups.
Massage your ankles, moving up to your thighs. Do the same for your arms, moving up from your hands to your shoulders.
Sleep disturbance. It is well known that the best and safest medicine for nervousness is sleep. However, if you go to bed with a load of problems, then your brain continues to solve them in your sleep, which does not allow you to fully rest. , in turn leads to a depressed state. It turns out to be a vicious circle.
A phyto-pillow will help - mix herbs in the following proportions:
o Mint, meadowsweet, lemon balm, wormwood - 1:1:1:2,
o Yellow clover, tansy color, lavender - 2:2:1,
o Chamomile, rosemary color, yarrow - 3:1:1,
o Hop cones.
Place this herbal-smelling pillow next to you at night. It is better to push the pillow with hop cones onto the floor as soon as you start to fall asleep. Otherwise, you risk oversleeping for work.
Making a phyto pillow is not difficult: put the herbs in a sewn gauze pillowcase, you can simply wrap it. It is better to store in a paper bag.
No interest in sex. The subconscious of a person in a difficult life situation establishes a ban on receiving pleasure from life. So that he doesn’t get scattered and throws all his energy into solving problems. It turns out to be a contradiction: a person in this state, on the contrary, needs positive emotions, namely the pleasure hormones endorphins produced during sex, because these hormones protect the body from stress and minimize its harmful effects.
It is necessary to have sex during difficult periods of life! Experts advise following biorhythms. In men and women, mutual readiness occurs around 16:00, the most unfavorable time is 18:00. But, of course, these recommendations are conditional.
Refusal to engage in a favorite hobby. All efforts are aimed at eliminating the cause of nervous tension (finishing a project, finishing an article, preparing a report, etc.), but there is simply not enough time or energy for the rest of life. The whole body is like a string, all thoughts are about one thing. This attitude towards the problem aggravates mental and physical discomfort.
Make it a rule to give yourself the opportunity to rest. Let your day off be a real break from all your problems. This will provide the necessary energy to solve troubling problems.
Repetitive actions: tapping fingers, swinging legs, walking back and forth. This is a natural reaction of a person to emotional stress, this is how he tries to restore balance and calm down.
Help yourself with similar repetitive actions: you can walk up and down the stairs, touch your rosary, knit. Even chewing gum has a good effect; chewing movements activate cerebral circulation, which increases resistance to stressful situations.
I will explain how to remain calm and cool in any life situation without the help of sedatives, alcohol and other things. I will talk not only about how to suppress states of nervousness and calm down, but I will also explain how you can stop being nervous in general, bring the body into a state in which this feeling simply cannot arise, in general, how to calm your mind and how strengthen the nervous system.
The article will be structured in the form of sequential lessons and it is better to read them in order.
Nervousness and jitters are that feeling of discomfort that you experience on the eve of important, responsible events and activities, during psychological stress and stress, in problematic life situations, and simply worry about all sorts of little things. It is important to understand that nervousness has both psychological and physiological causes and manifests itself accordingly. Physiologically, this is connected with the properties of our nervous system, and psychologically, with the characteristics of our personality: a tendency to worry, overestimation of the significance of certain events, a feeling of self-doubt and what is happening, shyness, worry about the result.
We begin to get nervous in situations that we consider either dangerous, threatening our lives, or for one reason or another significant or responsible. I think that a threat to life does not often loom before us, ordinary people. Therefore, I consider situations of the second type to be the main reason for nervousness in everyday life. The fear of failure, of looking inappropriate in front of people - all this makes us nervous. In relation to these fears, there is a certain psychological attunement; this has little to do with our physiology. Therefore, in order to stop being nervous, it is necessary not only to put the nervous system in order, but to understand and realize certain things, let’s start with understanding the nature of nervousness.
Lesson 1. The nature of nervousness. Necessary defense mechanism or hindrance?
Our palms begin to sweat, we may experience tremors, increased heart rate, increased blood pressure, confusion in our thoughts, it is difficult to gather ourselves, concentrate, it is difficult to sit still, we want to occupy our hands with something, smoke. These are the symptoms of nervousness. Now ask yourself, how much do they help you? Do they help cope with stressful situations? Are you better at negotiating, taking an exam, or communicating on a first date when you're on edge? The answer is, of course not, and what’s more, it can ruin the whole result.
Therefore, it is necessary to firmly understand that the tendency to be nervous is not a natural reaction of the body to a stressful situation or some ineradicable feature of your personality. Rather, it is simply a certain mental mechanism embedded in a system of habits and/or a consequence of problems with the nervous system. Stress is only your reaction to what is happening, and no matter what happens, you can always react to it in different ways! I assure you that the impact of stress can be minimized and nervousness eliminated. But why eliminate this? Because when you're nervous:
- Your thinking ability decreases and you have a harder time concentrating, which can make things worse and require your mental resources to be stretched to the limit.
- You have less control over your intonation, facial expressions, and gestures, which can have a bad effect on important negotiations or a date.
- Nervousness causes fatigue and tension to accumulate more quickly, which is bad for your health and well-being.
- If you are often nervous, this can lead to various diseases (however, a very significant part of diseases stem from problems of the nervous system)
- You worry about little things and therefore do not pay attention to the most important and valuable things in your life.
Remember all those situations when you were very nervous and this negatively affected the results of your actions. Surely everyone has many examples of how you broke down, unable to withstand psychological pressure, lost control and lost concentration. So we will work with you on this.
Here is the first lesson, during which we learned that:
- Nervousness does not bring any benefit, but only hinders
- You can get rid of it by working on yourself
- In everyday life there are few real reasons to be nervous, since we or our loved ones are rarely threatened by anything, we mostly worry about trifles
I will return to the last point in the next lesson and, in more detail, at the end of the article and tell you why this is so.
You should configure yourself like this:
I have no reason to be nervous, it bothers me and I intend to get rid of it and this is real!
Don’t think that I’m just talking about something that I myself have no idea about. Throughout my childhood, and then my youth, until I was 24 years old, I experienced serious problems with the nervous system. I couldn’t pull myself together in stressful situations, I worried about every little thing, I even almost fainted because of my sensitivity! This had a negative impact on health: pressure surges, “panic attacks,” dizziness, etc. began to be observed. Now all this is in the past.
Of course, I can’t say now that I have the best self-control in the world, but all the same, I stopped being nervous in those situations that make most people nervous, I became much calmer, compared to my previous state, I reached a fundamentally different level of self-control. Of course, I still have a lot to work on, but I’m on the right path and there is dynamics and progress, I know what to do. In general, everything I’m talking about here is based solely on my experience of self-development, I’m not making anything up and I’m only talking about what helped me. So if I had not been such a painful, vulnerable and sensitive young man and then, as a result of personal problems, had not begun to remake myself - all this experience and the site that summarizes and structures it would not have existed.
Lesson 2. Are the events that you consider so significant and important?
Think about all those events that make you nervous: your boss calls you, you take an exam, you expect an unpleasant conversation. Think about all these things, evaluate the degree of their importance for you, but not in isolation, but within the context of your life, your global plans and prospects. What is the significance of an altercation on public transport or on the road on a life-long scale, and is it really such a terrible thing to be late for work and be nervous about it?
Is this something to think about and worry about? At such moments, focus on the purpose of your life, think about the future, take a break from the current moment. I am sure that from this perspective, many things that you are nervous about will immediately lose their significance in your eyes, will turn into mere trifles, which they certainly are and, therefore, will not be worth your worries. This psychological setting helps a lot. But no matter how well we set ourselves up, although this will certainly have a positive effect, it will still not be enough, since the body, despite all the arguments of reason, can react in its own way. Therefore, let's move on and I will explain how to bring the body into a state of calm and relaxation immediately before any event, during and after it.
Lesson 3. Preparation. How to calm down before a big event
Now some important event is inexorably approaching us, during which our intelligence, composure and will will be tested, and if we successfully pass this test, then fate will generously reward us, otherwise we will lose. This event could be a final interview for the job you dream of, important negotiations, a date, an exam, etc. In general, you have already learned the first two lessons and understand that nervousness can be stopped and this must be done so that this condition does not prevent you from focusing on the goal and achieving it.
And you realize that an important event awaits you ahead, but no matter how significant it is, even the worst outcome of such an event will not mean the end of your whole life for you: there is no need to dramatize and overestimate everything. It is precisely from the very importance of this event that the need to be calm and not worry arises. This is too important an event to let nervousness ruin it, so I will be collected and focused and will do everything for this!
Now we bring our thoughts to calm, relieve the jitters. First, immediately throw all thoughts of failure out of your head. In general, try to calm down the fuss and not think about anything. Free your head from thoughts, relax your body, exhale and inhale deeply. The simplest breathing exercises will help you relax.
Simple breathing exercises:
It should be done like this:
- inhale for 4 counts (or 4 pulse beats, you need to feel it first, it’s more convenient to do this on the neck, not on the wrist)
- keep the air in for 2 counts/hits
- exhale for 4 counts/beats
- do not breathe for 2 counts/beats and then inhale again for 4 counts/beats - all from the beginning
In short, as the doctor says: breathe - don't breathe. 4 seconds inhale - 2 seconds hold - 4 seconds exhale - 2 seconds hold.
If you feel that your breathing allows you to take deeper inhalations/exhalations, then do the cycle not 4/2 seconds but 6/3 or 8/4 and so on.
During the exercise, keep your attention only on your breathing! There should be no more thoughts! It is most important. And then after 3 minutes you will feel relaxed and calm. The exercise is done for no more than 5-7 minutes, according to how it feels. With regular practice, breathing practice not only helps you relax here and now, but also generally puts your nervous system in order and you become less nervous without any exercise. So I highly recommend it.
Okay, so we are prepared. But the time for the event itself has already arrived. Next I will talk about how to behave during the event so as not to be nervous and to be calm and relaxed.
Lesson 4. How to avoid being nervous during an important meeting
Pretend calm: even if neither your emotional mood nor breathing exercises helped you relieve tension, then at least try with all your might to demonstrate external calm and equanimity. And this is necessary not only to mislead your opponents about your current state. Expressing outer peace helps to achieve inner peace. This operates on the principle of feedback, not only how you feel determines your facial expressions, but also your facial expressions determine how you feel. This principle is easy to test: when you smile at someone, you feel better and more cheerful, even if you were in a bad mood before. I actively use this principle in my daily practice and this is not my invention, it is really a fact, it is even written about in Wikipedia in the article “emotions”. So the calmer you want to appear, the more relaxed you actually become.
Watch your facial expressions, gestures and intonation: the feedback principle obliges you to constantly look inside yourself and be aware of how you look from the outside. Do you seem too stressed? Are your eyes shifting? Are the movements smooth and measured or abrupt and impulsive? Does your face express cold impenetrability or can all your excitement be read on it? In accordance with the information about yourself received from your senses, you adjust all your body movements, voice, and facial expression. The fact that you have to take care of yourself in itself helps you get together and concentrate. And the point is not only that with the help of internal observation you control yourself. By observing yourself, you focus your thoughts at one point - on yourself, and do not let them get confused and lead you in the wrong direction. This is how concentration and calm are achieved.
Eliminate all markers of nervousness: What do you usually do when you're nervous? Are you fiddling with a ballpoint pen? Are you chewing on a pencil? Are you tying your left big toe and little toe into a knot? Now forget about it, keep your hands straight and don’t change their positions often. We don’t fidget in our chair, we don’t shift from foot to foot. We continue to look after ourselves.
That's all. All these principles complement each other and can be summarized in the call to “look after yourself.” The rest is specific and depends on the nature of the meeting itself. I would only advise you to think about each of your phrases, take your time with your answer, carefully weigh and analyze everything. There is no need to try to make an impression in all available ways, you will make one if you do everything right and don’t worry, work on the quality of your performance. There is no need to mumble and get lost if you are caught by surprise: calmly swallow, forget and move on.
Lesson 5. Calm down after a meeting
Whatever the outcome of the event. You're on edge and still feeling stressed. It's better to take it off and think about something else. All the same principles apply here that helped you pull yourself together before the meeting itself. Try not to think too much about the past event, I mean all sorts of fruitless thoughts, what if I had performed this way and not that way, oh, how stupid I must have looked, oh I’m a fool, what if...! Just throw all thoughts out of your head, get rid of the subjunctive mood (if), everything has already passed, put your breathing in order and relax your body. That's all for this lesson.
Lesson 6. You shouldn’t create any reasons for nervousness at all.
This is a very important lesson. Typically, a significant factor in nervousness is the inadequacy of your preparation for the upcoming event. When you know everything and are confident in yourself, why should you worry about the result?
I remember when I was studying at the institute, I missed a lot of lectures and seminars, I went to the exams completely unprepared, hoping that I would pass and somehow pass. In the end, I passed, but only thanks to phenomenal luck or the kindness of the teachers. I often went for retakes. As a result, during the session I experienced such unprecedented psychological pressure every day due to the fact that I was trying to prepare in a hurry and somehow pass the exam.
During the sessions, an unrealistic number of nerve cells were destroyed. And I still felt sorry for myself, I thought that there was so much that had piled up, how hard it was, eh... Although it was all my fault, if I had done everything in advance (I didn’t have to go to lectures, but at least the material to prepare for the exam and pass I could provide myself with all the intermediate control tests - but then I was laziness and I was not at least somehow organized), then I would not have to be so nervous during the exams and worry about the result and about the fact that I would be drafted into the army if I I won’t hand over something, because I would be confident in my knowledge.
This is not a call not to miss lectures and study at institutes, I am talking about the fact that you should try not to create stress factors for yourself in the future! Think ahead and prepare for business and important meetings, do everything on time and don’t put it off until the last minute! Always have a ready-made plan in your head, or better yet several! This will save you a significant part of your nerve cells, and in general will contribute to great success in life. This is a very important and useful principle! Use it!
Lesson 7. How to strengthen the nervous system
In order to stop being nervous, it is not enough just to follow the lessons that I outlined above. It is also necessary to bring the body and mind into a state of peace. And the next thing I will tell you about will be those rules, following which you can strengthen the nervous system and experience less nervousness in general, being calmer and more relaxed. These methods are focused on long-term results; they will make you less susceptible to stress in general, and not just prepare you for a responsible event.
- Firstly, to correct the physiological factor of nervousness and bring the nervous system to a state of rest, you need to meditate regularly. This is very good for calming the nervous system and calming the mind. I’ve written a lot about this, so I won’t dwell on it.
- Secondly, go in for sports and take a set of health-supporting measures (contrast showers, healthy eating, vitamins, etc.). A healthy body has a healthy mind: your moral well-being depends not only on mental factors. Sport strengthens the nervous system.
- Walk more, spend time outdoors, try to sit in front of the computer less.
- Do breathing exercises.
- Quit bad habits! Learn to relieve stress without cigarettes, alcohol, etc. Look for healthy ways to relax!
Source
In the modern world, with its accelerated pace of life, the need to constantly solve many problems and regular stressful situations, the question often arises of how to calm yourself. Not everyone has the opportunity or desire to seek help from psychologists, especially since sometimes there is simply no time for this. This article offers effective methods that will help you quickly calm yourself down and stop being nervous even in the most difficult situation.
8 proven ways to calm yourself:
Breathing exercises
Proper breathing can quickly change our state and restore lost calm. This method should not be neglected due to its apparent simplicity, because managing your emotions with the help of inhalations and exhalations is the basis of many spiritual practices. Thus, an important aspect of yoga is pranayama - breathing exercises that calm the mind and promote deep relaxation. Simple practices are available to every person; you just need to know certain nuances of their implementation.
Breathing on a count
A simple technique will help you achieve inner peace: counting your inhalations and exhalations. All exercises should be performed with a straight back, preferably in a sitting position. So, close your eyes, let go of all thoughts and just breathe freely. After this, begin to take a deep breath and exhale for 4 counts. It is important that the process is as smooth as possible; no discomfort should arise during the exercise. There should be no pauses after exhalation and before inhalation; breathing must be natural. You should focus on counting, trying to ignore extraneous thoughts and images. Very soon you will notice that you have been able to calm down and now look at the problem from a different angle.
Affirmation
Do you want to calm down in a stressful situation? Create an image of yourself as peaceful and relaxed. To do this, you can repeat simple affirmations - positive statements that will quickly change your mood. These phrases should not contain the word “not”; their simplicity and conciseness are also important. In this situation, the following positive statements would be ideal: “I am completely calm,” “I am happy and calm,” “I have peace and tranquility in my soul.” After just a few repetitions, you will notice that there is no trace left of the previous nervousness. The most important thing is to believe in what you say, otherwise it will be difficult to achieve the desired mood.
Contact with water
To calm your frayed nerves, you can take a shower, doing it right. Water is capable of taking on negative information and energy, so contact with this element can really help a person quickly calm down. To enhance the effect, you can ask the water to wash away all the negativity from you. In this case, it is recommended to take a shower, and with warm water, since contrast procedures can further excite the nervous system.
Observing unpleasant thoughts
To get rid of obsessive thoughts that cause anxiety, you should not try to fight them violently; it is better to use the technique of calm contemplation. Find a quiet place to practice, close your eyes and simply observe your fears and worries. Do not get involved in the images that will pass before your eyes. It is important not to react to thoughts in any way, you need to allow them to simply be. There is no need for any assessments, because they are the ones that cause one or another attitude towards all phenomena. Very soon there will be pauses filled with silence. It is moments of thoughtlessness that give us the opportunity to experience the fullness of life and become who we really are.
If you manage to be an outside observer of your own thoughts, they will cease to have the same power over you. You will see that everything is not at all as you imagined. It is quite possible that the problem will resolve itself. In any case, your condition will definitely level out.
Walk
A change of activity will help change your condition, so if you are indoors, go outside and take a short walk. Fresh air and brisk walking will quickly clear unnecessary thoughts from your head and help you come to your senses.
Relaxing massage
How to calm yourself down? Do a head massage, because there are many nerve endings there, the impact of which will help change the condition. Approach this process consciously: expect that after the procedure your mood will improve and your nerves will stop acting up. After this, rub your forehead and temples with light massage movements, and also tap your fingers on the head from the forehead to the back of the head.
Pleasant smells
The healing properties of essential oils make them a very effective remedy in the fight against stress. To calm your nerves, add a couple of drops of lavender, tangerine or chamomile oil to the aroma lamp. Pleasant natural scents will help you relax and calm your nerves.
Dance improvisation
If you want to quickly calm down and relieve stress, we recommend doing movement meditation. Expressive dance will remove tension and blocks in the body and help you relax. There are no strict instructions; it is important to let go of your emotions, let them stop bothering you. Release the negativity with simple and intense movements, they can be absolutely anything: shaking, swaying or spinning. Don’t think about beauty, we are faced with another task - to calm ourselves down.
Certain techniques can help you calm down and stop being nervous, but none of them will eliminate the problem that caused the stressful situation. This is why it is important to work through your emotions and change their charge from negative to positive. One of the most negative habits is the constant feeling of guilt. This emotion is extremely destructive, as it leads to various ailments and mental disorders. As a rule, manipulators skillfully play on this feeling, because it is very easy to control a guilty person and get what you want from him. Think about it, perhaps your condition may simply be beneficial to someone, but why do you need it?
