Tips to Calm an Anxious Mind

Stress and anxiety are natural parts of life; they are the signals which our body releases to encourage us to act and keep ourselves safe from harm. They are in fact an essential part of our wellbeing, although in modern life they can feel really uncomfortable especially during times of uncertainty.

But here is the good news, stress and anxiety can be combated if you know how to reduce the symptoms and how to enter the relaxation state. Firstly let’s have a look at why the body feels the way it does when holding stress.

When we are feeling stressed the brain releases cortisol into our system to let us know that its feeling unsafe and that something needs to be done. When this hormone is released we will encounter many physical symptoms including: Increased blood pressure, a rise in anxiety levels, increased heart rate, the immune system may become less effective, sleep may be disturbed, you may notice an increase in irritability, libido is decreased, digestion can become less effective and depression can become more likely.

By activating the relaxation response, it depletes the stress hormone and the physical symptoms related to stress. We can begin to see the body feeling a sense of relaxation and calm, the blood pressure lowers, our heart rate slows down, the immune system, digestion and sleep all improves, libido returns to normal, we have a calmer mind and our brainwave patterns begin to slow right down bringing us a sense of overall calm and wellbeing. As you can see from all of those symptoms it's really useful for our body and brain to feel relaxed.

Here are a few tips can you take away to enter the relaxation state or to use your stress in a more productive way:

1. Relaxation activity

Stress can be debilitating and sometimes a distraction can be a good thing. What activities make you feel a sense of relaxation? Do something which helps you to feel a sense of calm whatever that may be for you for example listening to calming music, walking, stretching, reading a book, meeting friends or taking a bubble bath.

2. Release the judgement

Anxiety is painful enough, but we often get hit with a second round of self-critical thoughts. Ask yourself a question: Do the judgments make you more or less anxious? The answer is almost always, more. When you notice the self-critic, see if you can interrupt with some kindness towards yourself; is there a more helpful way to think about this, can I be kinder to myself?

3. Practice mindful moments

In moments of moderate to intense anxiety, the 3×3 practice can come in handy. Drop into three of your senses and name three things that you notice about them. In other words, name three things you’re seeing, smelling, tasting, feeling, or hearing. This can help interrupt the automatic catastrophic thinking that’s fuelling the anxiety.

4. Channel your anxious energy

Not all anxiety is bad. Like most mental events, anxiety lies on a spectrum. When you’re feeling a lot of anxious energy that could be stress or courage building up. Either way, we need to release that. If your anxiety isn’t severe, you can actually channel that energy into something productive. If you’re nervously waiting to hear some news for example, get active—go for a brisk walk, clean, or garden instead.

5. Write it down

If you’re feeling stressed it can be helpful to write down everything you feel until you exhaust every word that has appeared in your head onto the paper. It’s a way of releasing all the stress and worry and taking a new perspective. You may want to write down what’s helpful and what’s not helpful when looking back over the thoughts.

6. Watch your intake

Start to become more mindful or what you’re absorbing, mind, body and soul. If social media makes you feel stressed put your device in another space away from you, turn off media and technologies that increase stress levels, reduce caffeine and alcohol intake which increases anxiety levels and consume food and water which helps you at this moment in time.

7. Restore balance

It can be helpful to write down a list of things which make you feel stressed and things which help you to feel well and then come back to them to see how you can create some balance and restore a sense of wellbeing when you are in the midst of a stressful situation.

Thanks for reading this article. If you enjoyed it feel free to like and share.

Mind and Bloom

Sources: Mindful; Dr Elisha Goldstein; Mind and Bloom