If you have ever been told to “Calm Down” then you’d probably agree this well-meaning advice can be about as useful as a cooking advert in a war-zone.
Michael Winner may be able to sell car insurance but I doubt anyone has felt calmer having heard his nasal voice imploring them to “Calm Down, Dear!” (If you don’t know who Michael Winner is then count yourself lucky. Don’t Google him. Sometimes ignorance can be bliss)
Trying to relax under pressure is not easy and it requires practice and skill. So how can you start and how can you get better at it.
Here are several tips you might want to try. They work and are used all over the world but some of them may be new to you.
Use your Peripheral Vision
Significant research shows a link between Stress and peripheral vision narrowing. (The opposite of peripheral vision is foveal or central vision). However it goes both ways. Stress causes narrowing of vision but consciously widening your vision actually blocks the stress response (it reduces the creation of cortisol and adrenaline). Try it.
Place your hands either side of your head (covering your ears) and slide them forward until you can just see them in the edge of your site. Now look straight ahead and expand your width of vision until you can see both. Hold this for a minute and notice how you feel. Most people will experience a calming of their breathing and reduction in facial tension. With regular practice this is a very effective way of managing stress.
Focus on Relaxed Breathing
When stressed we tend to breathe fast and shallow breaths which reduces our oxygen intake and heightening levels of anxiety. Simply being aware of our breathing and making sure we are taking long deep comfortable breaths will help increase oxygen levels and naturally lift serotonin levels (which help regulate our mood).
Use Guided Visualisation or Self Hypnosis
If you are a parent you will most likely have noticed that one of the most effective ways of calming down a grumpy toddler is to distract them. Hand them a toy. Point something out that they may not have noticed and before they know it they will have forgotten that they were grumpy. Similar techniques are very useful in managing our own stress levels and moods.
Simply by focusing our attention on something peaceful or calm our mind casues our body to releases chemicals that are in keeping with what we are focusing on and our body relaxes.
Sounds too good to be true but humour me, imagine you are sipping a nice cold home made lemonade. Feel the cool edge of the glass against your lips. It’s been mixed well but you can feel the sweetness and texture of some of the undisolved sugar crunching against the sharp tang of the lemon and the refreshing cool of the ice cubes. Did you mouth water just a little bit more? Yes? Hold on did we just salivate over an imaginary drink?
The same goes for any number of situations.
The joy of self hypnosis relaxation is that it works with you to help you focus on relaxed situations, naturally. Unlike people telling you to calm down, however well meaning they may be; self hypnosis relaxation works with you to guide you into relaxation and embed powerful anchors that enable you to revisit that relaxed state effortlessly. Check out Deep Relaxation
So next time someone suggest you “Keep Calm and Carry On” you now have tools to carry out those orders!
Have you used any of these techniques? Let us know how you got on. If you’d like more information then feel free to leave us a comment below and we’ll send you it.
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