Stress Management Techniques

Stress isn't fun and it isn't good for you. I don't know about you, but it took me way too long to learn how to manage my stress effectively. With that said, I guess it's better late than never. So let's take a look at some stress management techniques.

Example of How NOT to Handle Stress

Let's start by briefly reminding ourselves of what negative practices there are, so we can avoid them.

• Smoking
• Excessive Drinking
• Drug Abuse
• Emotional Eating

It turns out smoking actually stresses you out more...

Effective ways to reduce stress

Now that we know what doesn't work, let's take a look at what does work.

• Mindfulness Meditation
• Breathing Meditation
• Guided Imagery
• Journaling

Mindfulness Meditation

Mindfulness meditation is something that I personally practice often. The goal of mindfulness meditation is to keep your mind stable and calm. This is done by focusing both your inner world and outer world. Your 'inner-world' is your thoughts, feelings and sensations, while your outer world is more of a constantly changing phenomena. Achieving mindfulness meditation is to live in the present moment, not the future or the past. More importantly, to live without striving or judging. Calmness or harmony is a natural aspect of the mind. With practice, you will be able to remain peacefully in your mind without struggling. Your mind will naturally feel content.

How to prepare for mindfulness meditation:

• Create a favourable environment: Choose a space that feels uplifting and sacred. Not too noisy or disturbing.
• Posture: Sit upright, everything level and stacked.
• Gaze: Look downward, a couple inches in front of your nose.
• Breath: Should be natural, not forced. Use it as your "object of focus."
• Thoughts: Think unbiased thoughts, without judgement.

Guided Imagery

Guided imagery, also called guided meditation, is a traditional mind-body technique... it is also considered a form of hypnosis. Visualization and guided imagery use images held in the mind's eye. These therapies use the connection between the visual brain and the person's involuntary nervous system.

Tips before engaging in guided imagery:

• Choose a time and place where you are least likely to be interrupted.
• Do not drive while listening to guided imagery.
• Let any thoughts or emotions that arise during imagery pass through you without engaging or analyzing them.
• If you fall asleep frequently while practicing guided imagery, you may want to choose another time of day.

• Select a comfortable location and room temperature.
• Turn off your phone and other distractions.
• It is normal for people practicing relaxation to tear up, get a runny nose, yawn, or experience minor muscle twitching.
• Try to avoid self-evaluation and any worry about "getting it right".
• If you feel better afterwards, you did it!

Breathing Meditation

With its focus on full, cleansing breaths, breathing meditation is a simple, yet powerful relaxation technique. It’s easy to learn, can be practiced almost anywhere, and provides a quick way to get your stress levels in check. It works in two main ways. The first is that focusing on your breathing gives you something new to focus on. The second is that it helps you get more oxygen, which also helps you feel less tense, short of breath, and less anxious.

Tips for practicing breathing meditation:

• Sit comfortably with your back straight.
• Hand placement. Put one hand on your chest, and the other on your stomach.
• Breathe in through your nose. The hand on your stomach should rise. The hand on your chest should move very little.
• Exhale through your mouth. Push out as much air as you can while contracting your abdominal muscles. The hand on your stomach should move in as you exhale, but your other hand should move very little.
• Continue to breathe. Breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth. Try to inhale enough so that your lower abdomen rises and falls.
• Count slowly as you exhale.

Pro Tip:

If you find it difficult breathing from your abdomen while sitting up, try lying on the floor.

Journaling

Journaling is a personal favourite of mine. It turns out that writing down your thoughts and feelings is an excellent way to process events going on in your life. Your journal can be a note pad, sketch pad, word document, phone memo, voice recorder, and pretty much anything else you want it to be. Even some scrap paper and a pencil will do. The point is to get your thoughts out, so that you can process them, and maybe even figure out what exactly is causing you stress.

Tips to get you started with Journaling

• Subject. Focus on current stressors. Writing about stress helps you step back, and hopefully see how things affect you more clearly.
• Technique. Journal entries should include what happened and your feelings towards it.
• Content. Don't hold back! If you want, you can just write straight for about 10 minutes with no censoring. This can help if you feel a need to just get it all out.
• Tone. Don't worry about your tone. Just let it all hang out. You don't even need to stress over the spelling and grammar. This is your personal journal. Let it flow.
• When. Write whenever you want or feel you need to. You can even write down what you ate that day.
• How much? Try it for ten minutes a day everyday.
• Should you share? It is wise to keep your journal to yourself. Journals are about self-care... not conflict resolution.

Popular Ways to Reduce Stress

• Drinking herbal tea

• Pets

• Bubble baths
• Nature walks
• Exercising
• Talking to loved ones
• Practicing yoga
• Playing an instrument
• Listening to music
• Reading a good book
• Working on crafts

It is up to you find what stress reduction strategy works best for you. If you don't know what that is, why not try them all to see which one you like the best? My personal favourites are journaling and working on crafts... but that's just me.

Hello. Nice to meet you! How are you? Hmm... this feels like a really one-sided conversation... why don't you follow me on social media so I can get to know you too!

About the Author

I started blogging about two years ago, and my collection of blogs and articles is getting pretty impressive. I’ve taken online classes for writing, and even some classes about the art of blogging itself. It would be really awesome if you join the adventure and maybe even help me think of what to write about next. If you would like to submit some feedback or ideas, you can always tweet me on Twitter.

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