We are living in a fast-paced age where technology, information, and commercials dominate our lives. The effect of the internet and social media, as well as longer work hours, have all contributed to lots of stress with everyone.

This is why people are stressed now more than ever! In all of this commotion, everyone needs to take care of their emotional health and actively work on reducing stress the best they can. If not, stress could lead to various diseases, general unhappiness, and even depression.

Don’t let stress take over your life – try some of these activities to help reduce stress and cope with it on daily basis.

Meditation

Stress and anxiety are caused by constant pressures that we aren’t able to cope with. Simply put, you don’t have enough emotional resources that your mind and body demand. Mediation is one of the most effective practices, where you can set a baseline which will help you control stress and don’t let the situation become uncontrollable.

Meditation helps you learn more about your emotions and control them better. Highly stressful situations are going to happen in life no matter what. Meditation can help you prepare yourself emotionally and learn how to deal with them once something happens.

Music and relaxation

There are many studies that show how music can impact our minds, general mood, and how we feel. Music has become an essential part of our lives and we all listen to music every day, some more and some less. One of the things that music can help with is high-stress levels. Slow and mild music can help us calm down, slow our heart rate, and reduce stress levels.

Similarly to meditation, it can also be used for exploring one’s emotions. This is why there are many meditation methods where music is played in the background. Listening to slow and silent music can help you relax and alleviate stress and help you be more productive.

Guided imagery

Think about it, were there any difficult and stressful moments in your life where you had to stop to take a deep breath? Have you ever had to close your eyes and imagine pictures of places where you feel relaxed? Did you sometimes go over memories of a vacation where you felt at peace?

After just a couple of minutes doing this, you probably felt like you blew off some steam and like you could face the difficult things that awaited you.

If you’ve ever done this in your life, then you already used guided imagery, a technique for managing stress. You just create an image in your head about places, people, or even feelings that make you feel calm and peaceful. By relying on all of your senses to imagine a place, smell the air, or feel the water on your skin, you will be able to put yourself in a relaxed state.

Guided imagery can be used in a couple of different ways to relax. You can try and create pictures of stress going through your body. Take all the distractions, problems, or everyday issues and imagine putting them into a chest. There are studies that show the effectiveness of this technique and many though that it couldn’t possibly work until they tried it out.

Aromatherapy

Even though aromatherapy is not a magical cure for the disease called stress, it still has positive effects that can help relieve stress. One of the biggest reasons why aromatherapy is so great is that it has no side effects. It can be used in a passive way, such as filling your room with a certain scent as you do other tasks around your home.

It can also be combined with other stress reducing techniques such as meditation and guided imagery to improve their effects even further. These products can be purchased in any local grocery store and they are very affordable.

Walks, hiking, running, anything that gets your body going

Physical activity improves overall health and helps our body fight diseases more effectively. Regular exercising can also be beneficial for improving mental health and reducing stress. There are studies that confirm that exercise reduces mental fatigue and improves concentration and overall cognitive function. This can be very beneficial when we run out of mental energy due to stress.

When our brain is stressed, this reflects on our whole body through the nervous system. This is why if your body feels well, it will affect your mind and make you feel better mentally. Exercise has been proven to produce endorphins, a valuable brain chemical that can help reduce pain and improve sleep, reducing stress.

Breathing techniques

Breathing exercises or techniques are very simple and yet very effective for relieving stress. There are many different breathing techniques that can help you deal with stress. Each one of them has its own quirks and can help in many different ways.

They can be useful for handling stressful situations better, help improve important processes that contribute to increased stress levels such as sleep, digestion, and pain. A lot of PTSD patients are even prescribed breathing exercises for regulating their emotions and helping them deal with stress.

Adding guided imagery for better focus

Guided imagery for focus is a form of meditation where you focus all of your attention on one thing. it can be an important task you need to do during the day or a stressful event you need to overcome. Rather than letting your mind drift, you will have to imagine doing the things that await you during the day and obstacles you need to overcome.

Think about doing those exact things that are worrying you and facing your anxieties. This is how you will be able to put yourself in a prepared state of mind. Stressful situations won’t affect you so much and you will be able to go through them more easily.