We are all stressed, especially in times like these. While some stress is good (yep, it is true), dealing with too much stress is damaging to our health and to our family’s health. The good news is that there are a plethora of ways to lower your body’s stress response and begin managing your own health when you are presented with uncontrollable circumstances.

Mindfulness strategies are one way to begin lowering your stress but they can seem really daunting or downright confusing. The following three strategies are accessible and easy-to-start. The results, with sustained practice, will surprise you!

1. Get back to your senses! When stress takes over, our brain kind of leaves our body and as such, our breath becomes erratic. This disconnection between mind and body only exacerbates our stress response. One way to reconnect the mind and body is to engage with sensory experiences such as noticing the sounds around you, smelling a favorite scent, or appreciating a tactile comfort like a fuzzy blanket. You can name three things you see or two things you hear. By refocusing your attention of very real sensations, you can lower your climbing heart rate, and thereby, stress.

2. Interrogate yourself! No, don’t play “bad cop, good cop” in your head, but definitely notice when you are feeling anxious, stressed, or otherwise scattered. Often, we wake up feeling this way with no clear reason or we begin feeling a sense of heaviness in our chest throughout the day, but don’t realize when it began. Asking yourself questions like “what am I feeling?”, “what happened recently that could make me feel x way?”, and “what name would I like to give this pattern of thought?” is an exercise in mindfulness that provide clarity. Once you identify when/where/why you are feeling a certain way, the root of the problem as it were, you can create an action plan and thus lower your stress.

3. Create! Arts and crafts and other modes of creative expression are fantastic ways to get back into your body, redirect your attention, and fully embrace the present moment. Finding a particular activity that encourages you to get into what I like to call the meditative trance is really magical and can help you lower stress acutely and chronically. It doesn’t matter if you are great or whatever-what matters is allowing yourself to create something new.

The three strategies above are great stress-reducing activities that you can do alone or as a family. If you would like more tips and tricks for keeping the vibe in your home chill, join our completely free Facebook group! We’d love to have you in the fold. You can also hear a little more in this video.

With kindness,

Heather

P.S. get the beautiful pdf here! Put it in your journal or hang it up!