Easy & Fast Ways to Relieve Stress

Stress. The one word that can cause sleepless nights, tearing out your hair, and crying your eyes out. It comes out of nowhere and always seems impossible to get rid of. The truth is, everyone experiences stress in varying forms, and is virtually impossible to get rid of, but there are a few semi easy and fast ways to reduce the amount of stress in your daily life.

Exercise

The most important method to consider is exercise. Although it is more of a chore then something most people are want to do after coming home from work, it has been scientifically proven that those who exercise regularly have less stress then those who don’t exercise at all. This is for many reasons including reducing the amount of stress hormones including cortisol and helping release more endorphins. Exercise also improves your sleep quality, which can be disrupted by stress and anxiety. It is recommended to chose exercises that repeatedly use large muscle groups, like walking and running.

Write it Down or Draw it Out

Keeping a journal and writing down what you are stressed about can help you to ignore the negatives and instead indulge yourself in everything that makes you happy. And making a list will help you see there are more positives than negatives in life. Another helpful method is to draw it out. This could be drawing, painting, etc. For those with less artistic abilities coloring is also a great option. It helps to distract your mind from what is bothering you and focus on coloring within the lines.

Reduce Caffeine Intake

Instead of reaching for the cup of joe to stay up and finish that late night project reach for fruits and veggies that give a natural caffeine or a cup of tea. Caffeine is a stimulant found in many popular items including coffee, chocolate, energy drinks, and soda and has also been linked in high amounts to contributing to anxiety. Although caffeine in low doses doesn’t hugely affect you negatively, everyone has different limits on how much is too much. So if you find yourself extremely anxious or jittery after drinking coffee it might be time to find another way to get energy.

Senses

Two of your most important senses are smelling and hearing. Lighting a candle which contain essential oils can be very beneficial to reduce stressfulness. Certain smells so a great job at this including lavender, bergamot, sandalwood, frankincense, Rose, etc. It is also important to play calming music to help you relax. Slow instrumental music can help to reduce blood pressure, heart rate, and stress hormones. Including nature sounds can also be beneficial, which is why they are so often included in meditation music.

Laugh

Most importantly it is essential to find moments where you can laugh. It has been proven in several studies that it is almost impossible to be anxious while laughing. Which may be because of a few reasons including, bringing more oxygen into your body, helps stimulate your stress response, and relieves tension by relaxing your muscles.

Avoid procrastination

And last but not least the biggest catalyst of stress. Procrastination. One way to avoid procrastination is to set priorities. This can be achieved by making a checklist of everything you need to do and their due dates. This eliminates the possibility of you forgetting something till the last second and also provides a sense of accomplishment when you are able to check the task off your list.

There are plenty of other ways to help reduce stress but these are some of the biggest ones. Incorporating these into your everyday life will help you to notice stress not having the same hold over your life.