10 tips for relaxation

As a life coach in Houston, I deal with many clients who have developed chronic stress. Today I am going to explain what chronic stress is, how a life coach in Houston can help you to get rid of it and tips to relax!

! Let’s start with what’s the difference between chronic stress and acute “normal” stress. Acute stress is short term stress, the type of stress that’s caused by a particular situation in your life like having a bad day at work, fighting rush hour traffic in downtown Houston, the sports bet you lost when the Astros didn’t win the world series. Our body is equipped to handle with acute stress easier than it can with chronic stress. Chronic stress has risen since COVID because more and more people are staying inside, and the unemployment line is longer than ever. Chronic stress can lead to depression, anger, loneliness, isolation, anxiety even suicide. As a life coach its one of the major battles that plagues my clients from the stay-at-home Mom to the corporate level executive. So, what can one due to eliminate stress?

How Houstonians Can Eliminate Stress

One of the first things I recommend is to take five minutes each day for yourself, and then practice this simple stress buster strategy.

# 1 Breathing exercise: Find a quiet place if you’re at work simply move your chair away from your desk and close your eyes or if you can take a walk and find a place to just sit down. Then take your right hand and place it on your stomach. Take a deep breath and slowly count 1-2-3 then breath out 1-2-3. If you have ever experienced giving birth or watching your wife, give birth its very close to the breathing technique learned in Lamaze. Feel your stomach rise and fall as you breath in and out. Do this five to ten times or until you feel your body start to relax. Realize how much more relaxed you feel? The reason is that when you focus on deep breathing your brain sends a message to your body to calm down and relax.

# 2 Keep a journal or create one on your phone using notes. I want you to write down 3 things every day you are grateful for. When you realize that there are positive things to be grateful for you tend to feel less stress. When a negative situation arises think of the flip side. I was late to work today but there was a wreck and I wasn’t involved. I lost my job, but I have a chance to find something better. Sometimes you may only be grateful that your spouse or children are alive or that you have a bed to wake up in but practicing an attitude of gratitude is a great way to relive stress.

# 3 Go do something random for someone just because. The other day my daughter was having a melt down about all the things that were wrong in her life incusing the fact that she couldn’t work as she s a server. I gave her $20.00 from my desk drawer and said go find something anything to do for some random, she chose to go and wash and vacuumed my car, her choice but when she got back, I asked her “How do you feel?” what she realized is that when you do something for someone else you get outside of yourself. You focus on them and their issues, it can be as small as a messy car to volunteering in a soup kitchen. Let’s face it folks even in the worst of times there is always someone worse off.

# 4: Exercise: The stress that’s happen internally can also occur physically as are all woven together. When you go to the gym and work out, your body may ache especially at first if you aren’t new to it but how does your mind feel? Usually, it feels a lot better than before you did some type of physical activity. If you work long hours take a yoga mat and shut the door behind, you. Another technique we teach our life coach clients in Houston is to lay on a flat surface and tense up one body part at a time and then release it. As you practice tensing up and releasing from your head down you will notice how your body sensations change.

# 5 Write down your thoughts, may times people keep everything bottled up until it comes spilling out like a volcano that has erupted with hot lava. Simply write down a few thoughts each day about how you’re feeling and how your day is going. This can be done on your phone so that its password protected, or you can write it down on a file safely stored on your computer at work. Don’t worry about spelling and grammar, just wrote let everything spill out that’s on the inside of you.

# 6: As a life coach in Houston one of the questions I ask my clients is “Where is your happy place?” like the place that you can go and just feel safe and at peace. For me I love driving down to Galveston and going to a little spot on the Seawall that very few people know about, I simply sit there and hear the waves crash onto the shore, this puts me at peace. But with the craziness of life many times I just have to close my eyes and visualize it. I can feel the sand between my toes, the ships off in the distance, the way the sun hits my face and shoulders. Suddenly I am at peace.

# 7: Connect to nature: Spending time in nature can help to relieve stress, there are a lot of great nature trails that run through Houston if you want to go exploring but scientist have also discovered that if you will look at nature pictures on your computer this can also relieve stress.

# 8: Get plenty of sleep, most people need betwen7 and 9 hours or they wont handle stress the way they should. If stress is keeping you awake at night then consider adding in meditation or taking melatonin or sipping hot tea before bedtime.

# 9: Having a bonding session with your fur baby. I have learned that even a short time with my husky Mister Smores can cut my anxiety level in half just as clinical studies show. Go give your pooch a big hug or toss a few balls out in the yard.

# 10: Carve out time for fun: Do you enjoy golfing, gardening, reading a good book or drawing. Find something you enjoy, and this will not only help to lower your stress but also your heartrate.

Leave a comment down below and tell us how you relieve stress.

Looking for a Life Coach in Houston that deals with chronic stress?

I am a certified life coach in Houston that offers one on one sessions and can help you learn to eliminate chronic stress from your life and more importantly deal with the underlying cause of stress. Contact me and lets chat!