Stress Management - Breathing To Balance The Brain
Posted on April 18, 2008 - Filed Under Self Improvement
Do you feel brain overload by mid-morning at your job? Mental stress can easily be triggered by the intensity, concentration and unremitting focus of much professional work. Solving complex problems, negotiating solutions, inventing new products and methods of delivery contribute to stress hour by hour.
Especially if most of your work is mental, you spend a lot of your time “in your head.” You use logic, analysis and reasoning. You use words and mathematics. Add all that mental effort to a sedentary day, plus the conflicts, emotional hassles and stresses of normal work and family life, and you may well find your brain gets fuzzy, foggy and frazzled. You might experience stress tension headaches, or just a sense of pressure in your head.
It’s common knowledge that you need to balance all that mental work with regular time exercising, doing physical chores, listening to or playing music, doing art, or other positive, non-cerebral activities.
But many of us can’t or won’t make time for those balancing activities. Often, you simply need a mini-break in the middle of your stressful mental efforts.
On the other hand, at times, your stressors are emotional. You get overwhelmed or too emotionally charged and need to calm down quickly. Maybe the kids are getting on your nerves, or too many people are saying, “I need it now,” at work.
Stress relief can be only a few breaths away.
Division of Labor in the Brain
One more point before I share how to do this technique. You’ve probably heard about the differing functions of the right and left sides of the brain. Researchers have noted that the left hemisphere is largely verbal, mathematical, analytic and good at recognizing your own self. The right hemisphere is mainly non-verbal, has spatial understanding, is holistic, understands emotions, and recognizes others.
Although some may be more analytical and some more emotional, we all normally use both hemispheres of the brain. It is helpful to have both sides of the brain operating in relative balance. Then we have easy access to both analytical and intuitive, creative or emotional knowledge.
Step by Step to Stress Relief
If you’re feeling stressed mentally or emotionally, the following simple technique can help you create stress relief and find balance again rather quickly.
1. Focus your attention in the center of your head and breathe into that space. You simply place your attention in the middle of your head, and as you breathe, imagine the breath is flowing into that space.
2. Notice what you experience. As you breathe and pay attention, notice what sensations are present. You may see, feel, hear or just know you are paying attention to that area. However you experience this is fine.
You may be aware of a gentle pulsing sensation in one or both sides of your brain, at the same or slightly different rates. You might notice a sense of warmth or a mild pressure. Breathing gently into your whole brain, allow the two sides to be in harmony and synchronization.
You don’t want to try to force this harmony, but you can gently invite or encourage it. Simply keep breathing into your whole brain area and allow the harmony to emerge. Allow anything that seemed a little off to become synchronized. It might help to picture or talk to your self about golden bridges linking the two halves of the brain, harmonizing and creating balance and naturally allowing stress relief to manifest itself.
3. If you are feeling emotionally stressed, it can be helpful to place your hand across your forehead, sideways, fingers parallel with your eyebrows. The palm of your hand should cover the two slight protrusions of your forehead above your eyebrows. Breathe into your forehead for a minute or two, or until both sides of your forehead feel in balance.
4. Enjoy the peace and balance of this moment. Come back to awareness of your environment, and open your eyes feeling refreshed and alert.
5. Repeat as desired. This simple process can bring an immediate sense of restored balance and refreshment, providing very fast stress relief. With practice, you can do this quickly and easily even in the midst of difficult situations.
For more stress reduction tips, sign up for my free newsletter, 17 Simple Stress Solutions, at http://www.powerofpersonalpeace.com/optin.htm Check out my articles on success, less stress, and my Ask Dr. Ilenya advice column at my blog, http://lovingyoursuccess.blogspot.com
Dr. Ilenya Marrin is a personal peace coach, spiritual counselor, inspirational speaker and author of ebooks The Power of Personal Peace: Reducing Stress by Loving Yourself from the Inside Out and 77 Loving Steps for Success.
Tags: balance brain, breathing technique, emotional stress tips, mental, peace, Stress management, stress relief
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