Written by Lyndall Mitchell
Shark VS Seaweed: Manage Stress & Anxiety
We often use stress to describe emotional, mental and physical effects on our bodies like muscle tension, headaches, insomnia, nervousness, jaw clenching and difficulty breathing.
‘Stress’ is a commonly used term which covers a wide range of daily experiences. We can often cycle a wide variety of these states in our normal week. The culture of the Western workplace, and now many other parts of the world – is predominantly fuelled by stress, sleep deprivation, and burnout.
Managing your stress is vitally important for your health and well-being. Even taking just 5 or 10 minutes per day to relieve stress will improve the quality of your life dramatically. Your confidence will improve from the inside knowing that you have some skills to work with to combat some everyday stressors in life. After understanding what stress does to your body physically you might want to never say or use the word again. Omit this word stress from your vocabulary is a great start. Just don’t even say it.
The stress response is the body’s natural response to a stressful situation. Our stress response was designed to be used when we are in danger as an emergency response.
Imagine yourself sitting in the ocean before you have a chance to take your next breath you are confronted by a 6 metre pointer shark. Your body goes into its fight or flight natural stress response to get you out of danger and safely to shore. However what happens more regularly is we are sitting out in the ocean having a relaxing time and something brushes past our leg…….. In a panic we go straight into our full stress response, then you look down and it is just a piece of seaweed.
How many times in your day do you treat normal every day events like a white pointer shark?
The guy that cuts you off in the traffic, the work meeting that you feel challenged by, the next exam, the next business deal. So often we trigger our stress response for normal everyday events. This wear and tear on our bodies in not only unhealthy it is unsustainable.
Our brains actually have trouble deciphering the difference between a shark and a guy that cuts you off in the traffic, so what we tell our brain to do; it very diligently delivers the responses it knows. If you say this is stress, then you will have the responses be that mild, moderate or extreme. Too often our fight or flight responses are being triggered day in day out which is not how they were designed to be used. Our stress response is designed to be switched on only every so often and then to be switched off as soon as it is no longer needed.
However where is the stressor for your mind? Most of the time it is an imaginary threat and your mind can’t tell what’s real and what’s not, it believes what you tell it
Now, if we’re in a situation where maybe the shark is in front of us in the water, and it has us in its sights, then we’re going to automatically activate the fight or flight response. There are so many reactions that take place in our body once we activate our fight or flight response. Some of these responses are, the thinking part of our brain shuts down, which no problem is if you don’t need to make decisions or be strategic, and however for most of us this is a problem in our work capacity.
This stress response can be triggered inappropriately when we:
- imagine situations to be more threatening than they really are
- worry about events that may not actually happen
- Repeatedly go over events that have already been and gone.
Some research suggests this causes “wear and tear” on our body that over time, increases our risk of illness.
What can we do?
In contrast to the stress response there is another response that we can intentionally activate that helps to keep our stress levels down, this is called the relaxation response.
In the 1970’s, Dr Herbert Benson conducted an extensive amount of research on the effects of how we respond to situations – a stress response vs a relaxation response and how they affect our bodies. He found that a relaxation response can counterbalance the effects of stress. After extensive research we can now see that the relaxation response is the key to increasing motivation, productivity, creativity and improve decision-making ability, as well as lowering our stress hormone levels and blood pressure.
The relaxation response is perhaps one of the most important skills you will use to gain control over your body. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) recognizes the relaxation response as having broad health benefits including the reduction of pain and restoration of sleep.
Our relaxation response needs to be cultivated by intention in comparison to the stress response which is automatic.
The first step to reducing stress is being able to identify the trigger, and recognise what the stress feels like in your body. Reflecting for a moment on what happens to firstly your body and then your mind when you feel the stressed? Do you feel it in your shoulders, your breathing, does your mind feels scattered, is it hard to focus?
The next step is creating some solutions to help you break the stress cycle. We have put together a list of 1 minute sensory stress busting ideas for you. Simply reflect on which of your 5 senses is strongest for you then you can tune into your favourite sure fire sensory solution.
SIGHT – have photos of relaxing places, inspirational landscapes, your next travel destination or people you love close by. We have ours in our diaries so they are always with us. Take a moment to pause and reflect on these.
HEARING – put an audio book, mindfulness app or your favourite music on your phone in advance so you can tune in and tune out.
TASTE – have a snack or a cup of tea/coffee (ideally no coffee after 2pm so it doesn’t impact your sleep). We don’t recommend any alcohol or chocolate here, sorry!
SMELL – take a break to take in some fresh air, essential oils can also be a great tool here. Lavender rose or chamomile is great stress busting relaxants. You could put a few drops on a tissue and carry that with you or use an oil burner in your home/work/study space.
TOUCH – put pressure on the points that feel tense in your shoulders or on the palm of your hand near the base of the thumb as these are go-to points help to release anxiety and tension, if possible take your shoes off walk in grass, keep some hand cream handy and take a moment to reapply (ideally one with essential oils so you can bet the benefit from the oils – take a deep breath while applying)
Another tool for reducing stress is a simple two letter word:
NO
Sometimes the stress we are under is caused by everything we have said yes too and the things we are doing out of guilt than desire. When we make decisions based on what we “think we should do” or “what we think other people want us to do”.
Managing your stress is vital key to living a healthy, confident life.
It lifts a daily burden of guilt, resentment and worry and transcends it into a calm, resilient, relaxed and enjoyable pathway for you to thrive in.
Lyndall Mitchell
Lyndall is an author, wellness entrepreneur, and accredited coach who thrives in seeing her clients benefit from her wellness philosophies. She is also founder of the Aurora Spa and ASPAR product Group, Australia’s pioneering, award-winning urban spa organisation and co-owner of The Essentialists, her partnership with Shannah Kennedy that provide a Masterclass of life and wellness skills to the corporate market.