Quick fix stress busters
.By Christine Morgan, Feb 3, 2011
Filed under: Wellness

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Never underestimate the power of a cuppa and Digestive. Caravan option. Photo: Getty

If January took its toll on your stress level, you’re not alone. One in five women currently claim their levels of anxiety are out of control, which suggests many of us are on the path to adrenal burn-out. And that’s not good news for your health, especially your blood pressure.

But is it any wonder so many British women are feeling frazzled? Take the average day, for instance: you might have to tackle rush hour traffic - twice - as well as do a full day’s work, get the shopping in, pay bills and when you get home there’s the hoovering to do too. And if you’re in a relationship, don’t forget all those worries that accompany having or living with a partner.

The trouble with de-stressing is it can take time - which is something most stressed women don’t have. So we’ve come up with some advice to help you find your inner tranquility including some techniques you can do in less than a minute as well as longer-term strategies…

Have a biscuit No, we don’t mean a whole packet of Chocolate HobNobs, just a little treat that can temporarily make you feel calm (all those little moments add up, after all). Eating your favourite foods may help your brain release endorphins, which give you that wellbeing rush. Just don’t have too many.

Apply pressure Pinching an acupuncture pressure point traditional Chinese medicine practitioners call the hoku spot can help you feel less stressed almost instantly. Give it a try: the spot is in that web of flesh between your index finger and thumb. Just pinch with your other hand for 30 seconds, then switch hands.

Take a sniff There’s nothing like soothing smells to give you an instant burst of bliss. Even if you don’t have time for a massage, a quick blast of an aromatherapy oil will do the trick - at least for enough time for you to feel calmer. Soothing oils include lavender, ylang-ylang, bergamot, jasmine, chamomile, marjoram and rose.

Stretch it out If all that tension has gone to your shoulders - which, if you work hunched over a computer all day, wouldn’t be surprising - a quick yoga stretch will help. Sit or stand up straight, raise one arm above your head and bend your elbow, so your hand reaches down behind your head and neck. With the other arm hanging down naturally, bend the elbow so that the hand is reaching upwards. Then try to get your fingers to touch (or if you’re quite flexible, you could clasp your hands together). Enjoy the stretch through your shoulders, then switch arms.

Have a snooze If you’ve got half an hour to spare, a cat nap of between 15 and 30 minutes is enough to lower your blood pressure, making you feel more relaxed.

Pump up the volume It’s a well-known idea that listening to music can help you chill out. Well, certain kinds of music, that is. But turning the volume up could help drown out the chatter in your head. Just don’t turn it up too loud or you could damage your hearing.

Get moving You may have heard it before, but exercise really does help you de-stress, as it boosts your production of endorphins and lowers your blood pressure (both of which help you feel calmer). Just half an hour’s activity will help.

Go green Not in the obvious way but by painting your main room a calming colour. Therapists who work with colour suggest green soothes the emotions, while turquoise calms tension.

If you try any of the above techniques, let us know if they worked for you. And if you have other tips for quick relaxation techniques, do let us know.

Meditating for just eight weeks changes your brain
.By Christine Morgan, Jan 23, 2011
Filed under: Wellness

Print this page|EmailShare on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on DiggShare on Lifestream 2 CommentsMeditation may change structures in your brain in just eight weeks. Photo: Getty
If you’ve ever tried meditation you’ll know how great you feel afterwards. But practising mindfulness meditation - described as meditation that focuses on awareness of sensations, feelings and your state of mind - for just eight weeks can produce actual changes in your brain, say researchers writing in the journal Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging.

By scanning the brains of 16 volunteers before and after they took part in an eight-week course in mindfulness meditation, the researchers discovered there’s more to the wellbeing feelings you experience after meditating than just being chilled out.

“Although the practice of meditation is associated with a sense of peacefulness and physical relaxation, practitioners have long claimed that meditation also provides cognitive and psychological benefits that persist throughout the day,” says the study’s lead author, Sara Lazar.

“This study demonstrates that changes in brain structure may underlie some of these reported improvements and that people are not just feeling better because they are spending time relaxing.”

After analysing the second set of brain scans the scientists found increased grey-matter density in part of the brain called the hippocampus - which is important for memory and learning - as well as in other brain structures associated with self-awareness and compassion. There was also a decrease in grey-matter density in the amygdala, part of the brain that’s involved in feelings of anxiety and stress.

According to the researchers that means an increase in memory and sense of self, as well as the ability to empathise and deal with stress. And going by this study, it only takes eight weeks to see results.

Have you tried meditation? How does it make you feel?

To avoid stress, avoid housework
.By Christine Morgan, Jan 19, 2011
Filed under: Wellness

Print this page|EmailShare on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on DiggShare on Lifestream 30 CommentsStress is something most people have first-hand experience of, with experts believing more and more women are suffering from too much of it. But instead of yet more news about how common stress is and how it’s stopping millions of us enjoy our lives, here’s the latest advice on how you might be able to deal with it (or even avoid it).

Ladies, it’s time to handover the housework. Photo: Alamy
Scientists from the University of Chicago claim writing down your fears just 10 minutes before a stressful situation - such as giving a presentation at work, taking an exam or going for a job interview - could help you perform better. Writing in the journal Science, the experts claim making a note of your worries could help you overcome your fears and reduce your anxiety.

They came to their conclusion after studying college students who were taking maths tests. Those who had written about how stressed they felt for 10 minutes before the test started produced significantly better results than the others, say the experts.

Even better news - well, depending on how you see it, that is - comes from Pittsburgh-based scientists, whose study is published in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine. Worrying over doing the housework increases your stress levels more than worrying about the office, they claim.

By testing more than 100 working men and women, the researchers discovered the individuals who were responsible for running their homes had significantly higher blood pressure than those whose partners did the housework.

If that’s not an excuse to ease up on the domestic chores - or, better still, get someone else to do them for you - then we don’t know what is.

How do you reduce the stress in your life?

Can meditation end all hangovers? (clue: yes)
.By Maggie Richards, Jan 5, 2011
Filed under: Wellness

Print this page|EmailShare on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on DiggShare on Lifestream 1 CommentsIs it possible to stop alcohol-related morning-after fugginess, nausea, regrets and lethargy? For good? By the power of your mind alone?

Yes. But not in the way you might think.

Let me explain.

Flickr, gromgull
Piss artist to peace maker
Three years ago, within the space of a year, I transformed from a relatively hard-drinking (I’m Welsh; it’s in my genes, isn’t it?) social butterfly to virtually teetotal. Hangovers I’ve had since, I can count on one hand.

What happened? I’d begun meditating more, up to three hours a day. And slowly - without any conscious decision or moral hoity toitiness on my part - I drifted away from excessive drinking. Among many realisations about how I was living my life, I understood how much more fun (on many levels) it was to be sober. To actually be where I was.

Why would I go on hurting myself?
I love my life and friends. I want to be ‘here’ enjoying every moment, not riding on some dangerous rum and coke-fulled rocket that takes me away from myself and my relationships, and might explode in emotional wreckage at any time.

To hurt my body and mind with booze seems absurd. Why would I want to do that? I became clear that I wanted to remember the laughs, chats and shenanigans of a good night out.

The more I meditated, the closer I got to myself, the less I attacked myself and the more peace and happiness grew inside.

Less stress, less drinking
I’m not alone in my experience. Mary Pearson, author of Meditation: THE Stress Solution (£9.99, HotHive), discovered meditation when she was severely stressed out as a teacher in an inner city comprehensive.

The first thing she did when she got home was pour a large glass of wine and carry for most of the evening. A dreadful hangover would usually greet her the next morning, but she couldn’t seem to find a way to stop.

A chance meeting introduced her to meditation. “As it became a part of my daily life, I found I coped better with stress, reduced my reliance on alcohol, and subsequently woke up feeling alive and alert.”

Sound good?

A future of health, peace and wellbeing
“Any lifestyle change involves the first step, which is often the hardest” says Mary. “Having directly experienced alcohol dependency and frequent hangovers as a way to relieve stress, I advise anyone in the same position to consider meditation to gently support a personal transformation and create a future of health, peace and wellbeing.”

So do I. And my advice is to start meditating for the sake of it; not with the goal of cutting down on drinking. Let your meditation be both the means and the end. Do that, and there’s a mighty fine chance that boozing will, in time, gently give up you.

Signs you need to meditate
.By Maggie Richards, Jan 14, 2011
Filed under: Wellness

Print this page|EmailShare on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on DiggShare on Lifestream CommentDo you want a break from yourself? Are you good at being busy but bad at just being? Do all the small things drive you crazy? Sounds like you could do with some mind-calming meditation. Read on for more telltale signs that your monkey mind is the boss of you.

It’s important to make time to relax, Barack. Photo: PA
1. Your New Year’s resolutions aren’t happening (despite your best intentions)
Regular meditation flexes your focus muscles and makes you better at dealing with things one at a time. It may also reveal to you why you’re sabotaging your attempts to make a better life for yourself. With this new knowledge, you can make - and stick to - decisions with more clarity and confidence.

2. You got everything you wanted for Christmas, but the niggling feeling that something’s missing still won’t budge
Regular meditation miraculously chips away at the defense walls you’ve unconsciously built around yourself that keep you separate, cut off from a connection with something bigger than your personality, age, gender, likes and dislikes.

3. You avoid spending time alone
Think of your best friend or partner… Got them? Now imagine what kind of relationship you’d have if you barely spent any time together, never listened to anything they said, and constantly rejected their feelings. Tragic, isn’t it?

This is what you’re doing to yourself every day you don’t spent at least five minutes turning your attention inwards and hanging out with your thoughts and feelings. Meditation is a powerful antidote to a sense of disconnection and emptiness way too many of us suffer from.

4. You think meditation is “not for me, thanks”
How do you know until you try? The way I see it, if you have a mind, it’s going to benefit from a clearing out. It needs a rest.

OK. I want to meditate! Where do I sign up?
Start with a Google search for a class or teacher near you that appeals. Some will have a religious/spiritual background and set practices, others not. Experiment and see which suits you best. Don’t give up just because you didn’t like your first attempt. Can you imagine where your love life would be if you gave up boys after the first bad kisser? Shop around until you find the right fit.

I’m not sold yet, actually…
Read all about it first, then. One of the best mind-mastering books around is professor Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life (£9, Piatkus Books).

The best-selling guide explains how anyone can use mindfulness - the Buddhist art of living each moment fully as it happens - to reduce anxiety, achieve inner peace and find fulfillment. “Excellent when your monkey mind is going crazy” says a reviewer on Amazon.

A short meditation for emotionally stressful Christmas moments
.By Maggie Richards, Dec 22, 2010
Filed under: Wellness

Print this page|EmailShare on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on DiggShare on Lifestream 2 CommentsIf difficult feelings crop up to bite you this Christmas, rather than eating and drinking them ‘away’, try meeting them face to face, so to speak, with this simple healing meditation that you can do at home (when everyone else is watching Doctor Who).

Flickr, ConstructionDealMkting
It so often happens in the winter holiday season that we go ‘home’ to relatives or loved ones loaded not just with presents but all sorts of expectations, hopes and unfulfilled longings from the past. The early darkness and cold weather seem to conspire to bring up our deeper, darker layers of feelings.

Rather than push away the difficult feelings only to have them come back to haunt you another day, try this decide-your-own-length meditation by Aneesha Dhillon who’s been leading body and breath-based therapy groups all over the world for 30 years.

Though anyone can try it, it’s best suited to those with some experience of therapy/working with their emotions.

Preparation and tips
Be alone in a warm, dimly lit room. Light a candle, and put on some suitable ‘soft’ background music that touches your emotions.

Feel and express whatever needs to be released from your body. Move whatever is energetically stuck inside, especially around the heart, throat, and belly - all common places for holding onto unexpressed hurts.

The stress-soothing stages
Let each stage be either five minutes, 10 or 15 - whatever fits you. The key thing is that they’re all equal in length, totaling 20, 40, or 60 minutes.

Stage 1: Standing, shaking the whole body gently.
Let everything be loose and stress leave your system.

Stage 2: Sitting or standing and laughing out loud for no reason.
If tears are there, cry, weep, grieve for no reason; don’t force anything. And keep the body moving, let your feelings change; either laughter or tears.

Stage 3: Sitting, swaying like seaweed in the ocean.
Hug yourself and/or a pillow; softly say out loud whatever your heart needs to say, to whomever.

Stage 4: Lie down on your back, relax, be still.
Simply watch thoughts, feelings and sensations, as if they were all your friends, coming to reveal something to you about yourself.

Did you try this? How was it? Let us know below