How to quickly reduce stress

Stress impacts our everyday life.

We may experience stress when facing challenges or threats. It may come from any activities or situations in our life. For example, meeting deadlines, working in a toxic workplace, experiencing a challenging relationship, preparing for an interview, during a job interview, facing uncertainty or financial crisis, etc.

When stress happens, we have a partly physical or emotional response. The body activates resources that help us either stay and confront the challenge or get to safety as fast as possible. There are numerous techniques for managing stress. Yoga, mindfulness meditation, and exercise are just a few examples of stress-relieving activities that many people practice to relieve stress.

However, in the heat of the moment when you feel stress, for example, during a disagreement with your spouse or a family member or during a high-pressured job interview, you can not just excuse yourself to meditate or take a long walk. In these situations, you need something more instant and accessible.

One of the most reliable and effective ways to eliminate stress is to engage one or more of your senses - sight, sound, taste, smell, touch - or through movement. Since everyone is different, you will need to experiment to discover which techniques work best for you.

There are 3 ways I found them easy to effectively de-stress. By practicing them constantly, you will be able to stay calm, productive, and focused.

1. Close your eyes, mind-scan your body

Take a few seconds to scan your body. Put your hands on your thighs. Sit in a comfortable position. Pay attention to your body, mind-scan your body slowly from the forehead, nose, mouth, neck, shoulders, chest, belly, thighs, legs to toes. Move your toes like playing the piano. Do this 3 times. By taking your mind and thoughts away from meeting that deadline or worrying about uncertainty, you will immediately feel a sense of calmness.

2. Take deep breaths

Taking a full, deep breath will help you relax. Inhale and fill your belly with the breath, and then slowly let it out. Feel your chest and your abdomen release each time and see if you can breathe more deeply with each breath. Do this ten times.

3. Relax your muscles

In this exercise, you will focus on relaxing your muscles and stimulating blood circulation by lightly hitting both sides of the thighs. You can do this when sitting or standing up. Make fists, hit lightly both sides of your thighs 36 times. Then make fists again and hit both arms 36 times and then legs 36 times.

Try these tips, and feel free to share with me if they work for you to help you relax, refocus and refresh!

Julie Hsu M.Ed, ACC, CPC, ELI-MP (ICF Accredited Coach)

Certified Professional Life Coach | Energy Leadership Coach | Career Transition Coach | Trainer & Facilitator