5 Easy Ways To De-stress Yourself
Accumulating your stress is not advisable, especially if you are in your 30s and above. Imagine this, you have been driving your car for the last 2 years without any maintenance, can you guess what will happen to your car? Exactly! It’s the same when you keep accumulating your stress, one day it will blow out of proportion.
“Stress, anxiety and depression are caused when we are living to please others.” — Paulo Coelho
Though most of us are aware of stress and what it can do to us the majority remains ignorant. We rather suppress our stress than finding a solution to regularly de-stress ourselves.
Or do we feel trying to de-stress can cause more stress? For example when someone suggested that I hit the gym or meditate when I am stressed and I tried but it didn’t work for me. It added more stress to me. Every day when it’s time to hit the gym, I find excuses to skip and when I really can’t skip, I find it more stressful when I drag myself to the gym or force myself to meditate.
After some time I became more stressed until I figured out simple ways to de-stress myself daily, that too without having to cause a major impact on my monthly budget. The 5 steps I am about to share did help me, and I hope it will help you too.
Antidote 1: Tech free exercise — ok the suggested exercise is targeted more for your mind and soul rather than your physical body. All of us have to agree that gadgets have become an integral part of our daily life and it’s inevitable in this era. But the real problem is when we allow our devices to control our lives, we become the prisoner of our gadgets. Especially all those constant texting and social media postings that begin to mess with our brains.
Fact: 31% of people are stressed due to daily texting. (Source: Study Finds)
Give your brain a break, make it a practice to go tech-free once a day, you can choose your preferred time and duration but do it at least once a day. For instance, you can choose to keep your phone away while driving (no songs, podcasts, audio e-books, etc). Or during your meals, it can be lunch or dinner. All you have to do is just stay away from your phone, laptop, and tv.
What happens when you do this tech-free exercise daily? You get time for yourself which can be used to rejuvenate yourself and do some self-reflection. Furthermore, you are also giving your brain a break from being ‘intoxicated’ with tons of information which can cause more depression or stress.
Antidote 2: Watch a cartoon — This is not a joke! Remember during our childhood days when we used to laugh at all the silly acts by the characters in the cartoons? As for me, Tom & Jerry is my all-time favorite and they are the best de-stress doctors for me. I am serious about it!
If you are wondering why I specifically mentioned cartoons and not animation, it’s simply because cartoons are simple and straightforward. It doesn’t require you to put in your thinking cap or the additional stress in following the storyline. It’s just so simple yet can be the best therapy for your de-stress session.
And the good thing is you don’t have to spend hours watching it, even a good 10 mins are enough to unwind yourself from your day to day stress.
If you don’t have your favorite cartoon, you can opt to watch your favorite comedy shows or watch a stand-up comedy on YouTube or Netflix. But my vote is always for Tom & Jerry. Try it.
Antidote 3: Draw — No, you don’t have to enroll in an art class, just time travel and bring back the kid in you. Grab a piece of paper, draw anything that comes to your mind. You are not going to exhibit your art in an exhibition, therefore don’t bother about perfection or getting it right. Just draw!
I find drawing is one of the instant and free of charge therapy for your mind and soul. If you really can’t think of anything to draw, go ahead and draw circles or squares or any shapes that come to your mind. Grab a pen and draw your stress away.
If you want to make it more interesting, try being a cross-dominant, meaning if you are right-handed then try using your left hand to draw. Have some fun!
Antidote 4: LOL — I find nowadays we forget to genuinely laugh, we either laugh because the situation demands so or we laugh for the sake of laughing. Or I rather say, I hardly find people with a great sense of humor or those who genuinely laugh their hearts out.
During my school days, we hardly hear students committing suicide due to stress or depression because we laughed more and worried less. But I was shocked by the recent findings that one out of ten students suffer from stress and one in five students suffer from depression.
Fact: 60% of young individuals aged 18–24 relate stress to the pressure to succeed. (Source: Mental Health Foundation)
We all should laugh more because not only helps us to destress but laughter helps to reduce your blood pressure, boost your immune system, breathes better, good for your cardiovascular system. But above all, it’s free! Laugh at every possible opportunity and make others laugh too. It is the best gift you can give to another human.
Antidote 5: Take a drive — ok this can be tricky, if you are living in a metropolitan city then you need to find the right time to go for a drive. Otherwise, you might spend hours caught in traffic, leading to a more stressful situation.
While antidote 1 to 4 can be applied on a daily routine, going for a drive can be a weekly affair. Take a short drive, try the roads that you have never been before. It helps you to unwind yourself as well as you get to explore new routes.
My personal preference is to go for a drive at night when the city is quiet. It’s one the best ‘me time’ moments where I can de-stress myself as well as a moment of self-reflection to express gratitude for all the good things that happened to me in the last 7 days.
You can use the opportunity to revisit those moments which made you happy, sad, stressed, anxious, etc. For me, going for a drive once a week even helps me to get clarity on issues or questions which have been bothering me. It is the best time to de-stress myself.
Though I have shared 5 easiest ways to de-stress yourself, there are many more ways you can de-stress yourself. Choose the best ways that work for you and do it regularly, preferably daily.
If you are still thinking about why you need to take the above advice seriously, then consider the following basic truth:
a. Life is a wonderful gift by God, don’t let humans or situation ‘eat’ you up.
b. It is not how long you lived, what matters is how happy you lived. Live a stress-free life.
“Ten years from now you’ll laugh at whatever’s stressing you out today. So why not laugh now?” — Tony Robbins
So folks, go ahead and give Mr.Stress a hard kick on the butt!!
