Evidence-based Ways To De-Stress In Less Than 10 Minutes.

In our previous articles, we’ve discussed simple yet powerful techniques that can help you manage stress across some of the significant ‘big’ areas of life, such as work and relationships.

But often our anxiety and stress can be a simple product of our current mood, irrespective of what’s going on around us.

As shown by Graham Davey in his book, The Anxiety Epidemics [1], negative mood contributes to the generation and preservation of worries; it facilitates threatening interpretation of events and unconsciously directs attention toward threats. Negative mood exaggerates a range of bodily and cognitive states, such as feeling stressed, sad, angry, tired, or experiencing pain itself.

Therefore, simply boosting your current mood may be all you need to feel less stressed or anxious.

Whilst this may sound like a daunting task, especially if you’re feeling low, there are a few scientifically proven ways that can lift your mood in less than 10 minutes.

Photo by Quang Anh Ha Nguyen Pexels

Listen to upbeat music.

Music has been shown to alleviate symptoms of various psychological disorders (such as depression and anxiety), decrease pain, and improve sleep quality.

A number of studies have moreover shown that music has a positive effect on mood in healthy individuals; a study published in Nature Neuroscience showed that listening to music stimulates the brain to release dopamine, a neurotransmitter in the brain linked to reward and motivation. More than that, even an anticipation of listening to music can have a similar effect.

Importantly, the researchers from the University of Missouri demonstrated that listening to music can improve mood, when the music is upbeat and you are intent on changing your mood (as opposed to passively listening to upbeat/positive music).

Dr Jacob Jolij, a cognitive neuroscientist at the University of Groningen, went as far as to develop a scientific formula, identifying the top mood-boosting songs. The list of top ten songs is as follows:

1. Queen, ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’
2. Abba, ‘Dancing Queen’
3. The Beach Boys, ‘Good Vibrations’
4. Billie Joel, ‘Uptown Girl’
5. Survivor, ‘Eye of the Tiger’
6. The Monkees, ‘I’m a Believer’
7. Cyndi Lauper, ‘Girls Just Wanna Have Fun’
8. Jon Bon Jovi, ‘Living on a Prayer’
9. Gloria Gaynor, ‘I Will Survive’
10. Katrina & the Waves, ‘Walking on Sunshine’

Don’t take our word for it and download Dr Jolij’s playlist on Spotify to test the positive effects of the top happiness boosting songs.

Take a walk.

Whilst exercise has been shown to help produce so-called ‘happiness hormones’, endorphins, it turns out that even stepping out of the office or classroom for a short, gentle walk has mood boosting effects.

A study by Gregory Panza, an exercise physiologist at the University of Connecticut, tracked the physical activity of 419 generally healthy middle-aged adults, showing that even a 10-minute walk around the block with no noticeable increase in breathing, heart rate or sweating, was associated with an increased sense of well-being and lowered depression levels.

A walk around the block can moreover help you detach from the environment that could be fuelling negative emotions, engage your thoughts in simple movement, and expose you to daylight, which in and of itself can stimulate production of serotonin which reduces depressive or anxious states.

Again, don’t take our word for it and try to set aside 10 minutes for a lunch-time walk next time you have a chance to do so.

Make yourself laugh.

Making yourself laugh is not only a powerful, intantaneous mood booster, but it’s also been shown to reduce pain and stress, and even increase immunity — turns out that a healthy dose of laughter increases immune cells and infection-fighting antibodies.

Laughing releases the natural opiate dopamine in the nucleus accumbens area of the brain, the reward centre that when stimulated, has the effect of making you feel less stressed and more positive.

Sadly, as we grow older, we tend to laugh less — research shows that while 4-year-olds laugh about 300 times a day, an average 40-year-old laughs only 4 times a day!

Whilst an idea of making yourself laugh may seem odd at first, considering the benefits of regular laughter, we think it’s worth a go.

You may want to bookmark some funny YouTube videos that make you laugh so you could access them when you need to, occassionally swap TV series or movies for some good comedy programmes, or even attend a laughter yoga class.

Alternatively, you may ask a friend to tickle you, as — surprisingly — research shows that tickling yourself doesn’t work.

Sniff yourself calm.

A growing body of research demonstrates that different odours and scents can significantly change our moods. In fact, smell is the strongest of the senses and is best able to influence brain activity. Olfactory bulbs are part of the limbic system and directly connect to the areas of the brain that process emotion and learning.

According to Beverley Hawkins, owner of the Vancouver-based West Coast Institute of Aromatherapy, “A simple inhalation of an aroma can cause many changes in the body,”, including activating the immune system, affecting blood pressure and stimulating digestion.

Hawkins recommends 6 scents with calming or mood boosting effects:

• Lemon; promotes concentration and calmness, and has antiviral and antibacterial properties, boosting the body’s immune system and improving circulation.
• Lavender; has a soothing effect on nerves and can relieve nervous tension and depression as well as treat headaches and migraines.
• Jasmine; calms nerves and is commonly used as an anti-depressant because of its uplifting capabilities that produce a feeling of confidence, optimism and revitalized energy.
• Rosemary; improves memory retention and has stimulating properties that fight physical exhaustion, headaches and mental fatigue. It can also be used topically to relieve muscular aches and pains.
• Cinnamon; has stimulating properties that can help fight mental fatigue and improve concentration and focus.
• Peppermint; invigorates the mind, promotes concentration and stimulates clear thinking.

Importantly, Psychiatrists at the University of Ohio examined psychological and physiological effects of different scents, concluding that that lemon oil reliably enhances positive mood compared to water and lavender regardless of expectancies or previous use of aromatherapy.

To surround yourself with mood boosting scents, you can light a fragnant candle or use a diffuser to create relaxing aromas around the house, or sprinkle your pillow with a few drops of a calming essential oil.

You can also get the benefits of aromatherapy in a shared workspace without offending others - just place a drop or two of an essential oil on a cotton ball and take a whiff when you need an energy boost.

Take a bath.

In many cultures bathing is considered a ritual meant to relax and purify the body; and indeed, lying in a hot bath for 10 minutes improves citculation, aids sleep, and lowers blood pressure in people with treated hypertension.

Now, a word of caution: if you’re experiencing a hypertensive crisis (a quick and severe rise in blood pressure) you should avoid a prolonged exposure to hot water (or sauna, as a matter of fact). However, if you’re a healthy individual, bathing at the end of the day can be a calming way of letting the day go.

Sometimes managing stress does not require complex techniques or behavioural change— often, simply changing our current mood is all that we need to ward off worries and anxiety.

Of course, we’re all different and prone to experience “mood lifts’ in response to different activities.

Cleaning up your flat, cooking a healthy meal, or chatting to a friend can be simple yet powerful ‘mood boosters’; but sometimes, when you’re really low, the last thing you want is to do is house chores, shop for groceries, or reach out to anyone.

The five ways listed above require minimum effort and can be practiced on your own almost anywhere. Maybe with an exception for taking a bath; you may have to wait until the evening to ‘drown your sorrows’.

How to deal with stress is a publication packed with tips and techniques for dealing with stress and anxiety in everyday settings — brought to you by Agnieszka (Aggie) Zbieranska & Leon Taylor.

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[1] Davey, G. (2018). The Anxiety Epidemic: The Causes of our Modern-Day Anxieties.