Get the Stress out of here!
Stress, we all deal with it one way or another. Stress is part of our lives nowadays in our society, a lot of us experience a high pressure to perform and to keep ourselves standing amongst all the things that need to be done.
The are different definitions of stress, it is described as the pressure that life exerts on us and how this pressure makes us feel and act. It is denoted as all the changes that evoke a physical, emotional or psychological tension. Or: Stress is the way how we react when our needs are not met. Anyway, stress is a condition, not an illness. It's a sign that it is useful for you to look at how you respond to the challenges that life presents you with and how they make you feel, think and act.
Physical stress response
Every living being on this planet has a natural physical stress response build into their system, aiming at physical survival when under threat. The ‘problem’ is that our system as human beings is not making the difference between a real life threatening situation and a situation that your ego experiences as threatening for its survival. Meaning that as a human being you might not be in direct physical danger, but when your ego feels threatened, you get the same physical reactions that are supposed to help you save your physical life.
A classical example is that as humans ages ago we needed to be able to run away like lightening when we would encounter a dangerous sable tooth tiger, or defend ourselves with all our might against the attack of another cavemen. In these situations the physical reactions to stress are useful and the chemicals released into your body help you to run faster, fight harder or climb the highest tree to hide yourself. But nowadays stress no longer presents itself in the form of a sable tooth tiger you need to run away from, but an angry boss that demands the job to be done within the coming hour or piles of bills you don't have a clue about how you are going to pay them.
We get the same physical reactions but instead of physically moving to either fight or flight, and in this way getting rid of the stress hormones, we are sitting behind our laptops with sweating hands or lie awake for hours at night trying to figure out the solutions for our problems. If the stress is prolonged and unprocessed we tend to get a build up in our bodies that on the long run will create physical discomfort and eventually dis-ease a.k.a disease. Then our bodies are forcing us to slow down and to look for alternative ways to deal with life. And that is exactly the core of the matter, the challenge that stress confronts us with. We don't have control over what happens in life but we do have control how we respond to life.
Creating space to observe
In order to handle stress we need to closely observe our inner response to a situation that we consider stressful. And we need to cultivate the inner peace and space to first of all being able to observe the reaction and then evolve into changing it and giving it a new direction.
When we first start doing this it does demand a good dose of discipline and a steadfastness decision. It means that besides your loaded agenda you also need to make the time for yourself to reconnect to that inner peace and silence. That’s how your stressed out mind will present it you for sure and it will probably provoke more stress. It is important to recognize this for what it is, a usual stress reaction, exactly the one you want to break free from and thus there is no other option then to start!
The good news is, it doesn't have to take hours! Even if you take 10 minutes everyday to consciously breath, to meditate or to do some yoga exercises, it can already make a huge difference! It will help your body to unload the negative side effects of stress. And when you start to experience how wonderful this feels, the feeling of ‘having to’ meditate/breath/do yoga, that you may have felt when you got started, will transform into a feeling of joy that is connected to that one moment every day that is fully dedicated to yourself, the moment the rest of the world can wait and continues without you anyway (it does, really!).
But, beware! Your mind will pull out all of its tricks to make you believe that it is really complicated, that you really don’t have the time, that you have many things more important to do then sitting on your yoga mat and just breathe. It will pour tons of thoughts and feelings of restlessness over you when you do finally sit down for your practice, but don’t be fooled! This is part of the proces in becoming more conscious. Not meaning that it feels nice or fun, you need to sit through it sometimes, but remember, you will be richly rewarded for it!
Need help on how to destress and how to bring body & mind back into balance?
In our Monthly Medicine Space we offer you a curated selection of Kundalini Yoga practices that flow with the current energies. All tied to a theme that is alive right now, these practices serve as Energy Medicine at this specific moment in the yearly cycle. Move your body, breathe and chant in newly designed Kundalini Yoga sequences that are weaving together ancient practices for modern times.
