08/23/2018 / By Michelle Simmons
There will be times, such as when you are stuck in heavy traffic, when stress will take a toll on you, making you feel agitated and anxious. During these times, you need an immediate and effective method to cool off. This simple three-minute breathing exercise can help you calm down and get rid of stress, preventing you from freaking out and making bad decisions.
Sometimes referred to as box-breathing, this breathing technique is used by Navy Seals, first responders, and people who are constantly facing massive amounts of stress. It has a direct, apparent, and positive effect on the functioning of the nervous system. And the best thing about it? No one will even notice that you are doing it.
In this breathing exercise, you simply inhale to the count of four using your diaphragm, then exhale to a slow count of four. It is important that you expand your lungs completely and fill them as much as you can.
Avoid shrugging your shoulders to your ears to avoid doing a “stress breath,” which is a shallow breath normally done when you are agitated or depressed. In addition to the lungs, the stomach should also expand because the diaphragm is moving down into the belly to enable the lungs to expand more completely. As soon as you can do this, you will have to change the ratio, starting with a 4:8 inhale to exhale ratio. Then, you can move to 8:16, 10:20, 22:44, or 30:80, and so on.
Breathing deeply and correctly for a few minutes can do wonders for how the body and brain respond to stress:
Stress can occur anywhere – at work, at home, and even on the road. You may need different stress-relieving techniques for different stressful situations. Try these emergency stress-relieving techniques that can help you stop stress at any moment:
Read more news stories and studies on stress management tips by going to NaturalNewsTips.com.
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Tagged Under: anger management, box-breathing, breathing, breathing exercises, breathing technique, Deep breathing, managing stress, mental, Mind, mind-body medicine, psychiatry, relaxation, stress, stress management, stress management tips, stress reduction, stress reliever