WE ALL KNOW what stress is, it’s that driver who cuts us up at the roundabout, it’s the mum who makes a weird comment about our yoga pants at the school gate, it’s the 100th email today that you don’t have time to read. How does it affect you? Do you feel sick in your stomach? Do you punch the computer? Do you hunt out that chocolate bar that you carefully stored out of eyesight?
Stress is a natural response and goes back to when we were cavemen and women. It helped us run away from sabre-toothed tigers. It got energy into our muscles and made our heart beat faster so we could either run or stay and fight, the ‘fight or flight’ response. But after we had fought or fled, we relaxed, we chilled with the rest of the tribe. What do we do now? We open another email, we carry on driving and shouting at people, we inwardly growl at the other mum. We store all the stress up and we don’t have an outlet.
Dr Rangan Chatterjee in his book ‘The Stress Solution’ talks about micro-stressors, like the morning alarm, and how these gradually build during the day. How can yoga help us balance these stressors? How can we learn to help ourselves when it all gets a bit too much? We do have the tools to heal ourselves, we just need to know how to use them. The first is the breath, this oversees our autonomic nervous system, both the ‘fight and flight’ aspect and the ‘rest and digest’ element. By slowing our exhale we begin to make contact with our innate healing system.
We can then introduce gently, flowing movements, such as moving in and out of a yoga pose like Warrior 1. Integrating the breath as we move, lifting the arms with the inhale and lowering them with our exhale. Gently to and fro, to and fro, feeling the movement in our limbs. When we have moved 3 or 4 times, we can maybe then hold the pose, softly, and with kindness to ourselves. Allowing ourselves to feel the air as it enters our lungs and then as it leaves.
Then take a pause and notice the sensations in your body. Take time to notice how your breath feels, how the space between your shoulders feels, how your belly feels. Do you notice any feelings of calm and peacefulness in your body? If not, that is perfectly okay. Your brain takes time to slow down and it may be resisting these sensations, maybe let it be so.
Coming into your mountain pose allow the arms to rise and fall again with your breath, do these 3 or 4 times then begin to lift your heels from your mat as you inhale. Lower your heels as you exhale. Repeat these 3 or 4 more times then hold with your arms in the air, gently reaching for the sky. Hold this pose for 2 or 3 breaths and on your exhale lower your arms. Gently pause a second time and notice how your body feels, notice the sensations once again in your heart space, how are you breathing? How does the space between your shoulders feel now? How does your belly feel now?
Very gently, bring your attention to your breath, as you breathe in say to yourself “I” and as you breathe out say to yourself “am”. Repeat this maybe up to 10 times, whatever is comfortable for you at the moment. Then, for the last time in this sequence, take a pause. Notice the sensations in your body, in your heart space, your breath.
By integrating your breath with your movement, you tone your vagal nerve, the parasympathetic side of your autonomic nervous system. This shifts your body into ‘rest & digest’, your own intrinsic, super-intelligent healing system. It brings physiological balance to the body and the brain; it calms the nervous system. This simple practice can be done standing or sitting. When you slow down your body, and your breathing, you become that caveman or woman who is relaxing after a tricky incident with a sabre-toothed tiger.
We need this opportunity to really relax, to really slow down, during pockets of time throughout the day. These bring us into a natural balance between our fight and flight daily incidents and our rest and digest inbuilt wisdom. This balance helps us to be more focused, to make better decisions, to be less reactive and to be kinder, both to others as well as ourselves.
So, take a pause in your day, maybe once or twice or even more, to give your caveman or woman a chance to say ‘boo’ to the tiger.
Debbie Wilkins
Debbie Wilkins is an accredited yoga teacher with Yoga Alliance Professionals. She lives in the Chiltern Hills in Bedfordshire and runs yoga-themed workshops for women cyclists. Debbie teaches yoga online and runs outdoor classes in local parks in the summer, and has taken additional training in Subtle® Yoga which aids nervous system resilience. Find out more at www.circle-yoga.co.uk/
