Cultivating Relaxation in a Stressful Time

March 26th, 2020

In the midst of this global pandemic, it’s easy to feel lost and overwhelmed. From our social media feeds, to the news, to our coworkers, everyone has an opinion and it’s hard to know what to think or feel.

Hand washing, taking vitamins, and eating healthy foods are great ways to boost the physical immune system, but these practices do not address the mental strain that each of us are experiencing. No matter what our situation is during this coronavirus pandemic, we’re all feeling the mental effects of living in an unstable time.

Let’s talk about stress for a moment. When we are operating out of fear we’re tapped into our sympathetic nervous system—our fight or flight response. This is a function in all humans and animals with limbic systems. It’s meant to occur for short periods of time while we run from or fight danger. Once we are away from that danger, we are supposed to go back to our natural state of being, our parasympathetic nervous system, or our rest and digest mode.

Physiologically, when we are stressed and in fight or flight, all non-essential systems shut down and work at a bare minimum. Our immune, reproductive, and digestive systems do not need to be on when we’re running from danger. The brain cannot differentiate between physical and mental stress. Whether you’re running away from an attacker or if you are reading an anxiety-provoking post on social media, the body’s response is to activate fight or flight mode. The body zeros in on the danger and essentially all other systems shut down.

When our fight or flight response is activated, we get surges of various hormones like adrenaline and cortisol to help us deal with the imminent threat to our survival. These hormones are effective in the moment, but if they are sustained in the body for long periods of time it can lead to many adverse effects such as high blood pressure, insomnia, weight gain, brain fog, and an overall weakened immune system.

When we allow ourselves to remain in the sympathetic nervous system for hours, days, and sometimes even months on end, it can wreak havoc on most of our bodies’ systems functionally optimally. If we don’t come out of fight or flight, our immune system cannot rejuvenate. If we never go back to our parasympathetic state, we don’t heal.

If we are isolating, drinking copious amounts of water, and chugging elderberry syrup but our mental state is putting our bodies into fight or flight we are still leaving ourselves extremely susceptible to immune dysfunction. In times like these, it’s integral to return to the parasympathetic nervous system and let the body naturally thrive the way it’s designed to. 

Here are a few ways to activate the parasympathetic nervous system and get back to a baseline mode of calm:

1.     Deep breathing. Long, full breaths automatically stimulate the relaxation response in the body. When you’re running from danger, you cannot possibly take deep breaths. By taking them, the mind senses safety and naturally shifts back into calm mode.

Try breathing in for four counts and out for four counts, matching the length of the inhale and exhale. Repeat for as long as you need to feel yourself relax.

2.     Meditation. Studies on meditation have shown decreased gray matter in the amygdala, the part of the brain that contributes to emotional processing, which lowers stress, fear, and blood pressure. Not to mention the focused attention and mental clarity that helps you observe your emotions and enables you to be in charge of your actions.

Try sitting or lying down comfortably and closing your eyes. Scan through the body and pay attention to the vibrations and tingling. Consciously relax the areas that are feeling tense, especially the chest and belly. Once the body is more relaxed, focus on your breath where you feel it the most. If you feel your mind wandering, don’t worry, that’s natural, just come back to the breath when you remember. Do this for five or more minutes.

3.     Calming music. The power of sound has been an essential part of human healing from the beginning of time. Studies have shown that certain types of music waves sync up with our brain waves and can create the vibrations that get us back to our sense of calm. Whether you listen to specific music to calibrate your brain wave frequency or simply put on music that makes you happy– these sound vibrations have the power to relax you tremendously. Added bonus— if you chant or sing along, the vibrations work even more powerfully.

Try listening to binaural beats at low frequency waves. Binaural beats, are a specific type of sound that address both ears differently, allowing the brain to produce a unique frequency that corresponds with the parasympathetic state. Tracks are often paired with nature sounds like waves which naturally calm the nervous system. Binaural beats can be found by a search on Spotify or wherever you find your music (look for tracks that are labeled “theta” for optimal relaxation).

4.     Sleep. It is truly the most underrated built-in immunity booster that we possess. A full eight hours of sleep allows all the cells in the body to rejuvenate and the mind to process and recover from the emotional strains of the day. Particularly when we are in prolonged states of fight or flight during our waking hours, uninterrupted sleep lets the body fully recover in parasympathetic mode. In fact, getting less than eight hours can drop our natural killer cells by up to 70% and increase the chances of you having a heart attack or stroke in your lifetime by 200%*. One more episode on Netflix is not worth lowering your immunity. Get your full night of sleep every day, and especially these days— it’s vital.

*Based on Matthew Walker’s sleep research 

Try not looking at your phone for at least one hour before going to bed. It drastically improves how deeply you will sleep, which corresponds to optimal healing and recovery.

Ultimately, we need to rest in order to heal our bodies. The more we can be in our parasympathetic state, the more our naturally incredible bodies can have fully functioning immune systems that are ready for anything. Wishing everyone love and deep healing!