Can Your Body Facilitate Stress Relief?

How have you been taught to cope with change, challenge or grief? For many of us, our autopilot response to feelings of stress, overwhelm and anxiety is to go into shut down, self-isolation and avoidance in an effort to cope or heal. While it is healthy to give yourself space, there is a difference between choosing that which nurtures your body and shutting yourself down and off from the world, which usually creates more of a sense of pain and contraction.

What if there was a different possibility? One where you and your body come together to connect, relax and receive?

Developing a greater intimacy with your body is a profound yet simple process, that you can begin right away, and it takes just a few minutes.

Why not try spending 10 minutes each day with the target to just BE, relax and reconnect with you and your body?

Here is an example of how you could do this:

1. Sit or lie down, in a position where you can allow your body to fully relax. It could be in quiet room, or under tree, where you can feel a light breeze on your face. Go somewhere you can create a sense of peace and give your body some attention and ease.
2. Take a few deep breaths, and allow any physical, mental or emotional barriers to begin melting away. You can let them go now -- imagine giving them back to the earth where the earth will dissipate it all with ease.
3. What if today, you could choose 5% more gratitude and connection with your body? A great way of inviting this is to ask: Hello, Universe. Can you please show me what having more gratitude with me and my body is?  And don’t go looking for the answer. As you ask, relax. Drop those barriers further. Be kind to you, be patient with you, and allow the universe to show you, in its own way and timing. If you ask, you shall receive.

Choosing something different creates a movement and sense of momentum forward in your life, which stops you from getting stuck in old patterns of stress and ineffective coping mechanisms. Whatever you choose is okay, there is not right or wrong. And what could you choose with your body that would allow you to receive the gifts of your body and what it desires to contribute to you?

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