The Old Wives Were Right: Tea Is Good For Stress

Remember in those old movies where the hero or heroine would undergo a trauma or suffer a terrible shock and some motherly type would step in with the classic line: “How about I go put the kettle on?” The next scene would demonstrate the apparent miraculous qualities of tea to perk up our hero or heroine (it was usually a woman) and step back into the fray again. But this merely echoed what was going on in everyday homes in everyday neighborhoods. No matter whether a house caught fire, a child was sick, or an aging parent died, the catch-cry … Continue reading →

Using Food to Change Mood

Prefer a natural alternative to changing your state of mind? While major chronic mood disorders require counseling and intermittent drug treatment, often we can make small but significant changes to our diet and lifestyle to assist us to get out of a bad frame of mind. Try these simple tips next time you have a case of the “blahs”. 1. Feeling Irritable? Maintaining steady blood sugar levels will help stave off sugar swings that can lead to irritability. Eating 5 to 6 small meals throughout the day and never missing breakfast can make for a much more stable mood. Supplementing … Continue reading →

Are You Running the Show or is the Show Running You? (2)

In Are You Running the Show or is the Show Running You? we looked how having an external locus of control, i.e. feeling that you are at the mercy of people and events, can make for increased anxiety and depression levels. Having an internal locus of control, which simply means that we feel that we have some control and choices over how we live our lives, results in lower stress levels and a sense of happiness and purpose. Tips to increase your sense of personal control: 1. Become aware that in every situation, no matter how dire, you do have … Continue reading →

Are You Running the Show or is the Show Running You? (1)

There are all sorts of formal definitions for what stress is, but one of the basic criteria that characterize stress is: do you feel in control of your life, or do you want the world to just stop while you catch your breath? When we feel a sense of control in our lives, we experience much less stress. It is when we feel that events are spiraling out of our control that those familiar symptoms start creeping into our lives. Stress headaches, indigestion, palpitations, a sense of dread, endless worrying, an inability to sleep well, loss of appetite and plain … Continue reading →

Music Therapy

Music as a form of therapy is a powerful aid to stress release and is useful for a number of conditions including anxiety disorders, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, even autistic spectrum disorders. The value of music therapy was first documented after WWII when doctors serving at medical outposts noticed that shell-shocked soldiers recovered more quickly and to a greater degree when exposed to the calming sounds of music. Researchers have also used music to help the developmental progress of autistic children, but the field of music therapy has expanded from its initial narrow application to include many forms of mental … Continue reading →

Are You Lonesome Tonight?

The relationship between loneliness and mental health is a well established one. In fact, the relationship between loneliness and health issues of many persuasions has been well documented by numerous researchers. We humans are a species that prefers to congregate in groups because it’s good for our mental health. This was very apparent in the case of one of my clients, Sally. Sally had successfully beaten a long-standing case of depression and had gone back to college, changed her career and embarked on a new job. The latter necessitated a move to another neighborhood and it was just months after … Continue reading →

Sing Your Way to Calm

Anyone who has suffered from debilitating anxiety will know that correct breathing is one of the principal weapons against anxiety and panic attacks. There are countless references to the importance of breathing correctly in many schools of relaxation therapy, including yoga. While all of these methods are excellent and should be pursued, it can take a considerable length of time to make correct breathing your everyday style. Patterns of quick, shallow breathing which promote anxiety due to the changing oxygen/carbon dioxide ratio in the blood, are often firmly entrenched. It can take a lot of conscious effort to make correct, … Continue reading →

Stress and Digestion

Stress affects most organs of the body and the stomach is no exception. Stress can cause those familiar knots in the stomach, some types of ulcers, constipation, diarrhea, poor absorption of nutrients leading to further ill health, and oversecretion of stomach acids. If all this sounds like a pain in the gut, it is! Of course, not all these conditions are caused by stress alone, but a person who is subjected to chronic stressors in their life will almost always suffer some form of digestional difficulty. It may be a sore stomach, frequent burping, heartburn or gastric reflux, or bouts … Continue reading →

Five-finger relaxation technique

Interested in a fast, yet effective way to relax? Like all methods of relaxation, this exercise is simple. But, of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean that it will, by definition, be easy for you to relax immediately. Any skill, including learning to relax, takes time and input, but the more you put into it, the more you get out of it. So what are you waiting for? 1. Close your eyes 2. Place your thumb on your index finger As you do this, go back in your mind to a time when your body felt pleasantly exhausted. A time when … Continue reading →

Is noise driving you mad?

Have you ever noticed that when a person gets momentarily lost while driving in the car, the first thing they do is to turn off the radio or CD player? Suddenly even music that is perfectly acceptable becomes a source of overload and the need to concentrate on the problem at hand is best served by shutting off the music. In fact, in this case, the music becomes “noise” and we want to get rid of it. Never underestimate the power of noise to overstimulate the nervous system and increase arousal and anxiety levels. The human body is very attuned … Continue reading →