Stress relief is now high on my schedule, and it’s about time too. The only comfort is knowing that I’m not the only woman in the world who has discovered that finding time to relax and unwind is becoming increasingly difficult. But I’ve been growing aware of the fact that my health must come first sometimes, and so I have spent a little while exploring various stress relief therapies for women.
I know that my days have been full and busy, but I never really took the time to appreciate the diverse range of methods available to help unwind and let the cares of the day fall like blossom in a gentle breeze. My blossom just seems to have just taken a shortcut straight to the compost heap lately. But there are actually several highly recommended stress relief therapies.
For me the first thing I tried was yoga, since I’d been walking past a poster advertising yoga classes for ages. Like many people I thought yoga was just about tying your legs in knots while trying to stand on your head, but it was actually very straightforward to get started, and as well as offering a way to relax mentally there are many physical health benefits to yoga too.
Having untied myself from the yoga class my next visit into stress relief alternatives was meditation. I thought this would be easy, but I spent most of my time trying to pick between the many ways in which meditation can be undertaken. I chose a meditation CD which I played whilst lying in the dark with my eyes closed. Very relaxing, although I have no recollection of the second half of the disk!
Although not personally undertaken to any very serious degree the next item on my list of stress relief alternatives was physical exercise. My idea of physical exercise is racing to the back of the shop to be first to the sale rail, but I have several friends who assure me that regular physical exercise can be one of the best stress relief therapies available. I’ll have to take their word on that, the pizza’s just arrived.
The next item on my list certainly focussed on the relief half of stress relief. Women’s toys are now so varied and ingenious that they seem to be able to cater for bits of me even I didn’t know existed. I had a browse through an online store, my responses varying from disbelief to confusion to sheer rampant fascination. I spent more time exploring this method of stress relief than physical exercise, although as it did make me a little out of breath, it must have burnt up at least a few calories.
Relaxing music came next (after me!) and I spent some time gathering all of the relaxing music tracks I could find, and downloading them all onto my iPod. As portable as my woman’s toy but rather more decent in public I just slip the headphones on and drift into a catatonic state of vacancy. It’s certainly relaxing, although I find having my eyes shut and the mobile switched off helps.
The final item on my list was almost laughable – ‘find time to get plenty of rest’. Lately I’ve been finding that the stress and pace of the day has stopped me from sleeping properly, which has made me even more irritable the next day. Planning to spend time trying out various stress relief therapies is important, because with a little effort and a little time reserved just for you, sleep comes better. The more you relax, the more you can relax.
