How to Do Progressive Muscle Relaxation (PMR)

Step 1. Find the right place

Start by finding a place that is quiet and relaxing—a place where you can sit in silence for at least five minutes. Be sure to sit or lie down in a position that is comfortable. If you are worried about falling asleep, you may want to try this sitting up at first.

Step 2. Begin with deep breathing

Begin by taking deep, long breaths; make it a point to breathe more from your abdomen and not your chest. Notice how your body feels first as it fills up with air, and then as the air leaves the body. Imagine all of the tension being released from your body as you breathe out, and the relaxation flowing in, as you inhale.

Step 3. Scan and relax your upper body

Turn your attention to your forehead. Tense the muscles in your forehead as hard as you can for five seconds, and as you breathe out let the muscles relax. Continue this with all of the muscles in your face: your eye lids, your jaw, and your ears.

As your head begins feeling relaxed, move your attention downwards, turning next to your neck, shoulders and arms. Shrug your shoulders and then relax. Squeeze the muscles in your chest, your arms, your hands… and then relax.

Now that your upper body is fully relaxed, take a few moments to breathe deeply, and scan through your upper body. Notice what it feels like when those muscles are relaxed, and what it feels like to be in this moment. Make a note of this so you can remember it later.

4. Scan and relax your lower body

Next, allow the relaxation to continue flowing through your body by tensing the muscles in your abdomen. Again, holding tight for five seconds, and then letting go. Follow this by tightening your butt muscles, and then your thighs. Let this relaxation continue to flow down into the feet as you pull your feet backwards tensing your calves, and curl your toes to tighten your feet.

At this point, scan one last time through your body to see if any parts have again become tense, paying special attention to common problem areas such as the shoulders, jaw, and stomach. If they have become tense, just tighten and release the muscles to relax them.

5. Continue to breathe deeply after finishing body scan

Lastly, take a few moments to notice what it is like when your entire body feels relaxed. Continue to deeply breathe in and out, and allow the feeling of relaxation to wash over you entirely.

“It’s a good idea always to do something relaxing prior to making an important decision in your life.”
—Paula Coelho

Tips for Practicing Progressive Muscle Relaxation at Home

Be sure to practice this exercise at least once a day. Remember, it may be difficult to relax at first, but like most things, the more you practice, the easier it gets. Avoid practising it directly before or after a meal. The hunger or feelings of fullness distract you from focusing on your muscles.

If you find that you have a hard time staying focused on PMR on your own, see if someone can read aloud a relaxation script to you, or even record yourself saying one slowly to play back later. Additionally, there are many free smart phone applications and guided PMR audios available online. Simply search “progressive muscle relaxation audio” or “progressive muscle relaxation script” online.

After you feel you have gained a good grip on the exercise, try using it just before or after situations you would normally find stressful. For example, the next time you have a presentation, exam, job interview, or uncomfortable social situation, try using this exercise beforehand.

It only takes five minutes a day to start working towards that level of ‘Zen’ you may be looking for.

Health Benefits of Doing Progressive Muscle Relaxation

While relaxation is a good reason to turn towards progressive muscle relaxation, it also has various other health benefits. Let’s look at some of them.

• PMR helps lowers the heart rate, blood pressure, and promotes healthy sleep. All of these things together lower momentary stress levels and long-term stress levels when practiced regularly.
• It is often used as a treatment for people who suffer from general and social anxiety, panic attacks, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. People who suffer from anxiety disorders are often unaware of how tense they are during the day because, for them, feeling stressed begins to feel normal. They clench their jaw, tighten their shoulders and back, tense their stomach muscles, and keep a tight fist for most of the day.
• When someone holds their muscles in tense positions for long periods of time, it results in back pain, headaches and/or migraines, bruxism [grinding of teeth], and stomach aches. This continued tenseness keeps the body’s anxiety levels high and makes it more difficult for the body to return to a state of relaxation. The good news is that you can use relaxation techniques such as PMR to put a stop to this vicious cycle of anxiety.
• After practising PMR daily for about a month, you should find that your muscles are more likely to turn to relaxation instead of tightness as their neutral position.
• Practicing Progressive Muscle Relaxation daily helps the muscles to learn to relax, and eventually lowers the body’s baseline stress level, so you should see a visible difference in your daily stress levels.

Music to accompany PMR

• Nada Himalaya by Deuter
• Shakuhachi Meditation Music by Stan Richardson
• Indigo Dreams by Lori Lite
• The Most Relaxing Classical Music Ever by Hal Leonard Corp

Here is a video of a guided PMR that will help you in the beginning.

The post Progressive Muscle Relaxation: Technique, Tips and Health Benefits appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.

• Introduction: Everyone Hesitates
• 4 Easy Steps to Help You Overcome Hesitation
  • Understand why you hesitate
  • Challenge your fears
  • Learn to relax
  • Set goals
• The takeaway

Introduction: Everyone Hesitates

Everyone has experienced hesitation at some point in their lives. Worrying about the outcome of this and that, being paralyzed over the fear that the decision they are about to make may not be the right one.

We hesitate. We think. We analyze. We freeze. Hesitation can be good at times, as it allows us to take a moment to think about what we are doing and process it; however, often it lingers on for too long and leaves us stuck in our path. When that happens, you need to figure out how to overcome it.

Hesitation can be the consequence of over-analyzing a situation, the product of fear, or the outcome of low self-esteem. Regardless of the reason, there are ways to stop hesitating, and move forward with your life. Let’s look at four easy steps that can help you to overcome hesitation.

How to Overcome Hesitation in 4 Easy Steps

1. Understand why you hesitate

There is no way anyone can stop hesitating without first understanding it. One of the best ways to process your uncertainty and overcome hesitation is to write about it. Ask yourself the following questions:

• What specifically is going through my mind right now?
• Is there something that is disturbing me, or a fear I am experiencing?
• These thoughts, images, or memories that come to mind, what do they mean?
• What do they say about me?
• What is the worst thing that could happen in this situation?

Very often, the underlying element of hesitation is fear of the outcome. Exploring what outcome it is that you fear can help you identify what is holding you back.

2. Challenge your fears

Hesitation often leads to anxiety, which is quite simply a fear of the unknown. By challenging your fears and their associated thoughts, you can begin the process of truly overcoming them. It can be helpful to revisit and analyse those fears about which you wrote. Think about that worst case scenario you imagined, and visualise what would happen if anything and everything went wrong.

Let us say that at work, people are expected to give presentations at your monthly team meetings. It is expected that people take turns; yet despite being in this position for over a year, you have yet to give yours. At the end of each meeting, your boss asks who would like to volunteer to present updates on their project for the next meeting. Your stomach begins churning, your heart races, your palms become sweaty, and all you say to yourself is, “Please let someone else volunteer so that I don’t have to.” To your relief, someone does, and you are held over for another month.

Unfortunately, you are also acutely aware that because you have not given a presentation, you are less likely to be considered when promotions and raises come around. You feel stuck in a catch-22 and don’t know what to do. Do I risk giving a horrible presentation and embarrassing myself, or do I risk not getting a raise when appraisals take place?

At this point, you’ve identified that your feared situation is embarrassing yourself in front of your work colleagues and boss. You have also identified that avoiding your fear is hurting your ability to advance at work. You are hesitating. You are analyzing. You are stuck. You are frozen. Again, your inability to overcome hesitation is keeping you from moving forward.

Ask yourself, “So what?”

This is when the challenge can really begin. As you are picturing this worst case scenario, ask yourself, “So what?” So what if you make a mistake in your presentation. How likely is it that you will make a mistake so bad that it would result in being terminated from your position? Chances are that you have seen many people trip over words in their presentations before, but no one said anything. Do you have any evidence that you will embarrass yourself? What would you say to a friend in the same situation? Is your fear in proportion to the actual event?

As you engage in this exercise, it is important to write everything down. Not only will it help you organize your thoughts, but will help you to see if your facts that support your fear are shorter or longer than the list of facts that do not support your fear.

3. Learn to relax

Often the experience of paralysis by analysis leaves people feeling anxious, tense and wound up. Taking a few moments to do deep breathing can do wonders in helping you to think properly. One of the prominent symptoms of anxiety is an increased heart rate. When one’s heart rate exceeds 100 bpm, adrenaline is released into the body, causing it to enter a stress response. When this happens, it affects the part of brain that is responsible for problem solving, making it harder to think clearly.

The next time you find yourself in this situation, try sitting comfortably and place one hand on your chest, and one on your stomach. Try to breathe in a way that only the hand on your stomach moves. Breathing in this manner, inhale as deep as you can for four seconds, and hold it for another four. Then, exhale very slowly over an eight second period. Repeat this for five minutes and you should feel very relaxed.

4. Set goals

Sometimes people hesitate because what they are avoiding feels too daunting or overwhelming. Just the thought of it may lead them to want to run away and do something else. Setting goals and breaking them down can help make these tasks feel more manageable. For example, when someone says they need to read one chapter from a book, this sounds more manageable than if they say they need to write a book report [which involves reading an entire book, and then writing about it].

So, think about what it is you are hesitating about, and brainstorm if there is a way to set up goals to overcome hesitation. Break each part of the goal down to its absolute smallest possible component. This will allow you to pick up more easily where you left off, and allow you to see your progress. If we are being honest, crossing five things off a list sounds more enjoyable than crossing off just one, doesn’t it?

The Takeaway

As Stanislaw Jerzy Lec said, “You have to decide, even to hesitate.” The next time you find yourself hesitant and frozen from making a decision or taking action, remember that you are already making a decision to hesitate instead of moving forward. Are you going to choose to stay stuck, or choose to move forward?

The post How to Overcome Hesitation in 4 Easy Steps appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.