When Controlled Breathing Isn’t Enough
*Make sure to download my free Managing Overwhelm Checklist at the end of this post!*
If you’ve seen my free public speaking guide, or if you’ve taken a workshop or worked 1:1 with me, you’ll be familiar with my go-to stress management exercise: controlled breathing.
It is the simplest most effective way to control your nerves when you have to speak in a difficult situation (giving a speech or presentation, in conflict, advocating for yourself or somebody else, or even just raising your hand with an idea at a work meeting).
But here’s the thing: if you’re using controlled breathing on the regular to calm down from getting stressed out - even outside of giving presentations - you might want to take a look at the source.
Irene Lyon has, in my opinion, the best nervous system healing training that I’ve come across. I have no affiliation with her, but have followed her for years and have done some of her work, and it’s excellent.
But beyond that, I’ve put together a list of things you can do/add to your routine to begin to heal your nervous system if it’s in a “trigger happy” state. By that, I mean that everything sets you off. Your adrenaline and cortisol spike at any sign of potential stress. You feel like you don’t even have a chance to think something through to decide if it’s stressful, your body just goes into attack mode.
And even if that’s not the case for you, these are great options to keep healthy, regulated and able to approach difficult tasks with a lot more ease.
Exercise
One of the biggest game changers for me in my early 40s was understanding how effective exercise was on my mental health. Exercise regulates your breathing, gets your blood flowing and reduces muscle tension - all of these things can be taxed when we’re under stress. Exercise can also be distracting, and you’re using your excess energy for something positive instead of something difficult (i.e. using your energy to perpetuate anxiety).
Over the years, I’ve read several articles about public speaking/speaking anxiety and many suggest burning off your nervous energy through exercise ahead of your presentation.
Stretching is a form of exercise that allows for deep and controlled breathing, while also releasing tense muscles and helping you to relax. In the tools section of this website, I include my morning stretching routine. I’m always happy to answer questions about that if something is confusing - either leave a comment below, or send me an email.
*Make sure to download my free Managing Overwhelm Checklist at the end of this post!*
Walking
Technically, walking is considered exercise, but I place it in a category on its own because I think you can achieve more.
Walking has all of the benefits that more rigorous exercise does: blood circulation, regulated breathing, stamina building etc., but because it’s a much lesser impact, it also allows you to use your brain more. One of my favourite things to do is take a walking meditation. This can take on any form you’d like from emptying your brain and allowing your senses to be heightened (pay attention to sounds, to colours, to sensory feelings like wind or rain).
Or you can repeat a mantra or a phrase, or even spend your walk working through something you’re stuck on: writer’s block, not being sure what to do next, whether or not you should bring up a difficult topic with somebody.
More often than not, by the end of the walk, not only have I solved my problem, but I have 20 new ideas that I want to get started on!
Practise Spirituality
If you are a spiritual person, practising different routines related to your spirituality can help to calm you down and keep you grounded. This could look like praying, attending your place of worship, using tarot cards, communing with spirit… Whatever way you spiritually relate to the world, making sure you carve out time for that brings you back to what is important to you, and how you have chosen to live.
And like anything, you gotta put it in your calendar because if it’s not in your calendar, it doesn’t happen.
The 5-4-3-2-1 Technique
If you’re flooded with panic, anxiety or overwhelm, this technique can help you get grounded so that you can dissipate some of the stress that has overcome you. You can read about it in detail here, but essentially you combine the numbers with your senses and go from there. Notice 5 things that you can see, 4 things that you can touch, 3 things that you can hear, 2 things that you can smell and 1 thing you can taste.
This helps you shift away from what has flooded you with overwhelm, calm down and allow your brain to focus again, regulate your breathing and get grounded. From there you’d probably want to practise controlled breathing to try and regulate yourself even further.
Meditation or Mindfulness
Most of us are familiar with the concepts of meditation or mindfulness, which essentially the exercise of focusing your mind and body (relaxation, breathing, calming down). Getting into the habit of practising every day, allows you to to build technique around managing your stress response.
YouTube is an amazing place to find guided meditations. Once you find somebody you like, you can often join one of their programs to have a variety of meditations available to you.
Talk to a Friend
Covid has been really difficult to stay connected, but actively staying in touch with people who love and value you allows you to feel less alone. It’s important to remember that our friends are not our therapists, but talking things out with somebody you love, every once in a while, helps to bring the fear out of hiding, which allows us to see it and actually deal with it.
A long talk with a good friend can often reset your nervous system by filling you with feelings of love and of being visible and seen.
*Make sure to download my free Managing Overwhelm Checklist at the end of this post!*
Shadow Work/Journaling
I have a great free workbook that talks about shadow work and gives a lot of journal prompts for you to get started. Always remember that shadow work does not replace therapy, but it sure can enhance it!
Sometimes, when we’re not able to acknowledge certain truths about ourselves, we live in fear. We worry about being found out, we don’t feel truly connected to who we really are, and we experience a lot of fear that we can’t quite place. Shadow work, and using journaling as a way of drawing this out, can be incredibly effective. It has been for me! And that’s why I started to offer it as part of my coaching.
Free Managing Overwhelm Checklist
I put together all of the details from this post onto one page that you can print out and have handy at your workspace whenever you start to feel stressed or overwhelmed! Grab it here.
Further Resources
Take a look at this Triangle of Well-Being to understand how your mind, body and relationships work together and how to keep everything in balance.
This article about fight/flight/freeze is excellent.
I’d love to know in the comments how stress response affects you and how you manage it!
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