10 Simple Steps to Get Rid of Stress

Dr. Herbert Benson is a well-known name in the field of mind and body, a respected professor at Harvard Medical School, who has worked for more than 30 years on mental techniques to improve and develop physical health. He shares his findings in scientific journals.

Dr. Benson believes that most of the physical imbalances that lead to illness can be traced back to mental stress. Most importantly, he has a way to reduce tension and mental and physical stress that contributes to its invalidation, and it helps heal from several diseases, such as heart disease, headaches, hypertension, and irritant bowel syndrome. (They are common disorders of the large intestine, and their symptoms include abdominal pain, bloating, gases, diarrhea, constipation, or both, and need long-term treatment as chronic diseases), insomnia, and pain in general.

You don't have to be sick to be able to benefit from Dr. Benson's exercise, as anyone who is subjected on a daily or near-daily basis to stressful and disturbing conditions - most of us, of course - will find it a very easy exercise that helps relax and calm quickly.

Below is a copy of Dr. Benson's Mind-Physical Relaxation exercise, consisting of 10 simple steps that can improve health and wellness in just 10 minutes a day. People who meditate skillfully should find these steps familiar:

10 Steps to Eliminate Stress and Improve Health and Wellness:

1. Choose something to focus on: The easiest thing to use for concentration is a word or a short phrase. Also, it is not important what that word or phrase is as long as it is short and gives a person a positive feeling. The word “peace” or “calm” can be used for example.
2. Find a quiet place where you will not be disturbed, and choose a comfortable seating position for some time.
3. Set a timer for 10-20 minutes, as most cell phones nowadays have a timer.
4. Close your eyes.
5. Relax the muscles. Start to relax the facial muscles first, as you have relaxed the muscles around the eyes in the previous step. Here, you have to let the tension out of your body while gradually relaxing the face, scalp, neck, shoulders, arms, hands, chest, upper back, stomach, lower back, hips, thighs, knees, calves, shins, ankles, and feet. Enough time should be taken in this step, and if there is a certain tension in any of the previous areas of the body, just touch it gently and allow it to relax, and then continue to relax the rest of the areas.
6. Start with a series of slow and deep breaths, say your focus word to yourself when you exhale, and take the air out of your lungs every time.
7. Allow the thoughts and feelings you have during the exercise to come and go, and then return to your meditative world.
8. Gently return yourself to focus on your word with every exhale when you feel like your mind is starting to lose focus.
9. Allow your thoughts to return to your mind for a minute or so after the timer has set off, and then open your eyes.
10. Move a little to restore focus on your body through a movement that might help you, such as putting your feet up and taking them down again, or rubbing the face with your hands.

The Effects of Doing This Exercise:

If your body is prepared for the hit-or-run response imposed by the stressful and exhausting conditions of modern life, it will return to normal after this exercise. This is the situation in which hospitalization, digestion, and all other internal processes that are useful to the body occur, and bloodstream is free of chemicals caused by stress and fatigue, which pose a threat to blockage of the arteries, which is known as the mental-physical relaxation response.

There are three benefits to practicing relaxation daily. The first is that we do not leave relaxation to coincidence and hope that it will happen to us when it may never happen. The second is to develop our abilities and create an internal pattern for us by abandoning thoughts and feelings that would return us to the state of tension from which we are trying to get out. The third is that the continuous practice of relaxation exercises will allow us to release the accumulated tension within us and free ourselves from it, which takes a long period as it also took a long time to accumulate inside us.

However, this exercise is only 10 minutes a day, and it is an investment that shows its results by gaining more energy, activity, and vigor, improving physical and mental health, and developing flexibility and adaptability.