How To Stay Calm In Difficult Times: 5 Psychological Keys
On many occasions, a multitude of feelings and sensations that are extremely difficult to handle and manage can go through us. Sometimes sadness, anger, frustration or despair can make us lose control. However, it is possible to learn to stay calm in difficult times.
Plato once said that “our most important victory is to conquer oneself” and he was right. We are all emotional beings and, therefore, we act as such when faced with the things that happen to us. Consequently, it is not about stopping feeling anger or sadness, but about learning to manage them effectively when they appear.
Also, sometimes, we face long periods of stress. In these vital situations, it is important to learn to develop strategies that allow us to balance the scales and find inner balance.
If you are experiencing a situation that is overwhelming you and you need some form of action to reduce stress, don’t worry… In this article we explain some of them. the most useful techniques to avoid losing control in difficult moments.
The best guidelines to stay calm in difficult times
Stress is a part of modern life, and we all worry and get upset from time to time. They are natural responses.
Our bodies release large amounts of cortisol when we experience a lot of stress. These hormones are a prehistoric response to danger, ultimately preparing us to fight or flee from danger or predator. However, most of these mechanisms are not useful, since we do not live in such a hostile environment. And stressors often involve work presentations rather than wild animals. If we frequently feel stressed or anxious, our fight or flight mechanisms are likely to activate too easily. In this case, it can be very useful to look for ways to return to a state of relaxation.
Financial and family concerns are often cited as sources of pressure. This stress can lead to an unhealthy physical and emotional state if left unchecked. If we often face stressful situations and don’t know how to handle them, we may need to make some changes in our life. There are some coping strategies that can help us stay calm in our daily lives. Below, we show some of the most effective ones.
Think about the days you sleep little and how you deal with bad news or the work day, it seems we can come to a conclusion: everything seems worse when you haven’t slept well. It is impossible to keep stress or other negative feelings at bay if we don’t get enough sleep. Although, sometimes we can find ourselves trapped in a kind of vicious circle. Stress and anxiety often cause insomnia, so we cannot sleep and then feel worse because we have not slept the necessary hours for us.
Not just for bad days or difficult periods, but to cope with life in general, sleep should be a priority. Although, it is true, even more so if we are under a lot of pressure. For example, it is not a good idea not to sleep if we have an exam the next day, it has been proven that our performance will be much lower than what we would have if we had slept the necessary hours.
To maintain proper sleep hygiene, it is obviously necessary to go to bed early, but above all do not use electronic devices in bed. Screens and the light they emit can tremendously affect our natural sleep biorhythms. If you are looking for some type of natural product to help you sleep, lavender essential oil can promote a feeling of calm and help us fall asleep.
2. Take a walk
Going for a walk outdoors for a short period of time to relax can help us, on the one hand, to put things into perspective and realize that the stressors in our lives are less serious than they seem. In this case, seeing things from a new perspective can give us the calm we need to handle the difficult situations we face. Consequently, Walking can give us some time to rethink the situation, think about solutions, and return home or to work with renewed optimism. Seeing things from a new perspective can give us the calm we need to handle difficult situations.
But walking also has physiological benefits, since it allows us greater oxygenation of the blood, which translates into a physical sensation of calm, and exercise also causes the body to release feel-good hormones, such as endorphins. Taking a short walk or exercising for a few minutes will greatly improve our mood. If we have more time, taking a walk outdoors is even more relaxing.
There are people who prefer to listen to music. If it helps, you can choose a playlist that energizes or calms you down during your walk. Otherwise, walking accompanied and chatting with a good friend can also help us find social support, essential in difficult times.
Taking regular walks can provide short-term benefits and get us out of the haze we’re in as well as providing us with the long-term benefits that sport gives us for both our physical and mental health.
3. Conscious breathing
Whenever we find ourselves under a stressful situation that we cannot escape from, breathing exercises can provide us with immediate relief. By providing more oxygen to our body, we manage to relieve the tension of physical origin that adds to the psychological one. Additionally, these breathing exercises can help in many ways, they are also an excellent exercise in conscious practice and allows us to focus on the present moment.
In addition, they have a great advantage over other relaxation techniques. We can do breathing exercises anywhere and at any time, even if we do not have the freedom or the possibility of leaving the situation that causes us stress.
Conscious breathing has a series of physiological effects. By focusing on our breathing, we can distance ourselves from any distractions and focus solely on the present moment. By doing it deeply and slowly, with each breath, we can stop the body from releasing stress hormones. This ultimately helps the body relax, calm down, and regain balance.
As for the technique, start by taking a deep breath through your nose. Instead of just breathing through your chest, you should learn to breathe into your belly, that is, to use your diaphragm correctly. After a moment of holding my breath, we must exhale slowly through the mouth. By practicing this technique for a few minutes, we will notice that we feel much more relaxed. If we are going through a period of stress or have a lot of work, it is advisable to stop from time to time to breathe and take several breaths of air, this can also help us concentrate again.
Finally, some people prefer to accompany their breathing by closing their eyes and joining their hands – similar to as if we were praying. These suggest that these movements can increase the relaxing effect of deep breathing.
It is important to remain calm in difficult situations, to be aware of the good things that surround us. Sometimes we intensify our experience of different situations by the way we think. Always putting ourselves in the worst-case scenario for every situation we face is a harmful pattern and is clinically known as catastrophic thinking. This can increase our anxiety and feelings of panic, which are no longer specific to the situation, but rather It is caused by our anticipatory anxiety.
We have to try to reformulate the situation. Instead of thinking about the negative aspects or results, we should take a few moments to think about the positive. If we are able to see the situation from a different perspective, we can give it its real value or find solutions. This reframing will make the feeling of stress and other negative sensations decrease considerably.
As we have seen, Mental and emotional stress can be the direct cause of our pessimism. Consequently, these types of problems are common in people with type A traits and other self-sabotaging thinking patterns. Ultimately, learning to change our framework or perspective of the things that happen to us will be very useful when facing difficult situations.
5. Write
Allowing ourselves to talk about our anxiety or anger through writing can be very comforting and helpful in staying calm during difficult times. A recent study showed that Maintaining a daily writing habit helps reduce anxiety in people facing the illness of a loved one. If we are able to express and label what we feel, anxiety and anger, as well as other negative feelings, can decrease. So, if we have some time a day, we can dedicate it to writing a small diary, where we can write about what causes us stress and capture our emotions. This constant chat with ourselves and our feelings will ultimately help us stay calm during difficult times.
