Let stress out of your body

Three practical ways to let stress out of your body

A lot of my work at loop involves helping people with stiff and painful neck and shoulders, this post is about how stress, anxiety and depression can affect your shoulders and neck, and a few simple tips to help.

As a society we are still getting our heads around the idea that emotions affect our body, but recently many of us have felt the effects of stress, anxiety and depression. This is known “psychomotor” - psychological reasons affecting the motor (movement) functions of your body. Here are 3 common psychomotor reactions and tips to help:

Step one

Rounding your shoulders up and forward. This helps protect all your squishy vital organs from harm, a natural response to feeling vulnerable! but you know the drill — loop your shoulders ;) up, back and down.

STEP TWO

Clenching your jaw also has a direct influence on your neck and shoulders as there are muscles that connect these areas that all work together. Try to notice if you’re clenching and actively let the tension go, maybe give it a little rub especially just before sleep.

STEP THREE

Unconsciously breathing shallow faster breaths happens a lot when you’re stressed. It also uses neck and shoulder muscles rather than diaphragm muscles because the top of your lungs live up just under your collar bones! Try a few breaths into your belly and sides.

In general making your out-breath longer than your in-breath naturally turns off your stress response, so try a long relaxed breath out. At loop we are all rooting for you to get your de-stress fix, so I hope some of these tips help.

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