This month at Angea we’ve been talking stress and how to deal with daily stress from a yogi perspective. We shared with you a Simple Stir-fry Recipe for a stress free dinner, 5 Yoga Poses to Help Reduce Stress and we also spoke with local Melbourne Yoga Teacher and Physiotherapist Irene Ais all about her approach to stress management. We liked what she had to say so much that we asked her to share a little more with us about her approach to stress management. Here’s what she had to say…
The Yogi Approach To ‘Stress Less’
Centuries ago, human beings did not rely on social media to dictate their actions. Believe it or not they used something called instinct. Our nervous system was programmed to stimulate our body to react to potential physical threats, commonly referred to as the ‘fight or flight’ response. This response is the excitation of the sympathetic nervous system which is responsible for initiating production of adrenaline, cortisol “the stress hormone,” the blood pressure rising, pupils dilating and heart rate increasing. As the name suggests, fight or flight stimulates the body to flee from a physical threat or prepare for battle.
The risk of being killed by a predator is thankfully not an issue that we commonly face in modern society, however fight or flight persists when we experience a stressful event in our lives. The modern day challenges which bring about such stress are mostly emotional or mental in nature. Our blood pressure rises and our palms become sweaty on a daily basis as a result of sleeping in, missing the bus, struggling to find a parking spot, needing to pay a bill or the printer getting jammed. There exist, a limitless list of daily stressors which our body responds to in the same way that it would to an attack by a saber tooth tiger. The issue is in the increasingly high incidence of stressors in our modern lives. The more we stress, the more our sympathetic nervous system is activated, resulting in the release of harmful stress hormones and the strengthening of the learned response to stress. Stress and anxiety are fast becoming one of our societies biggest and most costly epidemics. Growing numbers of people are becoming aware of the harmful effects of prolonged stress as science is showing its effects not only on our daily levels of happiness but its load on our organs and risk of chronic illness.
Physical threats tend to be short lived, our modern day stressors such as getting a parking ticket have a tendency to leave a lasting imprint. These experiences often inspire negative thoughts, which compounds our stress level even further. Anger causes us to clench our teeth and stores the frustration in not only our minds but in our jaw. The stress hormones ferment in your body as cortisol leaves its imprint in the tension in your neck and shoulder muscles. This learned response becomes stuck in a feedback loop where the more you think about getting a ticket, the more stressed you become, the more your heart rate elevates and the pathway in your brain which connects a parking fine to stress becomes stronger, the mental groove becomes deeper and your ability to not let a parking ticket ruin your day becomes impossible.
We cannot prevent the automatic fight or flight response to negative events as much as we can’t prevent the events themselves, however we can learn to alter our attitude and reactions to them. Mastering our attitude to negative events teaches our body not to see them as a trigger for stress, stopping fight or flight in its tracks or at least lessening its duration and allowing our bodies to return to a calm, relaxed state. Reining in our thoughts requires practice and is a central concept in the teaching of yoga.
The Sutras instruct us to use yoga to calm our thoughts. Yoga Sutra, ‘yogah cittavrtti nirodhah’ translates to ‘yoga is the cessation of the fluctuation of the mind.” When we practice yoga we direct our drishti, focus on our breath, a movement or a single point of focus. When the mind is focused it does not concern itself with the past or the future, which is said to be where our stress ors and thus the source of all our anxiety reside. The practice of yoga aims to still the mind, anchoring us in the present where we can cultivate mental clarity
There is a saying that says, ‘one can only see their reflection in still water,’ therefore learning to quiet the rapids of thought in our mind creates an opportunity for us to notice what floats to the surface from deep within our subconscious. With practice, a calm mind will learn the gift of self reflection and develop awareness of our stress triggers.
Our regular yoga practice generates an opportunity for stilling the mind and becoming aware of our thoughts and habits. This crucial first step may take many dedicated session on the mat to master, however it lays the foundation for creating a non-reactive mind. Noticing that falling out of a balancing pose creates frustration is important to gain awareness of this as a source of stress but practicing to not give into this impulse with anger and negative self talk is the ultimate antidote to stress.
Keeping harmful cortisol levels under control requires the body’s relaxation response to be activated after the fight or flight response occurs. This begins with taking a deep breath. We manipulate our breath hundreds of times in a yoga class. From deepening the inhales and exhales, to directing our breath, to practising pranayama. We learn the dance of vinyasa, where movement waltzes with breath and the quality of our breathing becomes a barometer for our comfort in a pose. When the breath is short we rest or attempt to lengthen our exhales and slow the breath down. We are lowering our stress in a pose and thus providing the perfect dress rehearsal for manipulating our breath to deal with any stressful event in our lives.
A strong yang practice can help us to become more calm and in control when we use the tools of drishti, breath and centring, however the greatest challenge for most is staying calm in the most sedentary of all yoga poses, Savasana. Practiced as the final resting pose at the end of yoga or in isolation Savasana can ironically be a source of great stress and frustration. As the body rests, the breath slows and our mind is forced into stillness a flood of every day thoughts, many of which are our source of stress can overwhelm us. Savasana is a practice in and of itself and the more often we find ourselves in this quiet place the sooner we shall become masters of our minds.
With dedication to yoga, awareness of stressful triggers and learning to breathe anyone can alter their experience with stress. Proof that with perseverance we can achieve control of the unpredictable beast which is our mind lies in the vast response that many individuals can have to the same situation. Our reality is formed by nothing more than our thoughts about our experiences and thus our reaction to them. If we learn to relax and control negative thoughts we can lower our stress and this raises our potential for happiness.
About Irene:
Irene Ais has spent 15 years exploring the ancient practice of Yoga. She is a Melbourne based Physiotherapist, a certified Yoga teacher, AcroYoga teacher and Pilates instructor.
Irene will take you on a journey to discover the transformative effects of yoga. She is passionate about helping students navigate the physical poses whilst offering an invitation to drop into the energetic practice. The layers she creates with her teaching will draw you out of the thinking mind to offer you an experience of deeper self-awareness.
Her strong hatha flow classes will challenge students to play to their edge and her extensive study in the human body and movement brings a teaching style focusing on finding our unique alignment and joy in movement.