If you’re here looking for how to relax your mind and body from stress, chances are you’re feeling stressed right now. Or maybe you’re being proactive, wanting to be better prepared for the next time it shows up.
If you’re tired of short-term fixes and relying on hands-on care, and you’re looking for a long-term approach, you’ve come to the right place.
As a physiotherapist who works online and is trained in mindfulness and coaching, I take a different approach to stress. One that doesn’t involve putting hands on you. Surprising? Maybe. But also empowering.
In this post, you’ll reconnect with your mind and body in ways that help you notice stress sooner and respond with more clarity. You’ll learn a few practical tools you can access in your everyday life. This will take intention and effort on your part, but it’s worth it if you’re looking for something that will stay with you for the long run.
P.S. This post will encourage you to slow down – notice how you react to that as you make your way through.
How Does Stress Show Up for You?
Before we dive in, let’s start with a simple reflection:
- How do you know you’re stressed? If you’re feeling it right now, what clues are sending you this message?
- If you’re not currently stressed – how would you know if you were?
It may seem like a silly question but take a moment with it.
Are there particular behaviours you exhibit when you’re stressed? Do you sleep poorly? Do you get indigestion or an upset gut? Do you experience persistent headaches? Do thoughts play on repeat in your mind? Does your breath become shallow?
Pause and reflect.
Stress shows up differently for all of us. Becoming familiar with how we respond – in mind, body, behaviours, emotions – can help us pick up on stress sooner. This is useful whether your stress is caused by a major life event, or a build up from a mix of circumstances.
It’s ok if you’re not certain – we’re just looking for a good place to start.
Write down what comes to mind.
How Do You Respond to Stress?
Now let’s turn to how you respond:
- What helps you relax your mind and body when you’re stressed?
- What have you tried that doesn’t work for you?
- What would you like to try that you haven’t tried yet, or in a long time?
Write down whatever comes to mind.
Stress: A Friend and a Foe
Stress often gets a bad rap – like it’s something we should avoid at all costs.
I think this is a good time to remind you that stress isn’t inherently bad. It’s essentially a warning signal from our body, letting us know there’s something threatening our sense of safety, whether that’s physically, mentally, or emotionally.
When there is a true, immediate threat – like someone threatening to punch us – our body knows exactly what to do. It kicks into flight, fight, or freeze mode in a matter of seconds, without our conscious control. This allows us to protect ourselves.
But when the threat is more abstract, or perceived by our mind, like the fear of being judged during a presentation, the same stress response can still activate. If it lingers, it starts to wear us down, taking a toll on our minds and bodies, and all the systems within us that keep us healthy. (Read more on the effects of stress on the body here.)
That said, we also need some degree of stress in our lives to keep us motivated and thriving.
Take exercise, it’s a source of stress. In the right dose, it challenges us to grow stronger – physically, mentally, even emotionally. When there’s too much of it though, or when we don’t allow time for recovery, things can start to break down – literally and figuratively.
That’s why tuning in matters. It helps us notice when something’s off before it snowballs. In the case of that presentation, it might mean recognizing that our stress is tied to a fear of judgment. This awareness may trigger a shift in our attention to what we can control, like preparation.
With exercise, it might mean acknowledging we’re pushing too hard and adapting our routine to include more recovery time.
Either way, with awareness, we’re given a choice – to continue as we are, or to respond in a way that supports our long-term well-being.
From Thinking to Feeling
Now, those first reflection questions were more of a cognitive exercise.
If you’re still with me and comfortable doing the next part, I’ll invite you to join me in a short body scan. We’ll briefly check in with our bodies from bottom to top, noticing what sensations are present, maybe even beginning to get a sense of where stress may be showing up in our body right now.
- Take this at your own pace. If anything feels like too much, it’s okay to stop. Listening to yourself is part of the practice.
Once you’ve completed the scan, take a moment to reflect on this question:
- What did you notice during that practice?
Perhaps you picked up on areas of tension, or the quality of your breath. Maybe you noticed your mind drifting a lot, or that it was hard to stay connected to your body for long.
Perhaps your experience felt a bit fuzzy, or unclear. Or maybe you didn’t notice anything at all. This is all ok, too. Simply noticing you didn’t notice anything – that counts as noticing, if you will. And it doesn’t mean you’ve done it wrong. It just means that was your experience at that moment.
These are all valid experiences.
Stay with your experience for a moment longer:
- Was there anything else that stood out, even if for just a moment?
Turning Toward The Breath
We’ll now return to our body for another practice. This time, we’ll focus specifically on our breath. Following a brief check-in, I’ll invite you to join me in a short breathing exercise.
Please keep in mind – you have agency in these practices. Everything I offer is simply an invitation – you get to decide what feels right for you in this moment.
If focusing on your breath doesn’t feel comfortable or safe, that’s completely okay. You might choose to anchor your attention on something else related to the body – such as temperature sensations on your skin, or the contact points between your body and the chair.
Before you move on, take another moment to reflect:
- What did you notice during the breath awareness practice?
- What did you notice during the breathing exercise?
It’s common to approach this kind of practice – or any kind, really – with the desire to do it perfectly – to not lose focus, to find a rhythm, to feel relaxed afterwards. The objective, however, is awareness – not perfection.
How did you approach the practice?
Did you notice a tendency to rush? To try harder? To judge how you were doing?
Meeting and Responding to Stress with Mindfulness
The practices I’ve guided you through in this post are mindfulness practices.
At its core, mindfulness is the practice of intentionally paying attention to the present moment. It also includes becoming aware of how we’re relating to the moment – whether we’re judging it, resisting it, or accepting it as it is.
This second piece is important to remember as you do the practices. When we notice tension in our body or breath, judgment and self-criticism can creep in, which may only hinder our ability to relax our mind and body from stress.
The breath and the body are often used as anchors to the present moment. They’re typically available to us in any given moment. So they’re accessible tools for checking in or for gently shifting our state when needed.
How to Use the Body Scan or Breath Awareness Practice to Relax from Stress
We can use a practice like the body scan or a breathing exercise like take 5 in a couple of ways to help us relax our mind and body from stress. First, we can use them as a window into our current state – a way to check-in – just as we’ve done here.
If this way of checking in resonates with you, I encourage you to do this regularly, not only when you feel stressed. Over time, this helps you build a deeper connection with your body and a clearer sense of what your personal baseline feels like. It becomes easier to notice early signs of stress and to respond in a way that is supportive to you.
We can also use these practices as tools to intentionally shift our current state. For example, softening one body part at a time during a body scan can invite relaxation to our mind and body. A breathing exercise like Take 5, when we use a 5 count inhale followed by a 6 count exhale, can soothe our nervous system. In this way, we’re gently guiding our breath or our body towards calm.
Another example: when you notice your mind spiraling into anxious thoughts, gently bringing your full awareness to your breath or body sensations, can anchor you in the here and now. This can break the loop and give you a moment of steadiness.
Sometimes the gentle shift that a mindfulness practice can create is enough. Other times, tuning in might reveal what you might need next, such as an earlier night, reaching out to a friend, or speaking kind words to ourselves. In this way, mindfulness becomes a doorway to supportive action.
Not a One-Size-Fits-All Approach
Importantly, these practices are not one-size-fits-all. For some, tuning into the breath is grounding. For others, it might be activating or even overwhelming — and that’s okay. This is about trying, noticing, and staying curious.
Mindfulness isn’t about fixing or forcing. It’s about discovering what works for you, at your pace, in your way.
Stillness or Movement: What Helps You Tune In?
If you joined me for the previous practices, you’ll have noticed that they were both done in stillness. They were guided that way to help narrow our focus – to tune into one thing, such as our breath or sensations in our body.
Stillness can be deeply supportive, especially when we’re feeling overstimulated. But for some, stillness can actually stir up more discomfort or restlessness. In those moments, movement might feel more grounding and be more accessible.
This is all part of the tuning in process: learning to listen and discover what works best for you.
Let’s try a practice now that involves a little bit of movement. This one invites you to stand up and walk around your space, bringing your fullest attention to the act of walking.
If walking isn’t accessible to you, you can do this practice seated, mimicking walking with your feet or hands, or even visualizing yourself moving through your space.
As with the other practices, let’s take a moment to reflect:
- What came up for you during that practice?
- What did you notice about your body – and your overall experience – while doing this?
Or does it depend? If so, what does it depend on?
Movement as a Way to Tune In and Relax from Stress
Movement, like stillness, can also be both a way to tune in, and a way to relax your mind and body from stress.
Take a walking meditation practice, for example. Because it guides us to focus on our internal experience while in motion, it helps us stay connected to what’s present in our body in the moment.
It can also support us in slowing down, in turn shifting into the parasympathetic nervous system – our rest and restore mode.
One way to use a practice like a walking meditation throughout your day is first to notice when you’re rushing or focused solely on getting from point A to point B.
In those moments, you don’t necessarily need to slow down, just redirect your attention to what’s happening within your body as you move. Even a few mindful steps can help to ease our mind and body from stress.
Returning to Your Own Experience
Now coming back to the reflection that started this section:
- Do you tend to gravitate towards movement or stillness when you’re stressed?
- If stillness, what does – or could – that look like for you?
- If movement, what does – or could – that look like for you?
A Note on Expectations with Mindfulness
Now, having said all of that, there’s an important idea I need to share with you about mindfulness.
I’ve offered mindfulness as one way to relax your mind and body from stress. It’s important to be – well, mindful – how we approach these practices.
The Attitude of Non-Striving (and Not Fixing)
In mindfulness, we talk about the attitude of non-striving. It means we’re releasing the expectation that a practice will make us feel a certain way. You might feel a sense of ease afterwards, or you might not. The reality is that mindfulness can also bring us front and centre with challenging emotions, sensations, or thoughts.
So rather than treating the mindfulness-based strategies offered here as fix-it tools, I encourage you to see them as ways to build awareness over time.
Mindfulness helps us relate differently to stress, not necessarily to eliminate it on command. When we learn to do this, stress can become easier to notice and work with. This shift tends to come from consistency and curiosity – not control.
Building Your Personal Strategy to Manage Stress
A few more reflective questions as we wrap up:
- What have you learned about your relationship with stress?
- What will you bring into your stress management strategy going forward, if anything?
- What feels worth exploring further?
I hope it’s clear by now that there’s no one-size-fits-all approach here.
Building a personal strategy is about being willing to experiment, and noticing what supports you along the way. For me, that’s a few minutes of formal practice most days, mixed in with informal check-ins throughout the day. Both help guide me in taking supportive action. It’s something I’ve landed on through trial, error, and curiosity.
The Value in Reflecting
Reflection takes effort – I get it. But it can be so helpful in discovering what works, what doesn’t, or what we need more time playing with.
As you shape your own approach to relaxing from stress, consider:
- What practice(s) do you want to bring into your routine?
- How often do you want to engage with those practices?
- What time of day feels more natural?
- Do you prefer guided support, or something more self-directed?
- Where will you practice – at home, outdoors, during a commute, or in between tasks?
What About Obstacles?
Obstacles will come up – they always do. Maybe it will be lack of time, forgetting, or feeling like you don’t have the support from others. Consider what might get in your way and how you can work around this.
This is about crafting something that works for you, not following someone else’s template.
Be curious. Be flexible. And most importantly, be kind to yourself as you go.
What This Work Looks Like Together
What you’ve experienced in this blog post – the practices, the reflection prompts – is a lot like the approach I offer clients who are ready to go beyond quick fixes.
We start by building awareness: noticing how stress shows up for you, and what your baseline feels like. From there, we experiment with different strategies to find what actually supports you, and what you feel most connected to. That might be the practices offered here, or others that feel more natural to you. Sometimes the practices reveal what else might be needed in your overall stress reduction plan.
I bring in my experience and expertise when it’s needed, but I won’t tell you what to do. Instead, I guide you to explore your situation, experiment with different strategies, and build trust in your own ability to navigate stress.
Ultimately, my goal is to help you take the reins of your own well-being.
Hands-on care has its place and can definitely be helpful, but having tools that you can turn to at any time is life-changing. Mindfulness and coaching are a powerful combination for this, helping you develop long-lasting strategies grounded in self-awareness, choice, and self-trust.
A Final Word on How to Relax Your Mind and Body from Stress
There’s no single right way to manage stress — but there is a right starting point: tuning in. The more you learn to recognize what’s happening in your body and mind, the closer you are to responding in ways that truly support you.
Next Steps On Your Stress Journey
I hope this post has reminded you that you’re allowed to go slow, to experiment, and to create something that feels like it’s yours.
If you’re curious about what this could look like with support, let’s jump on a free consultation call. We’ll chat about where you’re at and explore how working together could move you forward.