Moms, we all know life gets really busy and we will often place ourself and our needs at the bottom of our list. It is however a fact that stress leads to many health complications such as weight gain or inability to lose weight, headaches, lowered immune system function, insufficient sleep, lack of energy, or worse.
Your body works hard each day through release of hormones to try to keep your body in a healthy homeostatic place, but let’s face it, as a mom you are juggling, multitasking, and are many times overly taxed. This makes you feel stressed out. Give yourself permission to take your own “time out” to connect your body with your breath, push stimuli and racing thoughts out of your mind, and use this simple 4-7-8 breathing technique to say goodbye to stress.
This technique can be done anywhere at any time. Use it to help slow your body before bed, when life with kids, work, and other obligations gets to be too much, or at a time when you need some mental focus and clarity. As moms, our mind is constantly running and it is important to take time while you are awake to give it some ease and rest. You will come out of it feeling like a Super Mom!
Here is what you do:
Find yourself in a comfortable place, seated or laying down (even sitting in a car while waiting to pick up the kids at school is fine).
Close your eyes (if possible where you are) and breath in slowly allowing your chest and abdomen to expand while you slowly count to four.
Only think of your counting as you hold your breath, increasing oxygenation, and count slowly to seven.
Keep your mind free from all other thought as you slowly exhale your breath out, counting to eight.
Repeat this 4-7-8 breathing technique at least 2 more times, or as many times as you need to feel more grounded, mentally focused, energized, and less stressed.
