100 Hz: These brain waves indicate the awake state. Frequencies above 30Hz are associated with a wakeful state characterized by stress (positive and negative stress).
You can now imagine what kind of binaural beats are particularly helpful for relaxation: Binaural beats with alpha waves and 8-12 Hz. These tracks can be heard for free on YouTube, for example. While listening to these tracks, your brain is adjusted to the frequency of the track, making it easier for you to relax. So your brain starts to produce the same frequencies, which puts you in a relaxed state.
The Binaural Betas can be used at any time: Whether on the train, in a hot bath or meditating.
Mindfulness Meditation
Emotional outbursts occur in the brain region called the amygdala. Through increased attentiveness, we are able to strengthen another region of the brain, the prefrontal cortex. So we are moving away from a direct over-excited outburst of emotion towards a more attentive handling of our emotions. This does not mean that we suppress our emotions at this moment, but that we learn to deal with them differently. The prefrontal cortex is shut down by long-term stress because the prefrontal cortex is a fairly new brain area and in emergency situations the body reverts to the oldest brain areas. By strengthening the prefrontal cortex, you make it possible to perceive yourself more consciously and attentively.
Practice mindfulness meditation daily for at least 10 minutes and increase this time - some people meditate for two hours a day and you will soon understand why. Choose a quiet and undisturbed place for your meditation, wear comfortable clothes, sit cross-legged on the floor, put your hands loosely on your knees, close your eyes, and then begin the following meditation:
- The next time you exhale, gradually relax your body: head, face, jaw, shoulders, trunk, arms, hands, legs and feet.
- Then concentrate on your breathing for ten minutes without affecting it.
- Pay attention to the changes that occur in your body when you breathe: The chest, for example, lifts and lowers.
- Feel how each breath provides you with energy.
- Surely one or two thoughts will flow through your head. If you perceive them, do not evaluate them and always return to your breathing.
- At the end of this meditation exercise, try to feel how your body and mind have calmed down. - Open your eyes and slowly return to your everyday life with your consciousness.
The more often you do this exercise, the easier it will be for you to quickly get into a relaxed state and maintain it for the entire period of meditation. Your body and mind have had the opportunity to step out of the state of tension and you can devote yourself more attentively to your everyday life.
Progressive muscle relaxation
The progressive muscle relaxation has a lot to do with the alternation between tension and relaxation and even more with the ability to let go. Learning to let go is an important instrument for all those whose thoughts are often in the past and the future, but rarely in the here and now. Of course it is important to think about the future or to rethink past experiences, but only as long as these thoughts add value to our present. Maybe you just can't let go of the idea of a missed deadline and are therefore afraid of tackling new, interesting and exciting projects with a short deadline. Letting go of stress is learnable.
The progressive muscle relaxation can be done in peace at home or in the middle of nature - exactly where you need it and where you like it. Ideally, you should lie on a comfortable surface throughout the exercise, your arms lying loosely next to your body and your feet falling slightly outwards. The palms of your hands are down, your eyes are closed and your jaw is relaxed. Here we go:
- Breathe in and out deeply a few times.
- Watch carefully as your breathing supplies you with energy and spreads throughout your body.
- Now it starts with the tension and relaxation of the different muscle groups! Bend your arms, clench your hands into fists and now actively tighten your arms, hands and shoulders for about 7 seconds. When exhaling after 7 seconds you put your arms down again, relax and feel the heaviness and warmth of your arms and hands.
- Then it continues with the facial and neck muscles, the chest, abdominal and back muscles, as well as the foot and leg muscles.
- Once you have tensed all the muscles in your body, you can feel the relaxation spreading across your entire body.
- After a few minutes, open your eyes and return to everyday life with your attention. Perform this relaxation exercise daily to feel the calming effect on your body deeply and for a long time!
Showing humour and rediscovering your own laughter
You may not feel like laughing at the moment, but laughing is actually a great way to release tension and focus on what matters most. Laughter not only activates hundreds of muscles throughout the body, but also releases large amounts of the happiness hormones dopamine, serotonin and endorphin. Against this combination stress hormones naturally have no more chance and are reduced. When was the last time you laughed heartily and do you remember how relaxed, balanced and liberated you felt afterwards?
With increasing stress level also the daily laughter sinks. And if you think that you have forgotten to laugh over time, then I have good news for you: humour is learnable. Is there a better way to restore inner balance than to laugh heartily? From now on, go through your everyday life more open to humour and look for funny situations. What about your social environment, which people have a lot of humour there and make you laugh frequently? Surround yourself more often with funny, cheerful people! And of course you can go to cabaret, watch comedies or read humorous books.
There are many ways to make life a little easier and more relaxed, even if it doesn't work overnight. What kind of humor do you have and how can you make yourself laugh at least once a day? Life is only as serious as we take it. And by the way: humor not only makes us sexy, it also strengthens our immune system, improves our cognitive abilities, is a sign of intelligence, activates various brain areas and can even make us high!
Methods for a stronger inner balance: Reflection
Reflection teaches us an incredible amount about ourselves and gives us the opportunity to deal with ourselves, with challenges and with our fellow human beings in a more positive way. For example, we recognize negative emotions and no longer take them as an opportunity to make hasty, supposedly redeeming decisions. So our decision making becomes much more effective!
Also, by observing our own behaviour in conflict situations, we can react more calmly and strive to resolve the conflict instead of showing selfish behaviour (blame attribution). Conflicts, failures or mistakes then no longer become nightmares, but learning opportunities for which we do not have to condemn ourselves at all. Even self- pity does not find a place any more with an attentive contemplation of one's own person, because we can accept our fate as it is.
So in the future you can put your energy into optimising your abilities instead of letting your dissatisfaction, stress and anger evaporate. The better we know ourselves, the better we can set better priorities and healthier boundaries, identify our own goals and make positive changes with motivation and confidence.
Reflection can have very different faces. While one prefers to move to a monastery for a week, the other practices daily self-reflection through evening evaluation. In this chapter you will find some suggestions that will hopefully help you to find the right kind
