Ten ways to calm down the busyness in your brain
So much about life seems to go a 100 miles an hour, doesn’t it. Whilst that can be stimulating and invigorating, it can feel exhausting and unmanageable at times. And it can feel especially unmanageable when it’s your brain that’s constantly on overload. Work to tackle, tasks to do, appointments to organise (and then remember), meals to plan and cook, bills to pay, emails and messages to reply to….it’s a lot. So it’s easy to feel overwhelmed and out of control.
These are ten simple but effective ways to give your overloaded brain some much needed downtime.
1. Step away from your screens
Technology has transformed our lives in so many powerfully good ways. But it’s also the primary contributor to how ramped up the pace of life has become. As impossible as it is for any young person to imagine a time when everything you needed to know, wanted to watch or had to schedule, or anyone you wanted to get in touch with wasn’t instantly available at the tap of a screen, we Heydayers know that life was not only possible without all that, but (whisper it) sometimes more enjoyable, and certainly more relaxed/relaxing. So switch off, step back from your screens and give yourself and your poor weary brain some technology free time, ideally each day, but at least regularly enough to press pause from the frantic pressure of connection.
Instead, do something different, like…
2. Escape into a book
Reading has to be one of the most powerful ways to transport you and your brain to another place. There’s a reason it appears where it does in the list of the TOP 5 MOST RESTFUL THINGS TO DO. I challenge you to dive into, and become absorbed in, a great book and keep your brain whirring at the same time. It can’t be done!
3. Listen to music
Where would we be without music in our lives, and our brains. Whether your mind feels as if it needs a good jolt - and even better a dance around the kitchen - or whether what you most want is something that soothes away the stress, music can provide that. (Just by the way, if the effect of listening to music makes you cry, that’s not a bad thing. Crying can be brilliantly and importantly cathartic). The same, of course, applies to singing - see below.
What was that old slogan? Turn on and tune in (I know it also said ‘drop out’ but I’m ignoring that for these purposes!) Do that.
4. Get creative
And by creative, I don’t necessarily mean crafty if that’s not your thing. Tho’ if it is, go for it with gusto. Because concentrating on making or doing something creative - which could be anything from cooking, to taking pictures or doing a puzzle to singing - is a wonderful antidote for a swamped psyche.
5. Go outside
Feeling overwhelmed can also make us inclined to hunker down until it passes. But being indoors with our buzzing brain can make it feel even more oppressive and unmanageable. The effect of getting outside in the fresh air (even when it’s cold or rainy) has been shown to have all manner of positively soothing and detoxing effects on our minds. You don’t have to head out for a huge hike (so much satisfying alliteration there), a walk around the block, or even a stroll around your garden will do the trick. If you feel like throwing in a bit of gardening whilst you’re at it, all the better, because another great thing you can do for your beleaguered brain is..
6. Exercise
Come on. You knew I couldn’t write a post about feeling better or healthier without talking about exercise. Honestly, if exercise were a pill, every doctor in the land would be prescribing it. To everyone. (Indeed, we know that one of the things that GPs are doing more of is encouraging people to make lifestyle changes rather than rely on medication to help them be healthier). I’m not saying that you need to come over all Jane Fonda (although can we take a moment to appreciate that at 85, she’s still championing the cause of exercising in her tie-up with H&M), any exercise, however gentle, will be as good for your brain as it is for your body.
7. Sort out your inbox
If you’re anything like me, seeing the number of unread emails in your in-box is an unfailing trigger for brain stress. Once you’ve had your technology-free time, make good use of being back in front of your screen by devoting some time every few days to clearing the backlog. The build up is often caused by junk mail, or spam you haven’t yet deleted, or emails you haven’t unsubscribed from. Taking time to unsubscribing (annoying, I know, but worth it) and binning the backlog (I’m trying to get better at doing a mass delete on anything unread that’s over two months old) is more satisfying and soothing for the brain than I can say.
8. Try junk journaling
Here’s something you might not have heard of. I hadn’t until recently.
Basically, junk journaling is writing down anything that’s filling up your headspace. All those swirling thoughts, which could well be stopping you from sleeping or working effectively, will feel surprisingly more manageable and clearer when you have put them down from your head and onto paper.
A junk journal becomes a place you can park them until you’re ready to deal with them (or find you don’t not need to, because written down they seem less concerning than they did whilst they were being endlessly mulled over in your mind). Collate them into to-do lists if that helps.
Keeping your junk journal (aka notebook) by your bed means you can write down any nagging thoughts before you turn the light out, which is a great way to help you get a better nights sleep (one of the key ingredients to overall mental and physical good health).
9 . Tidy up a small something
In a similar vein to the inbox sorting, but IRL (that’s In Real Life, in case you didn’t know), getting on top of physical mess/chaos is a great antidote to mental tumult. Don’t set your aims too high (again unless you choose to, in which case if you have that much energy and would like to come over to my place…) just tackling one messy drawer, or the inside of your car (might be revealing too much about the state of my life there), will focus your brain on just one thing whilst you’re doing it, and make it, and you, feel so much calmer and better once it’s completed.
10. Breathe……
Obviously you’re doing this all the time, but taking deeper, more conscious breaths has been proved to be a super-effective way to combat stress, and therefore brain busyness. There are a number of different breathing techniques you could use. HERE are four that you can try. See what works best for you.
I do hope at least one, if not all, of those help you in those inevitable times when it all feels a bit much and your brain is going to explode if it has to cope with just one more thing to deal with or piece of information to absorb. Please do share your own brain calming tips in the comments.
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