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Posts tagged with “stress”

8 Things Not to Say to Someone Who’s Struggling with Anxiety

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“Sometimes just being there is enough.” ~Unknown

It felt like I couldn’t breathe. Like someone was holding me by the neck, against a wall, and the floor might drop beneath us at any moment.

I’m describing a panic attack, but this has actually happened to me before—being held by the neck against a wall, that is, not the other part. Growing up I experienced many moments like that, moments when I felt unsafe, physically and emotionally.

There were countless experiences that reinforced to me, over the years, that I couldn’t let my guard down, because at any moment I …

Becoming Less Reactive

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How to Make Things Better When It Seems Like Everything Is Going Wrong

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“You can never be happy if you’re trapped in the past and fearful of the future. Living in the present is the only way to be happy.” ~Unknown

Have you found that the local and world events of the last couple of years have taken their toll on you and your family and friends? With fires, floods, shortages of food, fuel, and medicine, illnesses, job losses, and more, all occurring in a short space of time, it can be hard to find anyone who has not been affected in some way.

Many people are experiencing feelings of hopelessness and living …

How to Let Go of Your Need to Be Informed at all Times

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“Don’t mistake being informed by trusting what you hear or read in the news. The most trusted information is what you feel in your gut.” ~Charles F Glassman

I was in my kitchen enjoying breakfast when a report about a murder was mentioned as one of the headlines on the radio news.

One of my boys started to ask me questions, none of which I could answer. They were questions about a detail of the murder, which I didn’t know, and also about bigger life issues, which at 7 a.m., I was struggling to get my head around.

I chose …

A Gentle Reminder to Anyone Who’s Struggling This Holiday Season

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“It’s okay to want to be alone. It’s okay to take time for yourself.” ~Kate Allan

It’s the holiday season, the most wonderful time of the year, they say, but it’s not for all of us. For those of us coping with the loss of a loved one, family estrangement, loneliness, financial difficulties, or health struggles, the holidays can be one of the hardest times of the year.

For some of us the holidays can feel as if we have been cast out in the cold. As if we are forced to look through a window of a happy, …

How I Got Sober and What I Now Know About the Impacts of Alcohol

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“Sometimes deciding who you are is deciding who you’ll never be again.” ~Anonymous

May 13th, 2011. I finally surrendered to the fact that I had a drinking problem and desperately needed help. The comments from acquaintances, the concern from friends, the complaints from my flatmates, the intensity of my depression, the conversations with my therapist—they all culminated in the decision that I had to break the chains from my liquid abuser.

It was one of the hardest decisions of my life, one that entailed waving goodbye to the life that I had led before and diving into a …

Stay in the Right Lane: Let Yourself Slow Down and Enjoy Life

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“I don’t want to get to the end of my life and find that I lived just the length of it. I want to have lived the width of it as well.” ~Diane Ackerman

Wow! My last weeks of my career. Though many days and weeks over the last thirty-four years have seemed to last forever, it truly is astonishing how fast time goes. And don’t we often try to make it go even faster?

Our jobs are stressful. We are often under tight time constraints and deadlines. We have clients and associates who want and need things yesterday.

We …

The 5 Happiness Zappers and What Helps Me Cope with Them

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“Emotion in itself is not unhappiness. Only emotion plus an unhappy story is unhappiness.” ~Eckhart Tolle

When my mother told me, “Honey, you don’t understand; you can’t,” initially I felt like she was being condescending.

It was Mother’s Day and, unbeknownst to me, the last time I’d see her before her final hospital visit.

We’d spent that Saturday updating her computer, watching waves at the beach, and picking up seashells, then eating dinner at a popular local restaurant frequented by travelers, including famous musicians on tour buses because of its location off of the interstate.

By early evening, we were …

How I Stopped Carrying the Weight of the World and Started Enjoying Life

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“These mountains that you are carrying, you were only supposed to climb.” ~Najwa Zebian

During a personal development course, one of my first assignments was to reach out to three friends and ask them to list my top three qualities. It was to help me see myself the way others saw me.

At the time, my confidence was low and I couldn’t truly see myself. I didn’t remember who I was or what I wanted. The assignment was a way to rebuild my self-esteem and see myself from a broader perspective.

As I vulnerably asked and then received the responses, …

5 Ways to Use Movement (Not Exercise) to Support Your Mental Health

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“Nothing is more revealing than movement.” ~Martha Graham

It seems like only yesterday that I was at home with a newborn, a kindergartener, two dogs, and a husband who, just like me, was working from home, when we were thrown into the unthinkable COVID19 pandemic.

It didn’t take long for the stress and tension to build in my body. The feeling of instability, uncertainty, and fear, not to mention the post-partum anxiety, took its toll on my body as it became more rigid, bound, immobile, and frozen.

All the ways I had relied on movement as exercise were taken away, …

Make “None of My Business” Your Mantra

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Get the full 30-Day Take Your Power Back Challenge here! And get Tiny Buddha’s Inner Strength Journal here.

4 Anxiety-Calming Techniques I Wish I Used When I Freaked Out on a Plane

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“When thinking about life, remember this: No amount of guilt can solve the past, and no amount of anxiety can change the future.” ~Unknown

I was buckled in on a small, twenty-person airplane, and we were heading toward the runway, when I looked out the window and saw the airplane wheel was wobbling.

I gathered my courage, unbuckled my seatbelt, and approached the flight attendant, who told me to sit back down.

“I think there’s something wrong with the wheel,” I said.

He looked out the window and said, “It’s fine.” But then he radioed the pilot, who turned the …

5 Simple Yet Essential Self-Care Tips That Can Change Your Life

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“Never be ashamed to say, ‘I’m worn out. I’ve had enough. I need some time for myself.’ That isn’t being selfish. That isn’t being weak. That’s being human.” ~Topher Kearby

Years ago, my extended family, who I am very close with, migrated from Vietnam to America as permanent residents. Four separate families had a couple of kids in each family. They are nice, kind, and loving people, and their kids were super cute and respectful.

My relationship with my extended family has taught me a lot of lessons throughout my life so far, but this was one of the most …

My Dad Died From Depression: This Is How I Coped with His Suicide

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“Grief is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.” ~Jamie Anderson

When I was seventeen, my dad died from depression. This is now almost twenty-two years ago.

The first fifteen years after his death, however, I’d say he died from a disease—which is true, I just didn’t want to say it was a psychological disease. Cancer, people probably assumed.

I …

How Mindfulness Made Me an Empowered Introvert (and How It Can Help You)

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“Introverts live in two worlds: We visit the world of people, but solitude and the inner world will always be our home.” ~Jenn Granneman, The Secret Lives of Introverts: Inside Our Hidden World

Never at any point in my life did I think I was an introvert. I always thought I was just a regular kid flowing with life’s experiences just like everyone else, and there was nothing strange about me.

That was until I started being told I was too quiet, serious-faced, shy, and a nerd. I liked, and still do like, my own space and doing …

How to Enjoy Life Without Buying Lots of Stuff

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“Minimalism isn’t about removing the things you love. It’s about removing the things that distract you from the things you love.” ~Joshua Becker

Over the recent few years of being a digital nomad, I got a chance to live in Spain, Sri Lanka, Mexico, and Canada for a month or longer. As I didn’t have a home base and only had one medium-sized suitcase with me (still do), I couldn’t really afford to buy new things.

I mean, I would need to put them somewhere, and my suitcase is already over forty-five pounds while most airlines only allow up to …

Why I Broke Down Mentally While Striving for Work/Life Balance

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“Maybe it’s time for the fighter to be fought for, the holder to be held, and the lover to be loved.” ~Unknown

I was breastfeeding my infant son when he bit me. That bite set the stage for a deeper unraveling then I could have ever imagined.

I unlatched him, handed him to my husband, and got in my car. As I was driving I began to lose the feeling in my hands and feet. My vision started to blur, and my breathing was fast and shallow. I was terrified I was not going to make it back home. …

Free Thich Nhat Hanh Audio Series: Living Without Stress or Fear

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When you think of the teachers who’ve had the greatest impact on your life, who comes to mind?

For me, it’s the calm, the humble, the patient—the people who not only imparted useful life lessons but also embodied their message with their grace and equanimity. People I was fortunate enough to know personally, like my grandmother, and others I never met that brought me clarity and peace from afar, like the inimitable Thich Nhat Hanh.

Thay, as his students called him, was a Vietnamese Zen monk, author, poet, peacemaker, and founder of the “engaged Buddhism” movement—the act of leveraging our …

How to Mindfully Temper Road Rage and Make Driving Less Stressful

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“Smile, breathe, and go slowly.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

As a Lyft driver, I once spent significant time out on the road—a setting rife with provocations and stressors.

Driving can feel like a constant challenge to employ mindfulness instead of giving way to destructive emotions like impatience and frustration. Meditation can be difficult to practice when you’re navigating a vehicle (demanding as both activities are of your full attention)—try channeling all your senses into it, and you’ll likely plow over a pedestrian or end with your car in a ditch.

Navigating the road mindfully, though, doesn’t have to mean closing your …

Feeling Burnt Out? How to Slow Down and Reclaim Your Peace

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“Burnout is a sign that something needs to change.” ~Sarah Forgrave

Fifteen years ago, my doctor informed me I was in the early stages of adrenal exhaustion. In no uncertain terms, she warned that if I failed to address the stress I was under, my adrenals might not recover. This was hard to hear, but it forced me to face the fact that eating well, exercising religiously, and keeping up with the latest research on wellness was not enough.

I had to ask myself a defining question that day: Am I ready to go down with the ship?

At the …