Relaxation Techniques to Reduce Stress

While stress may be a part of life, we could all use some support to prevent stress-related health issues and protect long-term mental health and physical wellness. If your body can’t relax from the stress-based fight or flight survival mode, your natural healing abilities and immune defenses become blocked, leaving you susceptible for infections, chronic conditions, fatigue and burnout to take over.  

These healthy relaxation tips are proven to help reduce stress, improve mental health, and increase your resilience to stress when it happens. They work by balancing inflammation responses, supporting neurological and brain function, detoxifying stress hormones, and improving your body’s tolerance for stress.  

Research shows that regular exercise helps detoxify extra fight-or-flight stress hormones, including adrenaline and cortisol, that impact your systems when you’re overloaded with stress. Daily exercise also stimulates endorphins, the brain chemicals that boost mood, reduce stress and relax your mind and body. With exercise, you can help improve your tolerance to future stress, promoting balanced mental health and mood.¹ 

Walking in nature can significantly reduce stress levels, mindset, and support mental and physical relaxation. Walking is a powerful yet gentle way to exercise your body, without causing inflammatory wear and tear that can come with more intense workouts. Research shows that even just a 20 minute walk in a natural setting can reduce stress hormones and improve biomarkers of inflammation.² 

Stress causes your heart rate to increase and makes breathing more difficult, shallow, and rapid. Slow, deep breathing exercises can help reduce stress by calming your nervous system, slowing down your heart rate, relaxing blood pressure, and providing nourishment and oxygen to cells, tissues and organs. Deep, slow breathing can be done as part of a meditation, yoga or other exercise routine, or on its own as a powerful stress-relief practice. 

Proper hydration is essential for every area of health—including stress and mood support. Aim for at least 8 glasses of water each day to help flush out toxins and stress hormones and prevent stress-fueled dehydration from damaging your body.³  

Inflammation drives stress, and vice-versa, creating a destructive stress cycle in your body that can fuel chronic health conditions. Reducing inflammation with a healthy diet is proven to improve mood and stress responses by providing essential vitamins, minerals and antioxidants that relax and nourish the brain and nervous system, detoxify stress hormones, and balance blood sugar to keep mood and energy levels stable.

Try these stress relief ingredients:  

Dark chocolate: A 2009 study showed that daily consumption of dark chocolate lowered stress hormones in the body. Dark chocolate is high in the stress-relieving mineral magnesium, as well as powerful antioxidants to reduce inflammation and improve neurological health.⁴ 

Complex carbs: Sweet potato, quinoa, brown rice, and steel-cut oats are examples of complex carbohydrates that help stabilize blood sugar levels, improve mood and reduce stress responses from blood sugar crashes.⁵ 

Bananas: Rich in potassium, dopamine and B-vitamins, bananas nourish the brain and nervous system with important stress-reducing nutrients.⁶ 

Omega-3 fats: Fatty cold water fish like salmon and sardines, and nuts and seeds like flax, chia, and walnuts, are rich in omega-3 fatty acids, which reduce stress hormones, boost mood, and support healthy hormone balance and brain health.⁷ 

Besides your diet, natural ingredients in supplements are proven to reduce stress, improve mood, calm your mind and support healthy inflammation responses in the brain and body.  

HonoPure is a relaxation, mood and sleep support supplement that crosses the blood-brain barrier and provides advanced benefits for healthy stress and inflammation responses, cognitive function, mood, and stress relief. Extracted from magnolia bark using a special CO2 method, HonoPure delivers the highest potency and purity honokiol extract that’s shown in research to offer a wide range of benefits for neurological health, mood and relaxation, antioxidant activity, and mental health.* 

While stress is a natural part of life, we need to find ways to relax our alarm systems so we can heal and thrive. These natural evidence-based relaxation and stress management and relief tips work to balance stress responses and create calm and clarity—for greater long-term health and wellness, and relaxing days ahead. 

Sources:

1. Emma childs, Harriet de Wit. Regular Exercise is associated with emotional resilience to acute stress in healthy adults. Frontiers in Physiology. 2014; 5: 161. 
2. Hunter, MaryCarol R., Gillespie, Brenda W., Chen, Sophie Yu-Pu. Urban nature experiences reduce stress in the context of daily life based on salivary biomarkers. Frontiers in Psychology, 2019. 
3. Castro-Sepulveda M, Ramirez-Campillo R, Abad-Colil F, Monje C, Peñailillo L, Cancino J, Zbinden-Foncea H. Basal Mild Dehydration Increase Salivary Cortisol After a Friendly Match in Young Elite Soccer Players. Front Physiol. 2018 Sep 26;9:1347.  
4. Ahmed Al Sunni and Rabia Latif. Effects of chocolate intake on perceived stress; a controlled clinical study. International Journal of Health Science website. 2014 Oct; 8(4): 393–401. Accessed September 25, 2020.
5. Naidoo, U. Nutritional strategies to ease anxiety. Harvard Health Publishing, Harvard Medical School website. April 13, 2016 Updated August 29, 2019. Accessed Aug 10, 2021.
6. Singh B, Singh JP, Kaur A, Singh N. Bioactive compounds in banana and their associated health benefits - A review. Food Chem. 2016 Sep 1;206:1-11. doi: 10.1016/j.foodchem.2016.03.033. Epub 2016 Mar 11. PMID: 27041291.
7. Maria Alessandra Gamonne, Graziano Riccioni, Gaspare Parrinello, Nicolnantonio D’Orazio. Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids: benefits and endpoints in sport. Nutrients. 2019 Jan; 11(1) : 46.