The Ultimate Stress Relief Cheat Sheet
If you can stop your nervous system from trying protect you, you can lessen your pain and quell your anxiety.
Hello reader! I’m Meredith Arthur. I work as a Chief of Staff for Pinterest’s product incubation studio and am the founder of Beautiful Voyager, a content and community site for overthinkers, people pleasers, and perfectionists.
I first started my journey into mental health research in 2015 when the neurologist treating my migraines diagnosed me with Generalized Anxiety Disorder. At the time, I found the Google results for “what is an anxiety disorder?” sorely lacking and I created Beautiful Voyager to fill the gap. My curiosity only deepened as I asked the same question over and over: Why didn’t I ever know that anxiety was contributing to the terrible physical symptoms (migraines, nausea, fainting, back pain, cramping) I was experiencing?
In 2016 I expanded my research by taking over the editor-in-chief role for Medium’s largest mental health publication, editing hundreds of personal mental health essays from people around the world. In 2020, just three months into the COVID pandemic, I published my first book on anxiety. That same year, I started working on the nonprofit How We Feel app with Ben Silbermann and Dr Marc Brackett. Since then, thanks to my partnership with the Pinterest social impact team, I’ve gotten to know the founders of many mental health nonprofits and stayed close to new trends in the space. It’s an ongoing journey that I find fascinating both on a personal level and a societal one.
Why a stress relief cheat sheet?
My understanding of anxiety has changed radically over the past nine years of curious investigation. I’ve explored many schools of thought and approaches to anxiety treatment. Take a look at how my answers to the questions “Why didn’t I know that I was suffering from anxiety?” and “Is anxiety connected to the terrible physical symptoms I’m experiencing?” have evolved over time:
2015: I don’t care why I didn’t know. I want to know why the therapists I saw didn’t know.
2017: Seems like, in the field of mental health, you need to know what’s wrong with you for people to be able to help you. At least I have Lexapro now.
2019: I guess I hid it so well that I unintentionally hid it from myself? I still have physical symptoms. I continue to be grateful for Lexapro, which helps me turn down the thermostat on my internal environment, especially on anxious mornings.
2021: I am still really sick—nausea, muscle aches, migraines, lightheadedness. Is anxiety connected to the physical pain I am in? I still don’t get it. COVID hasn’t helped.
2023: After a year spent in bed, something finally helped: I had a hysterectomy. I’m grateful to see a decrease in my physical symptoms, but I am still in pain. I don’t know what to do next. I suspect my nervous system plays a role here.
2024: I finally get it —I have spent a lifetime in a state of nervous system dysregulation. I believe I can improve my physical and mental health by regulating my nervous system. My pain is diminishing. It’s a daily practice, but I am healing.
I’m writing this cheat sheet to help you skip some of the steps I labored through over the years. Everything I share here is an honest recounting of what’s working for me based on personal experience.
Who you are
If you’re reading this, I’m assuming you’re a fellow voyager, a curious overthinker learning to navigate the choppy waters of stress and anxiety from other wayfaring overthinkers.
The philosophy behind this cheat sheet
If you can stop your nervous system from clumsily trying protect you, you can lessen your pain and quell your anxiety. Teaching yourself that you are safe is where this work begins. It’s as hard as it sounds. Your nervous system’s off switch is buried within a sea of internal confusion. (I’m simplifying the nervous system here — there’s no simple on and off switch. Your nervous system is more like fancy LED lights. The switch allows you to change the color and flashing patterns of the lights so that you can give yourself the right lights at the right time. No one needs fluorescent disco lights at 9 AM on a Monday morning. )
To become skillful at using the switch, you must find a path through the internal cacophony and learn which part of yourself to listen to when. A great place to start is with actionable nervous system regulation tactics.
Let’s get started.
Every technique I’m including has the same goal: to teach your body that you are safe. The best approach to all nervous system regulation is “little and often.” In other words, these are exercises that you can do in the moment to send messages of safety to your body (which, in turn, will send them to your mind and help you feel better overall).
Start with foundational, everyday practices.
If you start reading about nervous system regulation, it won’t be long until you start hearing about the “window of tolerance.” Your window of tolerance is, quite simply, your ability to tolerate the challenges of daily life. It’s your body’s ability to move from a hyper-aroused (fight or flight) or hypo-aroused (withdrawn, frozen) back to a more grounded self and place. If you’re interested in learning more about these three states, a great place to start is Stanley Rosenburg’s book on polyvagal theory. These daily practices build your window of tolerance so that you can recover more quickly and easily from nervous system arousal. (The nervous system exists to protect us. It is doing its job by going into an aroused state. The goal is to build a window of tolerance that lets you handle these inevitable daily stressors gracefully and intentionally, without your system being hijacked without you knowing it.)
1. Somatics
I’ve come to think of my daily somatic practice as meditation with movement. Every morning I unroll my yoga mat and follow one of Sarah Warren’s online classes, usually first thing in the morning, in order to release muscle tension and teach my body what relaxed is supposed to feel like. I recommend starting with her level one course. It is a guided experience that builds upon itself every day, costs $45, and take two months to complete. It takes around 20-30 minutes a day.
2. Polyvagal exercises
I bundle the following three lateral eye-movement exercises with my morning practice. They are adapted from Accessing the Healing Power of the Vagus Nerve by Stanley Rosenberg. Critics will tell you that we don’t yet understand the mechanism that makes this kind of exercise work, warning you to sidestep the hype. While I support a healthy dose of skepticism in all wellness endeavors, it doesn’t hurt you to give them a try as they are easy and totally free. I’ve definitely found them helpful for releasing my trapezius muscle and easing my morning anxiety.
The Basic Exercise
Sit tall wherever you are.
Interlace your hands and clasp the back of your head between your ears, sending your amygdala a message of safety.
With your EYES ONLY, look to the right and hold.
Breathe, relax, and allow your body to soften.
Hold 30-60 seconds until you yawn or feel an internal shift. It can take practice to learn to feel this shift, but the yawn is a dead giveaway that this is working.
Repeat on the left side.
Seated Salamander Exercise
I like to do this exercise on my heads and knees so that gravity helps me breath out with my belly. You can also do it sitting up. Whatever works for you to get the release.
With your EYES ONLY, look to the right and hold.
Allow your right ear to melt towards the right shoulder (not turning your head).
Breathe, relax, allow your head to be heavy and you body to soften.
Hold 30-60 seconds until you yawn or feel an internal shift. It can take practice to learn to feel this shift, but the yawn is a dead giveaway that this is working.
Repeat on the left side.
Sphinx with Head Turn
Lay on your belly and prop yourself up on your elbows with your chest and head facing forward.
Anchor your pelvis by pressing down through the pubic bone.
Draw your shoulders down out of your ears and extend your neck naturally (don’t look up too much).
Turn your head to look over your right shoulder and hold for 1 minute. Again, ou are looking for that yawn or internal shift into ease.
Repeat exercise looking over left shoulder.
3. Brecka breath
I do this practice every morning as part of my somatics/polyvagal routine. It was recommended by a somatic teacher who said, “It may look and feel a bit bro-y, but if you are oxygen-deprived due to stomach gripping or tension myositis syndrome, this kind of breathing can help you.”
What separates this practice from others, as far as I can tell, is the intentional pause you take between rounds of breath. In this special pause you relax and tune into the sounds of the world around you. Stay in that space for a few beats before slowly inhaling, exhaling, then returning to the next round. It took me a while to catch the hang of it, but now I really love that pause.
How to Brecka breathe
When just getting started, do 3 rounds of 10 breaths.
Inhale deeply as shown in the video. Exhale naturally. Do this breath 10 times in a row.
Let your shoulders rise as you breathe in. Fill your chest and belly on the inhale. Allow the exhale to follow the inhale without overthinking it.
Once you have finishes one round of 10 breaths, pause on the inhale. Do not exhale.
Tune into the sounds around you and try not to tense up as you hold the breath. Relax into the feeling. Check out the video to see what this looks like.
Once you’ve held that inhale as long as you can, slowly inhale and exhale, then get ready for round two.
Do another round of 10 breaths, same as above, then pause again on the inhale.
Repeat one last time.
Over time, build to 3 rounds of 30 breaths.
4. Mindset/emotion check-in
Every day I set aside at least 10 minutes to “tidy” my mindset. Depending on the day, I do this by journaling or sitting quietly in the sun. The goal is the same — to create the internal space to understand what’s happening that day on a deeper emotional level.
I use Nicole Sachs’ approach to journaling. It’s called Journal Speak. When you sit down to Journal Speak, your goal is to speak directly from the emotion itself, unmediated by thought or analysis. This is radically different from the way I journaled throughout my 20s, which was filled with overthinking and self-analysis. Remember, many of us unintentionally suppress and avoid emotions we perceive as negative. When we give voice to unconscious negative emotions, we’re defanging them and soothing our nervous systems.
When I’m not in the right place to journal, I do this same practice without paper, sitting quietly in the sun to tune into the negative chatter in my head. I try to feel the emotions surfacing in my body. I allow myself to rest in uncomfortable emotional spaces. This is not easy but I know that it’s important: By teaching myself emotions aren’t as scary as they seem, I am regaining control of my nervous system’s master switch. Once I’ve done that enough, I send soothing mantras/phrases to the parts of my internal self that are complaining the loudest.
5. Afternoon gear shift
Nervous system regulation is best practiced in small and frequent ways. It’s important to learn to shift gears periodically throughout the work day — moving from the sympathetic part of the system (“flight or fight”) to the ventral (“safety and connection”).
Learning to relax in between tasks is another way of mastering your nervous system’s light switch.5 I do this by taking a quick moment in the middle of the day to connect with nature. This could be 5 minutes spent in my backyard, a small walk up and down the street examining tree leaves, or sitting and petting my dogs. I tell myself, “It’s OK to coast sometimes. I don’t always need to be in overdrive.”
I’m a broken record but will say one more time: the goal is to teach yourself that you are safe. If you are able to do that, your entire system can relax, your pain will be lessened, and your anxiety will plummet.
Exercises for difficult moments
Everyday practices are great, but what should you do when you’re facing something hard? Ground, Orient, Resource.
Ground yourself by becoming aware of your feet on the ground or the seat under you. Orient yourself by selecting five things in your immediate environment to focus on, spotting details like color, form, and texture. Resource yourself by finding a small action that tells your nervous system you are safe. If any of these exercises resonate with you, they can act as your resources when you need them.
1. In-the-moment mantra
Too often overthinkers want to fix everything at once, and while that is a nice idea, it’s not always realistic. Having a phrase or mantra you say to yourself is a way to shift your mindset in the moment when you need it.
What makes a good mantra
It has to be a phrase you truly believe — your nervous system will know if you’re faking it
It should be powerful enough to interrupt unproductive or negative thinking
It should be connected to a topic that tends to cause you stress
Examples of mantras I currently use
“I am allowed to have a vacation from [insert issue].”
“I know that future me has [insert issue] covered, so I am going to let this go for now.”
“If I keep thinking this way, I will only get sicker. Instead, I am going to imagine a future in which I’ve solved [insert issue]. I will envision this future in detail and allow that feeling of peace to wash over me.”
2. Belly breathing
If you are a stomach gripper, this is a crucial exercise for your nervous system. Most belly breathing exercises tell you to push your belly out when you inhale. That description never worked for me — I didn’t understand it mechanically. Instead, I have taught myself to visualize the diaphragm in order to understand the mechanics of the breath.
Your diaphragm is a muscle below your lungs, represented here with a dark red line.
Think of your diaphragm as an upside-down-bowl that turns into a plate as it contracts, sucking air into the lungs via the vacuum it creates as it pushes itself flat. Since this muscle pushes down on the top of your belly as air enters your lungs, your belly sticks out. After inhaling, you allow your diaphragm to relax back into its upside-down bowl and naturally exhale. Belly breathing is not about pushing your belly out. It’s about allowing your diaphragm to contract (inhale, think of the diaphragm as flat plate pushing down) then relax (exhale, the diaphragm returns to its upside-down bowl state).
How to belly breathe when faced with stressful situation
Start by releasing all tension in your upper belly. Pop your belly out on purpose to loosen up. Do this in any position, wherever you are.
Next, imagine your diaphragm turning into a flat plate as it pushes down on your belly and you inhale. Your belly now pushes out due to the inhale.
Inhale for a count of 5 or 7. Your belly should feel big and free. Pause for a moment at the top of the inhale.
Now allow your diaphragm-plate to return to its natural curved upside-down bowl state as you exhale. Your belly will go in. Hold on to the feeling of looseness even with the exhale.
3. The Basic Exercise
In addition to being a great foundational practice to build your window of tolerance, this polyvagal exercise is great in the moment when you’re feeling stress.
Sit tall wherever you are.
Interlace your hands and clasp the back of your head between your ears, sending your amygdala a message of safety.
With your EYES ONLY, look to the right and hold.
Breathe, relax, and allow your body to soften.
Hold 30-60 seconds until you yawn or feel an internal shift. It can take practice to learn to feel this shift, but the yawn is a dead giveaway that this is working.
Repeat on the left side.
4. Neck massage using oil
This one is simple — I take a few drops of this scented vagus nerve scented oil and rub my neck and ears with it. I spend a couple of minutes trying to release tension in the sides of my neck and follow the patterns recommended for my specific migraine pattern as illustrated in Stanley Rosenberg’s book.
Whew, that’s a lot!
If you’re still reading this, good work. This stuff is not easy. Whether you’re at the beginning of your journey or a seasoned mindbody traveler, I would love to hear from you. Write me in the comments and let’s help each other along the way.
Recommended Reading
The Pain Relief Secret: How to Retrain Your Nervous System, Heal Your Body, and Overcome Chronic Pain by Sarah Warren
Accessing the Healing Power of the Vagus Nerve: Self-Help Exercises for Anxiety, Depression, Trauma, and Autism by Stanley Rosenberg
The Mindbody Prescription by Dr John Sarno
Recommended Listening
The Cure for Chronic Pain Podcast with Nicole Sachs
SOMA: Releasing Muscle Tension and Reliving Chronic Pain with Clinical Somatics Podcast with Sarah Warren
Using Polyvagal Theory to Balance the Nervous System on The Adult Chair Podcast with Michelle Chalfant
