Transforming Stress ~ Guest Article by Lennart Krogoll

As we travel through our day, figuratively or literally, we all encounter occasional experiences of anxiety or stress – sometimes light and subtle, at other times more obvious and tangible, or even traumatic. This is of course a natural part of our lives. It may be that the traffic does not run as smoothly as we would like or someone cut us off; or maybe we anticipate a difficult conversation and we keep test-running it through our head while busy with other things; or we might remember and re-live an unpleasant interchange or an old emotional wound gets triggered; or we don’t quite feel on top of our world and are inundated with demands we would rather not relate to.

All this is quite common and natural. Rather than rejecting them as obstacles, we can look into how these things can be turned into opportunities for us to grow and be more awake, effective, confident and resilient. However, often we do not notice how these stresses and stressors keep building up and settle into our system, creating tension or blockages. Even very minor amounts of stress and anxiety have an effect on our physical energy, our health and stamina. They also affect our cognitive faculties – how attentive, intentional and effective we interact and re-act. They reduce our emotional intelligence, relaxation and presence, how open and heartfelt we can be for others and in the moment.

If we were ignoring these messages, or pushing them aside with medication and distraction, it would be like removing the light bulb from the little warning lamp in our car, which informs us that it is time to replenish the oil.

Various ancient methods cultivate and direct our inherent capacity for mindfulness and awareness of mind, body and heart. Modern science has recently discovered that these techniques afford us to notice, accept and relieve physical, mental and emotional stress, disturbance and even trauma.

Not only can we relieve current and old stress, re-opening and energizing our channels, but these simple techniques also help us to mange stress ‘as it happens’, on the spot, and give us tools to prepare for situations of stress and develop greater relaxation and resilience.

We can actually enjoy applying simple, elemental wake up ‘tools’, while walking down the street, sitting at the computer or having a conversation – making any moment more delightful and meaningful.   

Lennart will be teaching about stress, mindfulness and using the wake up "tools" mentioned above at our yoga studio in November:

http://yogastudio.ns.ca/workshops.htm#lennart