Breathing & Visualizing Exercises
Breathing is life or death. Breathing brings balance to our life between the stressful events and leisure activities. The Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) awakes the body and mind for intense action and fires up our "fight, flight, or freeze" response. In contrast, the Parasympathetic Nervous System (PNS) calms the mind and fires up our "rest and digest" response when stress is not a seen as a threat. In sum, breathing calms our brain and balances our mind-body connection.
Visualizing exercises allow one to see into the future and bring back either a failed experience or a successful outcome. Whether one is aware or not, these visualizing activities also bring back the accompanying emotions----negative or positive. Visualizing allows one to feel as though she has been there before, thus, allowing her to respond to novel stress as though she is confident in this specific situation. In sum, visualizing calms nerves and builds confidence by allowing one to respond in a "state of flow" rather than a state of thinking or overthinking.
Breathing is life or death. Breathing brings balance to our life between the stressful events and leisure activities. The Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) awakes the body and mind for intense action and fires up our "fight, flight, or freeze" response. In contrast, the Parasympathetic Nervous System (PNS) calms the mind and fires up our "rest and digest" response when stress is not a seen as a threat. In sum, breathing calms our brain and balances our mind-body connection.
Visualizing exercises allow one to see into the future and bring back either a failed experience or a successful outcome. Whether one is aware or not, these visualizing activities also bring back the accompanying emotions----negative or positive. Visualizing allows one to feel as though she has been there before, thus, allowing her to respond to novel stress as though she is confident in this specific situation. In sum, visualizing calms nerves and builds confidence by allowing one to respond in a "state of flow" rather than a state of thinking or overthinking.