One Choice That Is Still Yours: How You Choose To Feel

After your health, and the health & survival of those you love, the most important thing you have control over right now is your ‘inside’ – your internal, emotional state.

The way you FEEL.

It’s the part of you that isn’t visible to those around you (unless it boils over or seeps out).

It’s the part you exist in all day, every day.

It’s the part that’s (relatively) easy to hide from others by showing them our ‘outside’ face, which can look completely calm and in control even though what you’re experiencing internally can feel stressed, panicked, out of control.

We show people our ‘outside’ but we live in our ‘inside’.

That’s not very nice if your inside is in a state of stress and overwhelm. An easy place to be right now.

What happens when you’re in stress mode

When you’re in stress mode, your nervous system revs you up, stimulates secretion of stress hormones, makes you think fast, breathe fast, tense your muscles and puts you on high alert. It’s an all-encompassing survival-critical state. Very helpful for cavemen. Less so for us 21st century humans, who tend to get stuck in it. Endlessly.

Being stuck in a stressed state worsens chronic health conditions like IBS, high blood pressure, headaches, palpitations, insomnia, pain, and makes you prone to weight gain, skin conditions, recurrent infections, low energy, anxiety, low mood or even depression. Stress also lowers the immune system.

In stress mode, we overthink, get lost in negative self-talk, get irritated easily, and are unable to relax, concentrate, or remember things. We lose our joy.

We cope less well with the big stuff. And the small stuff.

How do you feel right now?

How would you like to your inside to look?

Who benefits or suffers as a result of the way you feel?

How would you choose to feel, if you could choose?

Choosing your internal state is totally possible.

Choosing your state is very simple, very soothing and very well studied:

When you’re in a relaxed state, your mind is calm, your mood is balanced, you are focused and productive, more resilient, sleep more soundly and feel more refreshed.

Your levels of the stress hormone cortisol reduce

When you’re in a calm state, your immune system is robust, wounds heal better, you are less inflamed, your heart and digestion function better.

When you are peaceful, your brain changes – more blood flow and more super-calming alpha brainwaves; the ones you really need right now.

Your relaxed state is one side of your nervous system – that’s the naturally calming, restoring, conserving parasympathetic part of your nervous system.

The other side of your nervous system is called sympathetic. Only it isn’t kind and sympathetic at all; it gets us in a right old state.

You cannot change what is happening around the world right now. You can spend the next few months in a state of high stress and anxiety, or you can learn how to choose to spend it in a calm state.

But you can change your internal state – not just for this crisis, but forever.

You can choose your internal emotional state.

I learnt how to do it 25 years ago, and it changed my life.

I’ve been teaching this 121 for the last 16 years. Now we need it on a bigger scale.

You can:

Choose to learn HOW to induce a feeling of calm inside.

Choose to learn a simple skill that’ll last you a lifetime.

Choose to change your state, it’s one of the only things we CAN choose right now.

Calm or stressed. The choice is yours. I know which one I choose.

Want to know more? Add your name to the list for the next free relaxation session here now

Or, book a free 15 minute call with Sara to find out how naturopathy and herbal medicine can help you to feel calmer, more often, and how to manage anxiety so it doesn't overwhelm you and take over your life