Self-soothing activities are the things that we do to calm down or relax after a stressful event. If we have suffered trauma in our lives, we may need to learn these activities or practice them. Following traumatic events, we may have a more difficult time than others when it comes to dealing with stress. Some of us might have never learned how to self-soothe as children if we grew up in a dysfunctional household. We might be a little more high-strung or overreact to stress more than those without a traumatic background. We can start to bring more self-soothing activities into our lives to help us calm down more quickly. Try some of these activities when feeling stressed or overwhelmed:
- Use your hands to work through tense muscles in your body (especially the neck and shoulder area) and give yourself a massage
- Hold or hug yourself!
- Get some exercise and movement: go out for a walk, do some stretching, jumping jacks, anything to get your body moving
- Drink a hot cup of tea or even just a glass of water can help you de-stress
- Use positive self-talk and tell yourself that everything will be alright
- Light a scented candle and focus on the scent
- Rock yourself back and forth as you hold yourself
- Visualize something you enjoy, like your favorite place to be or a beautiful sunset
These techniques can help you self-soothe when feeling stressed. We can complete many of these activities, no matter where we are! Use these to ease your stress and calm yourself down.
Self-soothing techniques can help you de-stress when you feel overly anxious or excitable. You may have never learned these techniques as a child and can use them to help yourself now. If you have a history of trauma, you might want to consider integrating some of these activities into your life. They can help you relax and calm down with ease. Following trauma, we might experience stress more intensely than others. We might need to learn what our triggers are and how to manage them for long-term success. Self-soothing can be a way of managing triggers by helping us calm down before things get worse. Many of these activities can be completed without any special equipment. Try some of these things right now to practice and see how you feel. That way, you can be better prepared when you are stressed and unable to think clearly to cope. The Guest House can help those suffering from trauma with our treatment programs. We are here to support you. Call us at (855) 483-7800 for more information.