Get Quick Results from These Short, Stress-Relieving Workouts

Stress affects a vast percentage of the world's population. Mental stress is considered to be the underlying reason for many of today's psychological and physiological problems; it affects our temper, causes mood swings, affects our relationships and causes health issues such as blood pressure, diabetes and migraines. Physical stress comes from strenuous physical activity or over-working. Both forms of stress may cause physical pain or may create mental fatigue or anxiety.

It is important to make conscious and timely efforts to overcome stress and prevent these problems. There are many kinds of stress-relieving workouts - cardio exercises like walking, running, swimming, etc., Yoga, meditation, simply listening to soothing music, pursuing a hobby - all these can be very effective. But many require you to set aside at least 30 minutes of time for your workout. Let us look at some short Yoga and meditation based workouts and can be easily incorporated in a busy schedule. Here are six 5-10 minute stress-relieving workouts that tackle both mentally and physically created stress very effectively.

Stress-relieving workouts: Ocean-breathing (Ujjayi pranayam) - Here you inhale and exhale through the nose. Constrict the glottis (aperture of the throat) that regulates the amount of air going in and coming out. With the constriction, the inhalation and exhalation produce a long hissing sound like the waves of the ocean. In this style of breathing, the upper throat feels the passage of the air. Now for each breath, follow the pattern given below.

1. Inhale and fill your abdomen with air for 4 seconds.
2. Hold for 4 seconds.
3. Gently exhale the air over a duration of 6 seconds.
4. Hold for 2 seconds.
5. Repeat. Practice at least 3 sets of 15 cycles of inhalation and exhalation of the ocean-breaths.

During the workout, keep your spine erect. Preferably practice in the Thunderbolt Yoga pose (Vajrasan) where you sit on your knees and your buttocks are rested on your feet. Do not force air in or out - keep the process gentle. With practice you can eliminate the hissing noise.

The breathing improves oxygen intake in the body and calms down an agitated mind. It brings down an accelerated heart-rate and pulse-rate. It also helps with headaches and migraine (Light on Pranayama by B.K.S. Iyengar).

Stress-relieving workouts: Bellows-breathing (Bhastrika pranayam) - This is a forceful form of exhalation of air - like the way bellows blow air out. Breathe through your nose. Sit with spine erect and head held straight for your workout, preferably in the Thunderbolt Yoga pose. Follow the steps listed below.

1. Inhale normally. As you inhale raise both arms swiftly to point to the sky.
2. Exhale air forcefully and quickly with a brief hissing sound. Let your arms drop under gravity and give you some extra force to empty the lungs.
3. Repeat. Practice 3 sets of 10-12 cycles of inhalation and exhalation of the bellows-breath.

Always practice ocean-breathing before you start with bellows-breathing. This make the transition to forceful breathing smooth. The first few times bellows-breathing can make you feel dizzy but with practice the dizziness goes away.

Bellows-breathing is a little rigorous but it empties the mind out of all thoughts and restless. It leaves you fresh and energized at the end of a practice. It clears congestion in the lungs and eases normal breathing. It also improves blood circulation. Do not do this workout if it worsens an existing headache (Light on Pranayama by B.K.S. Iyengar).

Stress-relieving workouts: Laughter Yoga - Laughter is the best medicine. Practice 4-5 minutes of laughing aloud everyday. It is a big stress-reliever. It is fun to do it in larger groups but can be practiced in solitude. There is no set procedure - think of things that can induce you to laugh aloud and keep it up continuously for the duration of your laughter-Yoga workout. Research has shown that laughter-Yoga workout improves blood circulation in the body and helps in dilating the blood vessels. It also helps in improving endocrinological functions of the body (http://www.umm.edu/news/releases/laughter2.htm).

Stress-relieving workouts: Watch your mind meditation - This is a form of meditation. For 5-10 minutes, simply watch your mind with awareness - watch your anger, guilt, frustration, pain, anxiety, etc. - watch your emotions without resistance or judgement. Accept your emotions and let them pass. They are bound to sail away like clouds in the sky. It in only when you hang on to a cloud, that you tend to be swept away by it.

It is about being effortless. This is not trivial - it is a workout that takes effort to be effortless. Practice helps. But irrespective of whether you are a novice or an expert, good results are experienced immediately. The mind calms down, the heart-rate and pulse-rate return to normal levels and there is an overall sense of peace. Transcendental Meditation (TM) is one such meditation which gives great stress-relief and significant health benefits like increased longevity, stronger immune systems, healthier cardiac reponse, etc. (www.tm.org).

Stress-relieving workouts: Neck-rotation - This workout is usually done as a warm up before a full-fledged yoga session. By itself, it is excellent for relieving physical stresses in the muscles of the neck, upper back and shoulders. Here is how it is done.

1. Sit/stand with spine erect.Keep you shoulders level.
2. Start rotating your neck in a forward-backward plane (not an upward-downward plane). Begin with slow, small rotations and gradually increase the radius of rotation (after the muscles are active and comfortable). Alternate the clockwise and counter-clockwise rotations.
3. During each rotation, pause where you experience pain and breathe deeply for 20-30 seconds. Then continue.
4. Always maintain slow rotations - a normal rotation (without pauses) should last for 30-40 seconds. You muscles in the neck must feel the stretch. Breathe calmly through the workout.

Stress-relieving workouts: Standing Forward Bend (Uttanasana) Yoga - This pose is relieves stress in the spine and legs. It strengthens the thighs and knees and improves digestion (Light on Yoga by B.K.S. Iyengar). Follow the procedure below for your workout.

1. Stand with spine erect and shoulders even. Inhale.
2. As you bend forward start exhaling. Bend down as far as you can. Use your leg muscles (not back muscles) to lower your upper part of the body.
3. Hang from your spine. Breathe calmly and continuously.
4. If you can, bring your torso close to your legs and wrap your arms around the legs. Stay in this position for 1-2 minutes.
5. Take a deep breath in and and gradually rise.
6. Do the forward bend pose once a day.

Initially it may be hard to reach down with the forward bend - in this case bend as much as you can while working out the muscles of the legs (not the back).

Make it a point to incorporate these simple stress-relieving workouts in your daily routine. You do not need to do all of them back-to-back. Do both the breathing exercises in one time slot. You can space the other workouts through the remaining day.