The art of rest. Learning to relax

These days our eventful daily life can often feel like an assault course. Tight work schedules and a fast pace of life are among the main causes of chronic stress. How can you minimize the consequences of this stress and replenish your body’s resources regularly? It’s time to learn to properly relax and rest.

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Gadgets make us lose our ability to relax!

It’s a fact. Increased mobility played a cruel joke on us. Thanks to gadgets, we can work from virtually anywhere in the world at any time of the day. On the one hand, this is convenient. On the other, it makes it nearly impossible for us to unplug from work.

Multitasking as an endless circle

Our constant multitasking, which often stems from an ambition to accomplish more, only drives us deeper into stress. For many people, resting from work means switching to another type of work. Meanwhile, this kind of switching in no way contributes to proper replenishment of our body’s resources, driving us into a corner. The result is predictable: chronic fatigue.

Getting proper rest is becoming something of an art

We are losing the ability to properly relax. What many see as relaxation is definitely not. It’s time to learn to rest the right way. How? Just remember the simple rules that are outlined below. Sticking to them will help you understand and feel what real rest is about.

Draw a clear line between work and rest. These two activities can never be mixed. When you leave work, close the door behind you – both literally and figuratively. All work should stay in the office. This is difficult, but not impossible.

Reevaluate your work day. Strangely enough, you often rob yourself of free time during your work day. Keep in mind that surfing the Internet, getting stuck in social networks, and constantly monitoring your mail reduces productivity. These distractions disperse the concentration you need to complete your duties. As a result, you fall behind and fail to complete all your tasks for the day.

When you stay late as a result, you do so at the expense of your free time.

On weekends, do not be distracted from your much-deserved rest. If you think that a few work-related phone calls won’t interfere with anything, this is not exactly true. No matter how much you try to control your body’s perception, it won’t always listen. Lack of proper rest contributes to accumulation of tiredness, with your body switching to energy-saving mode, which means it may use any moment to replenish its resources. There is a good chance such moments will take place during your regular work day. You probably also understand that concentration drops to the minimum when you are exhausted. Below we’ll talk about gearing up for proper rest.

Rest now instead of living in anticipation of it. We often bury ourselves in work, consoling ourselves with the reminder that we can catch up on rest on our days off. This is a vicious practice that drives us into the corner even further. Why? It’s simple. Working on your last leg is unproductive and comes with little or no motivation. In moments like these, the person can be compared to an athlete running out of steam close to the finish line and crawling towards it.
Watching TV and using a computer are not relaxing at all. The deceptive feeling of relaxation in front of a TV screen or monitor is no more than a delusion. While watching TV or playing computer games, our brain can never fully relax. On the contrary, in these moments we overload our subconsciousness with a lot of unnecessary information that will hold us down in terms of performance.

Practical tips for holidaymakers

The idea of needing tips for how to relax while on vacation may sound strange, but most of us are out of practice. If your thoughts tend to wander back to work while you are trying to relax – if your hands are reaching for the remote control (which is common for 90 percent of people) – start acting according to the following plan.

Leave the house. This is a really simple way to change your surroundings. Where to go? There are many options: a café, a theater, a concert, a museum, an exhibition, a circus. Here’s an even easier suggestion: simply walk around the city observing its life. This can be captivating, and you will be amazed at how much escapes your attention daily.

Pay your friends a visit. Face-to-face communication with friends without reposts, likes, and other similar junk is priceless. If visiting your friends at home is not an option, meet on neutral ground – at a café or in nature.

Read a good book. Preferably the paper kind. The rustling sound and the feel of paper under your fingers are things the electronic surrogate cannot replicate. Reading books is an amazing way to travel to unknown worlds, live other people’s lives, and sometimes even try on unexpected roles. There is probably no need to say how beneficial good books are for your soul. Just don’t waste yourself on trashy books – make sure what you read is worth it.

Exercise your body. Physical exercise takes the load off your brain like nothing else. Going to a swimming pool, tennis court, ice rink, or fitness center will let you disengage from work. Rent a bike, a scooter, or roller skates to enjoy your time in the park with more benefits for your health.
Don’t forget about hobbies. A person with a hobby has better chances of enjoying a good rest.

These days there is no excuse for not having a hobby, because specialized stores and online resources make the necessary knowledge and equipment readily available. If you still haven’t joined the ranks of those passionate about something, it’s time to take your first steps. Go for it and spend your time doing the things you genuinely enjoy!

Meditate. This is a very efficient way to relax, especially when your brain is overloaded and won’t switch over. Chronic fatigue negatively affects the body, preventing it from functioning correctly. As a result, the right settings get disrupted and we lose control over the processes going on in our body. Meditation helps us restore the lost balance and reboot the brain. On our site you can find meditations for every taste.

To sum up:

It’s sad to realize that modern people are losing the habit of relaxing properly. But this is a fact that we cannot simply dismiss or ignore. Fortunately, everything is in our hands. Each of us, if we want to, can power up our internal reserves – it just takes a certain amount of effort. Don’t get your hopes too high; you won’t make it work on the first attempt. However, by following our recommendations, you can develop proper relaxation skills.

As a final recommendation, try going back to your childhood years. Watch kids and learn from their unique ability to live in the now. When they are playing, kids let their imaginations run free, forgetting about the world around them and completely surrendering to the process. Give it a try sometime—at least in the moments when you’re not overloaded with work or errands.