The 25 Minute Program for Stress-Free and Pain-Free Work/Life Balance

“If I wasn’t so busy!” is the moto of our time. I often hear people talk about doing healthy activities they know they should like exercising, relaxing, getting more sleep or eating right, but think they can’t because of all the stresses in their life.

I know how it is to feel overwhelmed and like you are just getting by in life.

There is another possibility. Instead of waiting for stress to end, you can end it now by making the decision to take control of your days.

Reducing stress is a worthy goal that can improve your life by transforming your daily outlook, relationships, health, and pain levels.

Many people believe that overworking creates stress. It can. Overworking creates stress that causes high blood pressure, poor diet choices during stressful times, and reduced healing from decreased sleep. The stress is also extremely damaging and aging to your body. I see many people push too hard by staying awake too long or jumping into physical activities they don’t normally do like shoveling snow. A fast paced lifestyle and jumping into seemingly urgent stresses sets people’s bodies up for injuries.

It’s ironic how these injuries often first present themselves. A person can get a screaming wake up call about an injury from the smallest action. One day you may be spending hours typing and putting together an important report, and in one moment, you reach down and feel a painful pull in your neck. I have had people share with me how the seizing pain in their back came directly after picking up a small item like a piece of paper or a pencil.

I know it wasn’t the action of picking up the pencil that caused the pain. Often the accumulation of stress in the body from a fast-paced, overly committed lifestyle is what initiates the sequence of pain. The stress and actions essentially cause the weakness, and injury then comes afterward.

You need to realize that there’s absolutely no reason to overdo it, even if you have bills to pay or a pressing goal ahead of you. In fact, the harder you push yourself, the closer you get to more injuries, body deterioration that looks like fast aging and prolonged debilitating pain.

It’s important to learn how to balance all the aspects of your life without focusing just on work and doing what others want at the moment. Sure, work is extremely important. It keeps your brain active, and it provides the income necessary for you and your family to survive. However, it can also wear you down, especially if you go non-stop. And yes, you have to shovel your sidewalks after it snows, but it can be better planned, prepared for and executed. Don’t jump into the task like you’ve been doing this type of work for a living because you risk overdoing it and causing injury.

The trick to balancing work with the rest of your life lies in performing this 25-minute exercise each day:

1. Five minutes for meditation and clear thought. This exercise is crucial for beginning each day. Meditating can mean the difference between attacking your day with ferocity or approaching it with an aura of calmness and preparedness.

• Meditation centers your mind and calms your spirit. It also helps relieve any tension and problems with quick action rather than a calm, focused but persistent energy you may otherwise bring into your day.
• Meditation can help you focus on your inner power, limitations, and resources and remind you of what’s important to you and those who love you.

2. Five minutes for energizing your body- While you meditate or just before, take time to stretch your body to ready yourself physically for the day. This preparation will help your body handle endurance, strength, and posture demands you don’t usually consider like sitting long periods in front of a computer or standing on your feet longer than usual for a presentation or event.

• Focus on stretching the areas of your body that are bothering you the most during your day

• Stretch slowly and deliberately, not to the point of pain but to the point of slight tension. This should feel comfortable enough that you want to breathe deeply and hold the stretch for a bit.
• Try your best to stretch at the beginning, middle, and end of the day, even if the grand total of each time amounts to under 5 minutes.

• Stretching does wonders for your body but doesn’t always clear the jammed or stuck spots in your body. Chiropractic treatments clear joint misalignment and restrictions to release pain and give your back, neck, shoulders, and hips better range of motion.

3. Five minutes for planning. After you’ve meditated, you should be in the frame of mind to plan your day or create your to-do list. Planning allows you to organize your tasks so you can be productive without abusing yourself.

• Prioritize your tasks based on their importance.
• Try your best to stick to the plan for the day. Having a clear plan for what you want to accomplish helps to keep you focused and stress-free.

4. Five minutes for checking in. Whether all at once or in one-minute intervals, check up on yourself. Assess how well you’ve been able to stick to your plan. Have you accomplished your important tasks? Have you been able to manage your day without losing your cool?

• There may be times when you’ll have to readjust your list of tasks. There are bound to be unforeseen circumstances. What’s important is that you take them in stride.
• Avoid letting unexpected events throw your plan out completely. Take a moment to change your approach. Learn how to go with the flow.

5. Five minutes for winding down. Now that you’ve come to the end of the day, it’s time to wind down. Maybe you’ve never allowed yourself the opportunity to do this before. Taking time to wind down is the best way to relieve the stress of the day.

• Engage in some relaxing activities. Do you like yoga or would you prefer to sit quietly and listen to jazz music? Let go of what happened today and get ready for tomorrow.
• Winding down also opens you up to spending quality time with loved ones. You’ll probably agree that at the end of a busy day, you may be too tired to interact with anyone. That will change when you allow yourself to wind down each day.

Once you try it, you’ll realize that this approach works. Designating these 25 minutes each day can help you maintain a balance between your professional and personal lives as well as manage all other aspects of your life with relative ease.

Be sure you get your back, neck, shoulders and hips checked by a chiropractor. Even the best of us need to press “reset” on our bodies after a while. Just like a car needs its wheels rotated, your body joints and muscles need to be gently adjusted to reduce the amount of stiffness and tension you feel.

Getting your spine and muscles checked by a professional can also help with sleep. We’ve had great success in helping alleviate sleep discomfort that comes from body tension due to stress. Contact us for a personalized evaluation to see what might help you get on track to enjoy calmer weeks.