It’s time to get whelmed instead.

Your plate is full, right?
You’ve been at this for a while.
Life is your kind of kuh-raz-eee.

And then it gets fuller, and the time has come, or there’s a curve-ball, and things get well n’ truly wild.

And you could say, because it’s your right to, that you’re feeling “overwhelmed”. But don’t. Don’t go there. Stay with me, on the light side of change and bursting creativity; on the front end of pressure, and greatness, and the best and worst kinds of challenges.

Back away from overwhelm. Because when you just utter that word, you cast doubt on your capacity to rise. You let angst flop on your couch. You fret that you might not have the resources to surmount obstacles or to seal the deal on your dream.

Let’s make a pact. If you slip and use the o-word, I’ll refuse to believe you. I’m going to act like you didn’t even say it, and I’m going to remind you that

: you put everything on your plate with intention, and you have a huge say in creating your reality.

: you’ve been watering your dreams for years and you’re going to get what you ask for and allow (ya!)

: tragic circumstances or a circus of success — you’ve got what it takes to meet life with more giving.

Ban “overwhelmed” from your vocabulary. Refuse it entry to your psyche. You’re bigger than that.

Just be, you know, whelmed (this is best said with a Jewish, Brooklyn accent.)

Whelmed. Not at full capacity, rather, full of capacity.

Whelmed. Sounds full of potential, doesn’t it?

Editor’s Note: Danielle LaPorte is the creator of WhiteHotTruth.com, which has been called “the best place on-line for kick-ass spirituality.” She is the author of The Fire Starter Sessions: A Digital Experience for Entrepreneurs, an inspirational speaker, former think tank exec, and news show commentator. You can read all of Danielle’s EcoSalon guest articles here, and find her on Twitter @daniellelaporte.

Image: uggboy

ColumnTips for dealing with female bullies.

One of my favorite stories is the one about my good friend and the little dog. When this friend, whose name is Carol, was a girl growing up in a suburban Seattle cul-de-sac, the neighborhood kids would often meet up after school in a patch of undeveloped woods nearby to play. One day, as she was running along the sidewalk to meet her friends, a neighbor’s Yorkshire terrier came charging down the path at her, and bit her hard. Carol didn’t think twice about how to respond. She picked her up and bit her back. No matter how many times I’ve heard it, I whoop when she tells me how totally shocked the little dog was. As you can imagine, that bitch never bit her again.

Bullies sure do come in all kinds of packages.

A bully can be an adorable Yorkie with a velveteen bow. A bully can be handsome, beautiful, rich, glamorous or more typically, feign a great approximation. This is so that you can later slam your head against the wall while asking yourself, “What the hell did I see in them?” A bully might be your neighbor, your mother-in-law, your business partner, your new best friend. Bullies may be do-gooding, world-saving, tree-hugging, down-and-out-helping, soup-ladling. A friend of mine knows a woman whose mother is a famous self-help guru. The woman herself is a psychotherapist; after many years in therapy she decided she might as well practice it. The reason she spent so many years in therapy is because her famous self-help guru mother hit her all the time.

Forget the bow. Ignore packaging, proceed to contents. Here’s how you know a bully: they bite.

Have you been bullied? I have – more than once, if you count having to live with roommates, and then there’s the one for the ages. My bully, my friend. She really had it all: money, warts, and herpes. I watched my bully cut every friend out of her life in the short time I had the misfortune of knowing her. Of course then it seemed an eternity, or at least a semester. I could have sworn she had made a list of everyone she knew, and one day decided to work her way down it, with the goal of leaving behind as much ruin and destruction to impress me as possible. When she severed ties with her best friend – who was terrified of her – over an argument about pleats on skirts, I reckoned my neck was up next. It was. Where I had once existed on a pedestal, I was now a bunion on the vamp of her progress, a sea urchin in the waters of her expression. Simply showing up to my life each morning caused her suffering. Couldn’t I wash my car more often? Couldn’t I change my ring tone? Did it matter if I had feelings and hopes and dreams or a separate different definitely provable-by-science autonomous existence apart from hers?

Faced with the inevitable path before me, I armed myself with psychology books from more than one trip to Barnes & Noble and consulted my people. Soon enough, having exhausted her supply of other people to chew on, she started biting me. Because I had prepared, I was able to walk away in a move that left her spluttering – I bit back – but what if she’d been my boss? Oh, that’s right, she was.

Who on earth are these people? Tina Fey called them Mean Girls, and they are everywhere, no matter how grown up we get. Naively, I had approached my very first bully with the plucky optimism of a community fundraiser. Soon, she needed me and my reliable niceness, and when you get to that point it’s a short trip to toast. I was but the earnest wheat germ, she, the flaring toaster.

Public service moment: Awareness of bullying has increased in recent years as our society has become more comfortable with acknowledging how bullying can be devastating, potentially scarring us for life. If you have a child who is being bullied, or if you yourself are in a situation you cannot get out of, or if the bullying has become abusive, this is not the best article for you. You should seek professional help now. The good news is that there is recourse in many cases; in fact, some states, such as Massachusetts, have even outlawed bullying. The trouble with bullying, though, is that as adults we can’t drag our bullies to the principal’s office.

How are we supposed to be women of principle and planet when we’ve got a yipping Yorkie on our butts? Easy. Really. When it comes to dealing with the garden variety mean girl, you do not need to read Sun Tzu. You do not need to possess Machiavellian insight. You do not even need to read every single one of the books I read (although please don’t tell the authors I said that). Here’s what you do need to know about your female bully:

1. Learn your bully. It won’t be hard. First, know that she is not well. She is really miserable. We are not talking about your friend with her flaws who lashed out that one time because her boyfriend dumped her. We are not talking about your bossy boss or your crazy client. We are talking core unwell, status Mother Mary. If you are sensitive to others, it can be easy to focus on their flaws, but remember that most people are basically good and decent, with occasional blips of stupid behavior. Learn to differentiate dramatic blips from toxic patterns.

2. But dear God, don’t be fascinated by her. If you’re a forensic dork like me, by all means, read twelve or twenty books on bullying. Google your heart out. But don’t get so sucked in to her neurosis or pathology that you fall for your bully. Bullies are really rather empty save for their pain, which is why they are unhappy, which is why they lash out. Translation: they aren’t that interesting. They have very little capacity for self-awareness. Oh, they may know they are mean and nasty – and she will probably even brag about it – but think about it. Since they’re rocking it so hard, it must be all they have. Your bully is but a vapid inedible puffball of mean, stuck on Repeat.

3. Find some compassion. I’m serious: she is miserable. I know it is very hard when someone is targeting you – hurting your business, or your good name, or just you – and really, really hard if you must spend a lot of time with this woman or if she pays your bills, but remember that she is miserable. If you can muster even the tiniest bit of compassion for her – and I am talking corn kernel – it will help you feel relief. Comfort. Happiness. Security. Acceptance. Warmth. Love. Have you experienced these things? Your bully hasn’t, at least not nearly enough to function. Happy people who feel safe and loved do not actively bother with controlling and hurting others. They just function.

4. But show no mercy. Compassion is essential to coping, and it’s also just good karma. But it’s for you, not her. Don’t feel compelled to help, mentor, teach or love her and by doing so, become complicit in your own abuse. She is not your case. She is not your concern. If you’re forced to engage with her for professional reasons or personal commitments, keep it as light and brief as possible, and don’t ever reach out to her in a spur of generosity. Forgiveness does not require masochism. No drunk texting your bully, baby.

5. Understand that she operates on one channel: hers. And it’s boring. You may seriously wonder if she has Asperger’s, or start to think that she has a hearing problem. How could anyone be so derivative, grandiose and obtuse? A bully could. Learn the traits of narcissism; the fat red flag is contempt, but there are eight more signs. Bullying is the calling card of the narcissist. Narcissists are self-absorbed to the point that they don’t recognize others as individuals with their own needs, and I am not talking about your cat. They’re both shallow and self-obsessed, but at least the cat doesn’t bite.

6. Love the one you’re with? Never. If you’re skilled at pacifying, whether from growing up with an abusive or addicted parent or managing child actors, you’re particularly at risk for doing this. Don’t try to be “the one” that your bully adores while everyone else gets the mean treatment. Eventually, your bully will turn on you, and it will hurt.

7. Walk away. Did you consider this? If the thought of never seeing your bully again gives you more joy than the thought of a bathtub full of calorie-free sea-salt and caramel chocolate truffles dipped in lottery tickets, fame, a flat stomach and true love, it’s time to walk away. We can get so wrapped up in our bullies and their bad behavior, we forget that just a few short months or years ago, we were living the charmed life free of Cruella. Just imagine: You can live that life again. Unless it’s your married mate or your boss, you can walk away fairly quickly and easily. Really. I promise. I know, you’re saying “But I just can’t, you don’t understand!” I do. Walk away. You will not die and you will not get sued. (And if you really fear for your life, see the above note about getting professional help.) Bullies can be smart; they can even be right. But they are never entitled to bite.

8. What a keeper! Here’s the other thing about bullies: they almost always come back. That’s because as narcissists, they have terrible memories in every sense – terrible in a way that thrills with its occasional laser focus, and terrible in a way that infuriates with its amnesiac spin. You can bite back, walk away, avoid, or simply suffer in silence, and they will always test the fences. Keep her on a short leash lest she keep you.

9. Pretend she is spectacularly stupid. Treat your bully as if she is at least a full quadrant on the IQ chart below Larry in Dumb and Dumber. We can spend infinite mind time asking “Why me? Why that? Why would she?” This is a waste of your energy. You are dealing with the emotional and intellectual equivalent of an office chair. Bullies often don’t know their bad behavior is bad, so don’t assume they know. The reason they’ve gotten so far in life behaving this way is because they’ve encountered a whole lot of people like you – that is, sane, normal folk – who all think “No one could possibly do this on purpose! Why me? Why that? Why would she?” Nice can get you a long way, but spice can get you further. So, when your bully lashes out, call it with confidence. Don’t be hostile; simply state that you recognize this behavior as aggressive and inappropriate, and you will not tolerate it because you don’t like to be treated that way. You’re not on a committee with her; this is not a review-the-behavior democracy. You are in charge, you define, you speak up, and that’s final. It’s so easy after you do it once, you’ll be annoyed that you didn’t do it sooner. It really works. Don’t yell, don’t coddle, don’t back down. Just express, and then shut up. Your bully will react in three ways: she will suddenly find a fascinating hole in the floor into which to crawl; she will erupt in screams and tears (don’t hug her), or she will act like you didn’t say a thing. But at least for that day, she will stop.

10. Don’t bite back too hard. A mean girl is really more bark than bite. Think about it: when someone is playing an abusive mind game with you, it only works if you participate. Bullying requires you to play the game, too. If you walk away, or take off the gear, neither one of you can play anymore. Seth Godin said it best: “Drop the ball.” (I wish I could find the permalink; if you do, tell me.) Realize that your bully is really quite weak – this is a little girl throwing a tantrum, not Maleficent directing the ozone layer. Walking away is shock enough to the bully, who has the emotional fortitude of a Yorkie. You’re just a shape or a shadow in her picture postcard world, so disrupting the mirage and stepping out of the frame is going to be deeply terrifying to her. Despite your overwhelming desire (believe me, I know), avoid layin’ it on thick with added helpings of vitriol or vengeance.

And good luck. There are so many nice girls, there’s just no time for mean. Find your true friends and together, you can do a lot, including calling off the dog or, when necessary, biting back.

P.S. My good friend Carol who bit the dog back is my mother. Thanks, Mom.

This is the latest installment in your editor’s column, The Insider’s Guide to Life, exploring topics such as media, culture, sex, politics, and anything else. Cheers and spellcheck!

Image: djg0333

A friend of mine – a therapist in a halfway house – once described a harrowing incident where a burly Hell’s Angel guy barged into a group therapy session, hollering and waving his arms around like a maniac. He was was having an “episode” that would’ve scared the bejeezus out of the toughest cookie on the block.

“Use your manners, would ya?” said the group therapy leader. “Turn around and come back in quietly.”

And then – fuming and puffing – Mr. Rage just…stopped. “Oh. Okay then.” He left the room, re-opened the door, walked in and sat down in the nearest empty seat. Calmly.

Just like that.
Standards work wonders.

When we routinely accept people’s poor behavior, we block the chances for radical change to occur. Excuses repress clarity. Justifications crowd out transformation.

I once worked with someone who was bi-polar manic depressive, and we always chalked up their behavior to their illness. We let them off the hook for all sorts of crappy behavior. But nasty is nasty, and mean is mean, and my standards are higher than that.

So next time your mother is a bit well, you know. Or your grouchy neighbor is a grouch, as usual. Or your super-stressed boss loses her cool because she’s, well, super-stressed. Call it at face value. Don’t let foul manners off the hook. Bad behavior is bad behavior – all afflictions and psych 101 labels aside.

Common sense is a mighty powerful agent for change.

Editor’s Note: Danielle LaPorte is the creator of WhiteHotTruth.com, which has been called “the best place on-line for kick-ass spirituality.” She is the author of The Fire Starter Sessions: A Digital Experience for Entrepreneurs, an inspirational speaker, former think tank exec, and news show commentator. You can read all of Danielle’s EcoSalon guest articles here, and find her on Twitter @daniellelaporte.

letting go, pro-actively (because passively waiting is passive-aggressive)

“Active letting go” is not to be confused with “passive letting go,” whereby life rips stuff out of your grip, or you back yourself into a corner, or your responsibilities get so burdensome that you have to offload them just to stay afloat. Active letting go is a little more – pro-active. It’s a practice. It’s awake. It’s somewhat exhilarating (except for the agony of it.)

1. Steel leads to softness.
   Imagine ripping off a bandage; dropping an heirloom off at the thrift store and resolving to not go back to get it; kissing him or her that way for the last time and tearing yourself away because you need to grow in the other direction; boarding the plane with a heavy heart. When you steel the nerve to be tough enough to let go, you stride across a sacred line. And on the other side, Tenderness is waiting, and She’s very proud of you.
2. There’s always more to let go of.
   Active letting go is limitless. Just surrender to the endlessness of it.
3. It’s always painful.
   From wince to damn near crippling, letting go is gonna hurt. Face it. Rock it. Revel in the beauty.
4. You can let go in pieces…
   …and even take baby steps, but you can’t avoid the pain that surfaces when you fully commit to letting go.
5. Acceptance is your balm.
   When you accept that the pain of letting go is part of the deal, your let-go wound will heal faster.
6. The odds are in your favor.
   Out of, say, 100+ people I’ve talked to about letting go of stuff – material and emotional – 88 percent of them wished they’d done it sooner, and 97 percent of them have no regrets whatsoever. Only 3 percent are still uncertain. When you let go, the odds are stacked in your favor.

Editor’s Note: Danielle LaPorte is the creator of WhiteHotTruth.com, which has been called “the best place on-line for kick-ass spirituality.” She is the author of The Fire Starter Sessions: A Digital Experience for Entrepreneurs, an inspirational speaker, former think tank exec, and news show commentator. You can read all of Danielle’s EcoSalon guest articles here, and find her on Twitter @daniellelaporte.

Image: moriza

I’m nomadic by nature but strive to travel for a purpose. Writing and taking pictures as a job blurs the line between work and play, but still, I tend to stay busy in far away places. By contrast, this last week in Mexico was down time. Me time. As it turns out, learning time.

I was there for a very small wedding of two good friends, in a tiny town of old homes and a few fancy houses built by California surfers.

It felt a bit ironic, as a decade-long relationship of mine recently came to a close. What I did not anticipate about this trip was how much time I’d spend in my head meditating on life and work and how love might function within it. When the water was clean, I surfed, forgetting my thoughts. But when I wasn’t surfing, I had a lot of time to think, mostly in a hammock staring at the ocean. It was hard; tearful at times. Not because I was watching new love pledge togetherness, but more because I was thinking about a past love. Far away, even with such vast space and peace, you still can’t always find the answers. Sometimes there simply aren’t any.

Love makes you think about dying alone. Silent breakfasts on Sunday morning. What you’re going to give in this life and what this life is going to give, in return, to you.

It’s complex for a wanderer like me; I’d need someone who shares my lust for adventure, my love for empirical experiences that challenge the very foundation of what we think we know about human nature. My mother tells me that I have to drop ‘I am what I do’, but I can’t. When the dust settles, all you really are is the sum total of your deeds in life. I believe nature really is that simple.

At the crux of this, for me, is a lifelong goal to sail around the world and document the cultures and people I meet. It’s something I’m currently doing. I’d love to share it with someone, a friend who shares my endless love of and fascination for the ocean. Isn’t that what we all want? These kinds of connections are rare, but sometimes you find them when you choose to take the offbeat path of your heart. You find others like yourself, who have committed to a life less ordinary. This is my tribe.

And we learn, too, that it is possible to love someone thoroughly yet realize that togetherness simply isn’t going to work. Paths cross, and lives connect, but our tribes pull.

Mexico, your hammocks and salty breezes brought me back to my true self. And sometimes losing love is a necessary step towards the path to personal discovery. And that’s a brutal fact.

There’s a moment in the third season of The West Wing where President Jed Bartlet declares that stress is something that happens to other people. Sadly, many of us are holding ourselves to the same harsh standard with devastating consequences for our health.

Stress is a natural physical reaction and it’s useful - the problem is that in modern life we don’t give our bodies time to recuperate. Instead we subject it to yet more stress and the cumulative effect can lead to health problems such as high blood pressure or poor digestion.

My wake-up call came recently when I fainted at a public event (this one) and was carted off to the hospital in an ambulance (thankfully at no cost since I live in the UK and it’s all covered by the National Health Service). The doctors couldn’t find anything wrong with me whatsoever and I can only conclude that it was my body’s way of telling me to look after myself.

When I stopped to think about it, I knew that I’d been feeling stressed for some time. Everyone has stresses in their life – the recession and financial problems is a big one for many people at the moment, while life events such as redundancy, divorce and moving home rank right up there, as well. The biggest stress in my life is organising my wedding, which is less than a month away now.

For me the idea of wellness and ecology are intrinsically linked. If I’m wound tight with stress, I’ll inevitably go for the fastest or easiest option and not necessarily the greenest one. I’m more likely to order take-out because I’m not in the mood for cooking or catch a cab because I’m running late.

I might feel guilty about it but guilt is not a productive emotion. On the other hand, a more peaceful and relaxed state of mind gives me the space to make eco-friendly choices. If I nurture myself, I can nurture others and the world around me and I can practice compassion and creativity.

I started making changes to alleviate stress on my own and then last week I went to a workshop on understanding stress at the Neal’s Yard Remedies store in Covent Garden (NYR sells natural, organic beauty product and treatments at stores in the UK and through their online stores in the US and Japan).

I thought I’d share with you the changes I’ve made and what worked and what I’m yet to try. In this post I’ll write about the changes I initiated on my own and I’ll do a follow-up post to share what I learnt at the workshop.

1. Diet: I already eat a healthy diet but I’ve made more of an effort to focus on nutrition so that I have the energy to deal with stressful events. I eat a wide variety of fruit and vegetables, whole grains and low-fat protein and I’ve cut out most sweets and fried foods and limited my coffee intake. Bonus – this will also help me look better in my wedding dress!

2. Exercise: I find exercise is a highly effective stress-reliever. You might be tempted to skip it if you’re feeling tired but actually it gives you more energy because it gets the oxygen circulating and triggers your body to release endorphins. I’d been slacking off a bit so I picked it up again. I like to run, but walking is also very good exercise and a great way to clear your head. I don’t like the gym but I do find exercise DVDs can be a godsend at this time of year when it’s cold out. I also resumed my morning yoga practice – just a simple 10-minute routine but I could feel it dissipating the stored tension in my neck and shoulders within days.

3. Vitamins: My iron levels are slightly below par (although this was not the reason for the faint). I already eat plenty of iron-rich food and making further changes to my diet wasn’t practical so I started taking an iron and vitamin C supplement (vitamin C helps your body absorb iron and, hey, it’s also good for you).

4. Sleep: I started going to bed earlier. My new rule is no computer after 9pm and I’m trying to get to bed by 10pm or 10.30pm most nights. I can operate on less sleep but I feel so much better with more. It doesn’t have to be a permanent change but it’s helping me right now.

5. Productivity: A major source of stress is my own ill-discipline – I am the world’s best procrastinator. I obviously can’t blow off my work nor the wedding preparations, so I’ve been trying to work more effectively instead. Wasting time doesn’t get my work done, it just leaves me less time to do it, and hence adds to my stress. I find the Getting Things Done system helpful and I’ve also tried to curb my addiction to tools such as Twitter.

6. Treats: We all know that all work and no play makes you dull and it doesn’t do anything for your stress levels either, so I’ve been making sure I schedule in fun things with friends and loved ones. I also went for a remedial massage – Neal’s Yard Remedies offers cut-price treatments with its graduates once a week, and I picked up the leaflet for the workshop while I was there. I’ve also enjoyed small treats like a bubble bath or a few squares of dark chocolate.

What are your top tips to deal with stress? Please share with us in the comments section.

Image: Townend Photography

In an idyllic world, you could file your stress along with completed assignments when the clock strikes five. In reality, it tends to follow you home after a taxing day at work. If throwing on a pair of cozy pajamas and sinking into your sofa with a good book just isn’t enough to rid your mind of worries, try aromatherapy. This fragrant method of therapy can alleviate much more than just anxiety:

If humdrum routines have faded your passion into apathy, take a bath enhanced with peppermint essential oil to awaken your zest for life.

We all feel out of touch with the world sometimes, so combat those occasional sentiments of loneliness by mixing a little marjoram essential oil into your body lotion.

Have minor disputes caused you to fly off the handle lately? Well, you don’t need a counseling session to abate your heightened sense of irritability. Just burn some lavender incense and let the calm wash over you.

Whenever you’re feeling blue, add several drops of neroli essential oil to a bowl filled with steaming water, cover your head with a towel and inhale this uplifting scent.

You’re always up to speed on the latest trends, but scanning through all those fashion magazines is hardly a ticket for high self-esteem. Light a sandalwood essential oil soy candle and show your insecurities (and the magazine) the recycling bin.

Interested in around-the-clock relief? Make your own essential oil perfume with these aromas and soothe these emotions all day long.

Image: estrilda

I’ve stood up in here and proclaimed my love of lists, and the healthy joy of being slightly control-freaky. But it’s all going wrong. We’ve gone all judgemental.

It’s a fact that keeping a food diary (a hastily-jotted list) can help you lose weight. But there’s a better reason for anyone to do it. If you want to really enjoy your food, a food diary points to where your palate might be getting tired. List what you eat, scan back over a week’s worth, decide if you’re happy with that pattern, and plan accordingly. If you’re happy but a little bored with your diet, factor in some new cuisine.

I’m suggesting list-making for self-awareness, not self-improvement – because lists are nasty like that. Lists can suggest we’re incomplete. They can be a way of getting us to do too much, heightening our anxiety and frustration. They can give a false sense of achievement when we ‘tick off’ something by merely skimming its surface because we’re in too much of a hurry. “Achievement” lists are everywhere, from irritating Facebook applications to sites such as Meosphere. Lists pretend to offer nothing but options, but slyly suggest we’re kinda broke until we complete them.

In fact, life isn’t a fully-ticked list – it’s the pen.

So instead, let’s continue making lists, for ourselves and for others – but keep them neutral. Drain their poison. Cork their sting. We have the right to constructively light a little fire under ourselves now and again, and maybe a list is a tool to employ – but generally, that’s not what they’re for.

Image: sunshinecity

So they’ve done it again. The folks at Harvard University have managed to distill stress relief into SparkNotes (or Cliffs Notes for those of you over the age of 35). This mini-therapy session will have you seeing the glass half-full in no time and leave that co-pay cash in your pocket to enjoy the holiday season. Whether you have one minute or half an hour, you’ll find ways to ease your day.

Take the sting out of 10 common stressors.

Sometimes just thinking about embarking on a program of stress control can be stressful. Start small and bask in the glow of your successes. Give yourself a week to focus on practical solutions that could help you cope with just one stumbling block or source of stress in your life. Pick a problem, and see if these suggestions work for you.

Frequently late?

Apply time-management principles. Consider your priorities (be sure to include time for yourself) and delegate or discard unnecessary tasks. Map out your day, segment by segment, setting aside time for different tasks, such as writing or phone calls. If you are overly optimistic about travel time, consistently give yourself an extra 15 minutes or more to get to your destinations. If lateness stems from dragging your heels, consider the underlying issue. Are you anxious about what will happen after you get to work or to a social event, for example?

Often angry or irritated?

Consider the weight of cognitive distortions. Are you magnifying a problem, leaping to conclusions, or applying emotional reasoning? Take the time to stop, breathe, reflect, and choose.

Unsure of your ability to do something?

Don’t try to go it alone. If the problem is work, talk to a co-worker or supportive boss. Ask a knowledgeable friend or call the local library or an organization that can supply the information you need. Write down other ways that you might get the answers or skills you need. Turn to tapes, books, or classes, for example, if you need a little tutoring. This works equally well when you’re learning relaxation response techniques, too.

Overextended?

Clear the deck of at least one time-consuming household task. Hire a house-cleaning service, shop for groceries through the Internet, convene a family meeting to consider who can take on certain jobs, or barter with or pay teens for work around the house and yard. Consider what is truly essential and important to you and what might take a backseat right now.

Not enough time for stress relief?

Try mini-relaxations. Or make a commitment to yourself to pare down your schedule for just one week so you can practice the relaxation response every day. Slowing down to pay attention to just one task or pleasure at hand is an excellent method of stress relief.

Feeling unbearably tense?

Try massage, a hot bath, mini-relaxations, a body scan, or a mindful walk. Practically any exercise – a brisk walk, a quick run, a sprint up and down the stairs – will help, too. Done regularly, exercise wards off tension, as do relaxation response techniques.

Frequently feel pessimistic?

Remind yourself of the value of learned optimism: a more joyful life and, quite possibly, better health. Practice deflating cognitive distortions. Rent funny movies and read amusing books. Create a mental list of reasons you have to feel grateful. If the list seems too short, consider beefing up your social network and adding creative, productive, and leisure pursuits to your life.

Upset by conflicts with others?

State your needs or distress directly, avoiding “you always” or “you never” zingers. Say, “I feel ________when you _____.” “I would really appreciate it if you could ______.” “I need some help setting priorities. What needs to be done first and what should I tackle later?” If conflicts are a significant source of distress for you, consider taking a class on assertiveness training.

Worn out or burned out?

Focus on self-nurturing techniques. Carve out time to practice the relaxation response or at least indulge in mini-relaxations. Care for your body by eating good, healthy food and for your heart by seeking out others. Give thought to creative, productive, and leisure activities. Consider your priorities in life: is it worth feeling this way, or is another path open to you? If you want help, consider what kind would be best. Do you want the job taken off your hands? Do you want to do it at a later date? Do you need someone with particular expertise to assist you?

Feeling lonely?

Connect with others. Even little connections – a brief conversation in line at the grocery store, an exchange about local goings-on with a neighbor, a question for a colleague – can help melt the ice within you. It may embolden you, too, to seek more opportunities to connect. Be a volunteer. Attend religious or community functions. Suggest coffee with an acquaintance. Call a friend or relative you miss. Take an interesting class. If social anxiety, low self-esteem, or depression is dampening your desire to reach out, seek help. The world is a kinder, more wondrous place when you share its pleasures and burdens.

Meditation on the go!

Meditation can evoke the relaxation response, and appears to have health benefits as well. It’s also simple to perform. Here’s how to get started:

Choose a mental device to help you focus.

Silently repeat a word, sound, prayer, or phrase (such as “one,” “peace,” “Om,” or “breathing in calm”). You may close your eyes if you like or focus your gaze on an object.

Adopt a passive attitude.

Disregard distracting thoughts or concerns about how well you’re doing. Any time your attention drifts, simply say, “Oh, well” to yourself and return to silently repeating your focus word or phrase.

Now slowly relax your muscles…

Moving your attention gradually from your face to your feet. Breathe easily and naturally while using your focal device for 10 to 20 minutes. After you finish, sit quietly for a minute or so with your eyes closed. Then open your eyes, and wait another minute before standing up.

Try to practice this meditation daily for 10 to 20 minutes, preferably at a specific time each day.

Try a mini-relaxation.

Mini-relaxations can help allay fear and reduce pain while you sit in the dentist’s chair. They’re equally helpful in thwarting stress before an important meeting, while stuck in traffic, or when faced with people or situations that annoy you. Here are a few quick relaxation techniques to try.

When you’ve got 1 minute:

Place your hand just beneath your navel so you can feel the gentle rise and fall of your belly as you breathe. Breathe in slowly. Pause for a count of three. Breathe out. Pause for a count of three. Continue to breathe deeply for one minute, pausing for a count of three after each inhalation and exhalation.

Alternatively, while sitting comfortably, take a few slow deep breaths and quietly repeat to yourself “I am” as you breathe in and “at peace” as you breathe out. Repeat slowly two or three times. Then feel your entire body relax into the support of the chair.

When you’ve got 2 minutes:

Count down slowly from 10 to zero. With each number, take one complete breath, inhaling and exhaling. For example, breathe in deeply saying “10″ to yourself. Breathe out slowly. On your next breath, say “nine,” and so on. If you feel lightheaded, count down more slowly to space your breaths further apart. When you reach zero, you should feel more relaxed. If not, go through the exercise again.

When you’ve got 3 minutes:

While sitting down, take a break from whatever you’re doing and check your body for tension. Relax your facial muscles and allow your jaw to fall open slightly. Let your shoulders drop. Let your arms fall to your sides. Allow your hands to loosen so that there are spaces between your fingers. Uncross your legs or ankles. Feel your thighs sink into your chair, letting your legs fall comfortably apart. Feel your shins and calves become heavier and your feet grow roots into the floor. Now breathe in slowly and breathe out slowly.

When you’ve got 5 minutes:

Try self-massage. A combination of strokes works well to relieve muscle tension. Try gentle chops with the edge of your hands or tapping with fingers or cupped palms. Put fingertip pressure on muscle knots. Knead across muscles, and try long, light, gliding strokes. You can apply these strokes to any part of the body that falls easily within your reach. For a short session like this, try focusing on your neck and head.

Start by kneading the muscles at the back of your neck and shoulders. Make a loose fist and drum swiftly up and down the sides and back of your neck. Next, use your thumbs to work tiny circles around the base of your skull. Slowly massage the rest of your scalp with your fingertips. Then tap your fingers against your scalp, moving from the front to the back and then over the sides. Now massage your face. Make a series of tiny circles with your thumbs or fingertips. Pay particular attention to your temples, forehead, and jaw muscles. Use your middle fingers to massage the bridge of your nose and work outward over your eyebrows to your temples. Finally, close your eyes. Cup your hands loosely over your face and inhale and exhale easily for a short while.

When you’ve got 10 minutes:

Try imagery. Start by sitting comfortably in a quiet room. Breathe deeply for a few minutes. Now picture yourself in a place that conjures up good memories. What do you smell – the heavy scent of roses on a hot day, crisp fall air, the wholesome smell of baking bread? What do you hear? Drink in the colors and shapes that surround you. Focus on sensory pleasures: the swoosh of a gentle wind; soft, cool grass tickling your feet; the salty smell and rhythmic beat of the ocean. Passively observe intrusive thoughts, and then gently disengage from them to return to the world you’ve created.

Keep a gratitude journal.

Reflecting on the positive experiences, feelings, and relationships in your life can bring you greater joy. A gratitude journal is a good way to acknowledge the things that brighten your life and help you turn your focus away from negative thoughts and feelings.

Keep a journal by your bed so that at the end of each day, you can spend five to 10 minutes writing about something that you were grateful for in your day. Savor pleasant sights, sounds, and experiences – a sunset, the birds chirping outside your window, a hug from your child, or a call from a friend. Celebrate accomplishments large and small – learning to master a new hobby, doing well on a project at work, or getting the kids off to school on time.

Conjure up the scene in your mind and try to write about it in detail. Then, spend a few minutes soaking in the experience again. You can also use this journal to reflect on things from the past that you are grateful for.

Deflate cognitive distortions.

When you recognize negative thoughts cropping up, take the following steps.

Stop: Consciously call a mental time-out.

Breathe: Take a few deep breaths to help release tension.

Reflect: Ask some hard questions. Is this thought or belief true? Did I jump to a conclusion? What evidence do I actually have? Am I letting negative thoughts balloon? Is there another way to view the situation? What would be the worst that could happen? Does it help me to think this way?

Choose: Decide how to deal with the source of your stress. If distortion is the root of the problem, can you recognize this and let go? Is the problem or constraint a real one or is it one of your mind’s making? If the problem is real, are there practical steps you can take to cope with it? Practicing a mini-relaxation may also help.

Make a worry box.

Everyone gets distracted by worries and concerns, but sometimes these worries can spill over, seeping into the fabric of your day. Having a place to contain your worries – literally – may help you set them aside so that you can focus on the more pleasurable or meaningful parts of your life.

Begin by finding or making a worry box. Any box will do. This is a great exercise for children, but youngsters may find it even more appealing if they can decorate the box as they like and keep it in a special place.

At the end of the day, take a few minutes to write down two or three of your concerns on slips of paper and place them inside the box. Or if the box is handy, you can write down worries as each crops up and drop your worries into the box throughout the day.

The worry box allows you to mentally let go of your worries. Once your worries are deposited in the box, try to turn your attention to other matters.

What you do with your slips of paper is up to you. Some people choose to throw out the notes without reading them again while others benefit from looking through them periodically before tossing them away. In that case, you may be surprised to find that most of your worrying was fruitless; the scenarios you imagined never came to pass.

For more information, check out Harvard’s free stress relief reports.

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What was really interesting about the study, though, is that they found a holographic effect with happiness. If something makes you happy, your friends, who may not even be around, have a higher chance of feeling happy, too. You’ve probably heard it explained from a metaphysical standpoint that your vibration is only as high as the “vibes” of those you spend the most time with.

So choose your friends wisely – the impact may be social, emotional and spiritual as well. And, in science’s defense, it’s nice to see objective evidence of things we know, deep down, to ring true.

Image: Shereen M