By now if you have been reading my blog posts, you all know what stress is and the kind of problems it can cause. Battling stress and achieving peace of mind or happiness takes times. Most of us today are not in the habit of waiting for the long-term benefits of meditation, introspection, thought policing and positivity to kick in.

While I am all for adopting solutions that will have a long-term effect on you, I also understand that sometimes there is a need to see some immediate positive results to encourage yourself to keep working on yourself.

This post is all about giving you some quick and handy tools that you can use to reduce stress. There are 2 things that you need to know before we get started on the list.

1. Some of the tools mentioned below may seem a bit ridiculous at first. They may seem to be silly things that I am recommending and you may feel that they are plain basic things that will not have any effect on your stress levels. I would ask you to ignore that feeling, have some faith in me about how these things work and do them diligently without being skeptical. The idea is to keep an open mind and all the tools to work by practicing them regularly.
2. Sometimes doing some things can make you feel better for a short time. Almost all of us indulge in these from time to time like shopping or binge-watching or going off on a vacation. None of the recommendations below are related to such short-term measures that do nothing for long-term destressing. Each of the tools below, if reflected upon, will add to the overall sense of wellbeing and peace

With that, dive into these tools that will help you destress, see some great results coming in quick enough for you to want to discover more, and achieve a stable and stress-free mindset!

Maintain a Gratitude Journal

We often forget our blessings and concentrate too hard on what we do not have as against what we do have. A few years back when I found my son complaining too much about how he did not get enough time on the mobile or the latest gadgets that he wanted to be able to play them, I asked him to make a list of the things that he does have. He found it tough at first because he was so concentrated on what he wanted to get from his parents. However, a little persistence into the process had him writing some stuff that he had that was important to him. Among other things, he also mentioned that he had all four grandparents alive and healthy, something not all his classmates had.

This is a great example of how we take a lot of things for granted and are not thankful about them every day. Even if you find yourself writing similar things or the same things every day, maintain a gratitude journal where you actually pen down at least 5 things that you felt grateful for today. If you feel nothing really great happened, check yourself about being negative and think harder. Every one can find something to be grateful for every single day!

Do Things You Enjoy

The daily chores of life pull us down. A 9 to 5 (often 9 to 9) job can suck the joy out of your life if there is too much workload all the time. In fact, sometimes it becomes so overwhelming that we are unable to balance work with other aspects of our lives and need some serious work-life balance. For those who are stay-at-home moms, deciding the menu every day, buying groceries, taking the dog out and doing the same set of things over and over again can make life extremely boring and dull. These are the times when you can slip into a depressive state of mind thinking about the past or the future and feeling miserable about it.

To try and enjoy every day better than you are, make a list of things that you like doing. These do not have to large goals that you have set for yourself. On the contrary, these should be things that you enjoy on a daily basis. Some of these might take a few minutes while others may take a few hours. Some of my favorite things to do in a day include going to the gym, reading a book for at least 30 minutes before sleeping, reading my kindle in Starbucks alone, taking a long walk with my dog, going for a movie in a movie hall, and taking a walk with some friends in a park.

List these things and make sure that you do at least one of those on your list every day. You can pick and choose based on the kind of day you are having but it is a must that you do at least one of those things after you have created that list.

Do a Quick Jig or Sing in the Shower

Music is great to lift your mood and make you feel destressed. You will be surprised to see how much forcing yourself to put on some upbeat music and doing a jig can help generate some great ‘happy hormones’.

Singing your favorite happy song at the top of your voice can do the same for you in the morning. It does not matter whether you have a nice voice or whether you can do a great dance. Just holler and since or move your arms and legs in all kinds of directions and see how it elevates your mood and makes you feel ready to combat the day! The jigs that I do not only make me feel good but they elevate the entire positive vibe of the house and the family too!

Watch a Stand-Up Comedy Show – Laugh

Watching television or a web series is a great way to unwind. However, what you choose to see affects how you feel because most of us tend to empathize with the characters in a movie or a serial and get pulled into their emotions. This is not to say that you should not watch serious videos, movies or series.

Learn to assess your emotion and stay away from serious and sad videos and movies at that time. Try and avoid listening to or reading news as the first thing that you do after waking up. After a particularly stressful day at work, put on some stand-up comedy show and watch it with your family and laugh your guts out! Make it into a regular habit each day and you will have a better atmosphere at dinner time as it will take your mind off the pressing concerns of your office or work.

Park Your Worries

You may feel that it is impossible to not worry about things that are happening in your life. Worry does not really get you anywhere, planning does. The typical steps that you should take when you feel there is something that you are worrying about are these:

• Ask yourself whether the situation is avoidable. If no, there is no point in worrying about it.
• If you can do something to change the situation, think about what ‘you’ (and not others, because you cannot make other people do what you think is right). Then concentrate on what you can do to change things and you won’t have to worry because you will be changing the situation.

Despite this, sometimes it seems that the thoughts will just not go away. A good strategy to use at such times is to ‘park’ the worries for now and concentrate on what you can do and what you can enjoy. Parking your worries is a toll in which you set aside 30 minutes of your time thinking about the future and arriving at ways in which you can act upon those thoughts. It helps to park worries because then, you can concentrate on other things that you need to do rather than fretting about things needlessly and missing out on what you ‘can’ do or enjoy!

As mentioned earlier, take these tools and use them regularly. Do them even if it seems as if they will not help because they seem to simple or too easy to achieve. You will be surprised how effective such basic techniques can be!