Does life seem really complicated to you sometimes? Do you feel overwhelmed by responsibilities? It can happen to anyone. Fortunately, cultivating peace of mind and eliminating all kinds of negative influences from your life is possible. You may not know where to start right now, but by reading this article you can immediately begin to bring more peace into your life. Whether it's modifying your behavior slightly or changing your lifestyle, work hard today to get the peace and quiet you deserve.
Steps
Part 1 of 2: Developing Your Own Peace of Mind
Step 1. Breathe
Mindful breathing is a simple but very powerful exercise that can infuse you with considerable serenity. Emotions and breath are intimately connected. By slowing down the pace of your breathing and learning to make it powerful and regular, you will be able to calm your emotions as well. It has been shown that breathing exercises are able to reduce the levels of cortisol, also known as the stress hormone, and to activate the response of the parasympathetic system defined in Anglo-Saxon terms "rest and digest". Here are some helpful tips on breathing exercises:
- Find a comfortable, quiet place to sit.
- Place one hand on your chest and the other on your abdomen.
- Inhale deeply with the abdomen, so that the stomach region expands while that of the chest remains stationary.
- Hold your breath for a couple of seconds, then slowly exhale as you empty your abdomen.
- Repeat the entire sequence until you reach a regular rhythm. Commit to repeating the exercise every day for 10 minutes.
Step 2. Exercise
Sticking to a regular exercise routine is one of the main gifts you can give to your body and mind. For best results, your goal should be to do 30-60 minutes of aerobic exercise (walking, running, cycling, swimming, etc.) 3-5 times a week. Among the many benefits of physical activity we can certainly include:
- An improvement in mood caused by the release of endorphins and serotonin in the brain, substances that promote the feeling of happiness.
- Increases in energy levels and reduced feelings of fatigue.
- Improvement in sleep quality, even in the case of chronic insomnia.
- Reduced risk of serious conditions, including heart disease and type 2 diabetes.
Step 3. Get enough sunlight
When exposed to sunlight, the body produces vitamin D, another substance that increases serotonin levels. Artificial light does not achieve the same result, so try to spend as much time outdoors as possible. Here are some recommended activities:
- Play sports in nature.
- Swim in a natural environment.
- Plan a picnic.
Step 4. Get in the flow
One of the best ways to live in a state of tranquility and happiness is to enter a state of flow. Being in the flow means feeling completely involved in the activity that is taking place and not thinking about anything else. We enter a state of flux when we dedicate ourselves to the things we love and when we are challenged in a way that is appropriate to our abilities.
Do what you love. Choose any activity you enjoy, whether it's playing darts on the weekend or studying to see your dream career come true
Step 5. Be generous
In fact, being generous makes us happier and increases our level of tranquility. Donating money can help reduce the stress hormone cortisol. Being generous also makes us longer-lived and mentally healthier. People who are more generous are unlikely to suffer from depression. It's up to you to decide how generous you want to be, here are some tips to start with:
- Volunteer at a homeless shelter or other local charity.
- Make a donation to your favorite charity.
- Offer to help friends and family financially; alternatively, take care of their children or help them with home maintenance work.
Step 6. Feed your gratitude
Being grateful for everything you have in life will help you develop powerful peace of mind. Gratitude reduces stress and increases positive feelings, such as optimism and satisfaction. There is no need to have great things to be grateful, the reality is that there is always something to be grateful for. Here are some tips that will help you fuel your feeling effectively:
- Keep a gratitude journal. People who regularly write a gratitude journal are happier with their lives. Make a commitment to write down the things you feel grateful for every day.
- Learn to see the bright side of difficulties. For example, having an extremely noisy neighbor will give you the opportunity to exercise your patience and learn to curb anger.
Step 7. Join a group
Generally, people prefer to be in a group rather than alone. In fact, connecting with others provides us with an uninterrupted flow of peace and happiness. When it comes to bringing calm and happiness into our lives, most solutions turn out to be only temporary, but spending time with the people we love doesn't seem to abide by this rule.
- For example, if you identify with a particular religious belief, look for a church, temple, mosque, or synagogue to attend with pleasure.
- Following your personal passions, you can also decide to join a sports team or a reading group.
Step 8. Express yourself
The creative arts can be a powerful source of happiness and peace of mind. The multiple ways you can express yourself through art can help you gain a better perspective on life. Here are some activities you can experiment with:
- Draw, color or paint. It is not necessary to be a skilled artist, anyone can feel better by giving free rein to emotions and imagination.
- Dance. Sign up for a dance class or just get into the habit of dancing to music within the walls of your home.
- Play a musical instrument. Guitar, piano and other instruments allow you to express yourself through music.
Part 2 of 2: Working on Problem Areas
Step 1. Identify your problem areas
If there is something that prevents you from achieving the tranquility you seek, the best thing to do is to get to know it. Distinguishing obstacles better will allow you to create a plan of attack that helps you overcome them. Try to list the aspects of your life that make you dissatisfied. Writing them down is a good way to analyze them more effectively.
Step 2. Make peace with your past
Is there an event from your past that still haunts you? Maybe you made a mistake that screwed up your career or you never found the courage to confess your love to someone. Whatever the case may be, try to make peace with your past to be able to exorcise those old ghosts that may still be hunting you. Sometimes the tranquility of the present moment is jeopardized by a past situation that we have not been able to resolve.
- Think about the possibility of forgiving yourself. You most likely didn't have the same knowledge you have now, don't think in hindsight.
- Let go of anger. Describe it in the private pages of your diary. You won't need to hold back or censor yourself because no one will have access to your thoughts. Don't underestimate the importance of letting off steam while preventing repressed anger and negativity from harming you internally.
- Accept what happened. Constantly reliving the past in your mind only keeps the painful feelings active. Accepting and overcoming events will help you start the healing process by allowing you to shift your focus to the future.
Step 3. Analyze your social relationships
If your relationship with your parents or partner is particularly strained, try to bring them back to a peaceful state so that you can accept yourself and your life more profitably. Often the best way to achieve peace of mind is to solve the current problems that are putting us in difficulty. Intimate relationships are a major source of calm and happiness, so it's worth trying to smooth them out.
- If you feel your marriage or relationship is in serious trouble, ask a couples therapist for help.
- If you have hurt someone, ask for forgiveness. Make sure you are ready to take responsibility for your actions.
- Write a letter to the person you feel you hurt and ask them to make up for you.
- Social isolation is a significant source of unhappiness. Try not to be on the sidelines to ensure the social interactions necessary to achieve peace of mind. Participating in group activities is a great way to connect with others. For example, try joining a club or a group class or volunteering or participating in a team sport.
Step 4. Forgive others
Holding a grudge is all too easy, but if you want to preserve your mental health and improve your social relationships, you need to learn to forgive those who hurt you. If you want to achieve peace of mind, you need to let go of all animosity you feel towards people from your past. Unless you want it, it will not be necessary to reconcile yourself personally, forgiveness is in fact something that happens exclusively within you and not between you and the other person.
- When you forgive, you allow yourself to heal because you decide to let go of complaints and negative judgments. Carrying a grudge can negatively affect your life by bringing anger and hatred into any new situation, thus preventing you from appreciating the present; your relationships with others will be hindered and you will feel a sense of general dissatisfaction, also risking feeling depressed or anxious.
- An effective exercise is to write down the names of the people you are angry with and the reasons for your feelings. Then you can decide to read each name aloud and say "I forgive you". Choosing to hold a grudge will hurt yourself more than others, so act for your own good.
Step 5. Avoid materialism
Buying things is not a good way to achieve peace of mind. You may initially feel happy that you have come into possession of something new, but the feeling of pleasure will fade more quickly than that provided by other more suitable sources, such as interpersonal relationships. Materialism increases competitiveness, and more competitive individuals tend to be dissatisfied with their marital relationship and are more likely to suffer from depression. If you want to find your peace of mind, avoid the trap of having to buy something new to feel good.
Step 6. Make the necessary changes
To be able to find peace of mind, you may need to make significant changes in your life. For example, living in a bad neighborhood could negatively affect your mind, causing ailments including depression. If current circumstances make you very stressed, for example because of your job or where you live, the best thing to do is to take action to change them. A job that makes you unhappy or a neighborhood where you don't feel safe might seem like two tolerable factors, but they could greatly affect your mental health and prevent you from finding the peace of mind you want. Here are some tips that will help you make lasting changes:
- Make sure you make the right choices. In the change planning process, focus on identifying what you really want. For example, if you want to move to another neighborhood, make sure the place you choose really meets your needs in terms of culture, services, political orientation, entertainment, etc.
- Move gradually, starting with small, well thought out steps. Don't make the crazy decision to move from one side of the country to the other over the coming weekend. If you want to move, start looking for a possible home, find out about the schools for your children, etc.
- Involve the people who are part of your life. Don't try to go it alone, get support from friends and family. For example, if you want to move, ask them what they think and find out if they are willing to help you with the preparations.
Step 7. Learn how to deal effectively with toxic people
Toxic relationships can turn into a powerful obstacle to peace of mind. Negative people tend to drain you emotionally without guaranteeing any positive returns, they could take advantage of you and make your relationship turn out to be one way. In their presence, you may have a hard time being yourself. Here are some tips to help you manage this type of toxic relationship effectively:
- Admit the reality of the facts. Constantly finding excuses to justify the people you love around you is all too simple, but it's time to see how you feel after spending some time in their presence. Ask yourself if you really want to be with them or if more than anything else you feel you should. Ask yourself if you usually expect something that in practice I am never able to give you.
- Identify the benefits guaranteed by that relationship. Even the most toxic relationships serve our purpose, otherwise we would not accept being part of it. Perhaps the toxic person in question is able to make you feel comfortable despite hurting you, or perhaps they usually give you gifts to compensate for their negative behaviors.
- Find alternative solutions. In all likelihood, you could meet your needs in other ways as well. You don't have to stick to a friendship or a toxic relationship just to get some rewards, there is certainly a way to get the same benefits without having to endure such negative burdens. Try meeting new people.
