Relaxing Is a
Skill. Here’s How to Do It.
New York Times Jan. 5, 2022 Written by
Sometime in 2021, I learned
how to do something that I suspect will greatly improve how I deal with what
already looks to be a harrowing 2022. This thing I learned sounds trivial, a
practice so simple you’d think there’d be no need for special instruction —
which is probably why a lot of us go through life not knowing that there is a
particular technique to getting it right.
What is this dark art? I
learned the proper way to relax.
I don’t mean that I discovered
the benefits of taking it easy or of remaining calm in the face of adversity
and letting life’s troubles slide off my back. I mean it more literally: I
learned how to relax my muscles, to purposefully, systematically isolate each part
of my body and loosen the meat on my bones.
And I learned that doing so
regularly, once or several times a day, can be more or less instantly life
changing. For me, deliberate muscle relaxation immediately reduces fatigue,
stress and anxiety. It creates a kind of allover refreshed feeling that can be
attained nearly anywhere and at any time. And it gets more effective the more I
do it.
I have come to think of
relaxation as a skill; the more I relax, the better I learn which parts of my
body tend to become tense, what that tension feels like and how to unlock that
tension with a quick flick of the mind.
This might sound like New Age
nonsense, but the benefits of muscle relaxation have been studied for decades,
and research has found that versions of the practice may mitigate a wide
range of physical and mental conditions — among them generalized
anxiety disorder, hypertension, irritable bowel
syndrome, insomnia, chronic pain, postpartum depression,
some symptoms of schizophrenia,
some side effects of cancer treatment, stress
among students and anger and
aggression in adolescents.
But enough about what
relaxation does. Here’s how to do it. One of the most widely used methods is
known as progressive muscle relaxation, which was developed early last
century by Edmund Jacobson,
a medical doctor who pioneered research into the connection between physical
tension and mental well-being.
Jacobson’s insight was that a moderately tense muscle is indistinct —
that is, one often does not notice, in ordinary life, that certain muscles are
in a state of tension. His method for relaxation is thus a two-step process.
First, learn to recognize what a particular muscle feels like when it is
flexed. Then, focusing on that muscle in the flexed state, do the opposite of
flexing: Relax.
When you’re starting out with
muscle relaxation, it can be helpful to set aside time and space to do it. Find
10 or 15 minutes in the day when you’re unlikely to be disturbed. Look for a
quiet spot where you can lie down on a bed or sit on a couch. Close your eyes.
Take a few deep breaths.
Now begin: Start at your
extremities — say, your hands. Clench them and focus your mind on what that
feels like. What is the physical sensation of a clenched fist? Which muscles
are activated, and what does their activation feel like?
After you have spent a
few seconds focusing on the clench, you will be able to do the opposite. As you
exhale (I’ve found that relaxation is best achieved on an out breath), gently unclench your fist.
Let go of the tension. Feel your hand loosening, becoming heavy, falling into
relaxation.
After repeating this a few
times, you can move on to other parts. Your arms: Flex your biceps, feel the
flex and then let go.
Your shoulders:
Shrug, then unshrug.
Your mouth:
Smile
wide and feel the pull of your smile muscles, then let your smile go limp.
Go
on like this through your whole body, tensing and relaxing, and by the end of
it, I promise, you’ll notice something. At first, it may be just a sense
of calm, but the more you do it, the deeper into relaxation you’ll fall,
eventually reaching a state of such blissful ease that it can feel hard to
stop.
On a weeklong beach vacation last summer, I spent an hour or more each
day just relaxing — reveling in the euphoria of a body at maximum slack.
Muscle relaxation has also
become my go-to way of going to bed. I used to have a lot of trouble falling
asleep; now I lie down, breathe in and out in a slow rhythm and focus on
letting all tension flow out of my limbs. I usually fall asleep within 20
minutes.
A few years ago, I wrote about
how daily meditation had helped me cope with the chaos of digital life.
I still meditate quite often, but I recognize that meditation is not for
everyone. Many people find it close to impossible to quiet the mind; a lot of
people told me they found the practice so hard that they gave up after one or
two sessions.
Muscle relaxation is related
to meditation — quieting the body is an important part of quieting the mind —
but it is much easier to get into and a lot more portable. After your first few
practices, you’ll begin to achieve mastery over your tension, to sense how you’re
unconsciously tightening parts of your body during the course of a day.
Once you begin to recognize
that feeling, muscle relaxation can become an allover, all-the-time activity.
Unless you’re operating heavy machinery, being pursued by a bear or otherwise
facing imminent danger, you can generally relax whenever you like.
I find myself consciously
relaxing everywhere, anytime — in the checkout line at the supermarket, say, or
while on hold with my insurance company. And now that I’m done singing the praises
of relaxation, I suppose I’ll go off to relax right now.
