WELLNESS
Psychologies Wellness Director – mindfulness guru and yoga teacher Ali Roff Farrar – shares expert advice and inspiring ideas to increase your holistic wellbeing
Stress less
There’s plenty to get excited about at this time of year – but there’s no doubt that winter can send your stress levels soaring! ‘When you encounter a stressful situation, your body rallies its resources to help you prepare to confront and overcome the issue,’ say the experts at mental health and wellness community app TruConnect. ‘Your brain releases chemicals such as adrenaline to increase your heart rate and open up the airways in your lungs, to prepare you for fight or flight. Meanwhile, your body releases cortisol into the bloodstream, increasing alertness, preparing your body to withstand pain by putting the rest of your natural responses on hold. Exposure to chronic stress may mean your body fails to regulate your cortisol levels, leaving your stress response system imbalanced, which can lead to sleep disturbances, anxiety, irritability, and other cognitive and physiological issues.
‘Regulating your stress response system means finding a sense of relaxation, and reminding your body that danger does not lurk around every corner. Try to find a moment of calm to allow your mind and body to feel safe. Any activity that relaxes you will allow your stress response system to return to an optimal level.’ truconnect.fit
Rest to re-energise
Is there anything better than the ritual of a bath on a cold night? And for me, it’s all about the ‘bath condiments’, as I like to call them. Jurlique’s new pure essential oils, Soaking Rituals, are great to restore and re-energise. Choose to Relax with lavender, chamomile, geranium and orange, or Revive with rosemary, mandarin, grapefruit, palmarosa and olibanum. Add to your bath and let the blends do their work, or for a quick-fix, add eight to ten drops to a bowl of warm water, dip in a face cloth, and compress onto the face and neck, inhaling deeply.
Worrying trend
Fascinating research* studying stress from a period at the beginning of the pandemic shows an interesting difference in stress sources for men and women. Facing the same problem as the world went into lockdown, researchers found that men were significantly more stressed about work, and job and financial security, whereas women’s anxiety levels were raised mo
