Learn to breathe and let go of your thoughts

A couple of nights ago, I had the worst sleep of my life. It felt as if my thoughts were racing around faster than a Nascar at the Daytona 500. I tried going to sleep at around 10 o’clock but I just laid in my bed tossing and turning for hours. After a long and exhausting day, every single one of the stressors in my life just flooded my mind. I turned over, looked at my phone, and it said 1am. Great… Frustration was piling up and I was faced with a choice. I could either let myself get all riled up, or I could simply breathe and let go of all of my stress until the morning.

Thinking about the stress in my life wasn’t doing me any good as it had already kept me up for the last three hours, so I didn’t really have any other choice. It was either trying something new, or risk being up for an addition three more hours. I took the next five minutes or so and really tried to focus on my breathing. Deep breaths in and long exhales. After these five minutes had gone by, I was out cold. Granted I only got six hours of sleep (I am used to getting around eight a night), it was a deep, quality sleep.

Of course I woke up the next morning and I was not wanting to get out of bed, but it was basically my Friday. It was really a Tuesday, but with the 4th of July on Wednesday and taking PTO on Thursday, I saw it as a weekend. I rolled out of bed, got dressed, and drove to work. The same stressors that had come to my mind the night before came right back on my drive to work. After realizing that these were the same thoughts as the night before, I asked myself a question. Were these really the thoughts that kept me up for three hours? These stressors were miniscule to what I overcome with ease on a daily basis.

In August, one of my best friends from college is getting married. The thoughts that were racing through my head happened to be about the wedding. I had to RSVP, and I still had to find a hotel room. Seriously, I was stressing more about my friend’s wedding than I probably will with mine. Aside from this, I was wondering what people would think of me, how I compared to others success in life, and then I just stopped. Isn’t my goal with this blog to focus on my life and be the best person that I can be? Well, I wasn’t doing a very good job at focusing on just myself.

This goes to show that no matter how happy you are in life and no matter what your goals in life are, you are always going to face obstacles. Whether these obstacles are events in life or just thoughts that roam your head, they are going to come. The best thing that you can do for yourself is to just breathe and put your mind at ease. When you release all of the tension that you are holding, your thoughts will be more clear, your abilities will be more powerful, and you will endure less stress.

So as I am driving to work the next day, the thoughts came back to my mind. What once kept me awake for three hours took me all of five minutes to resolve. I sent in my RSVP, texted some other buddies, got a hotel room, and all was good. The only thing that I couldn’t control and what I still can’t control is how people think about me. That’s just fine. I got invited to the wedding for being who I am. These are some of my closest friends and they know who I truly am. I don’t need to act like somebody that I am not, I just need to be me.

What we all need to do a better job of learning to breathe and let go. Let go of all of your thoughts, and let go of all of your emotions. Let me tell you, when my mind was racing with negative thoughts, I was growing more and more frustrated by the minute. Once I focused on breathing, the stress settled. When I woke up in the morning and the thoughts came back into my mind, and the solution was much easier than I could ever have imagined. I was able to think more clearly because I was not fighting with my emotions. I was not as tired and I actually had the energy to piece together a plan to help overcome the stress.

From time to time, we all get caught up in our own emotions. We get stressed, the stress soon takes over, and frustration settles in. We just need to learn to breathe and realize how strong we truly are. Instead of letting your emotions get the best of you, take a few moments to breathe and simply let go of all of your thoughts. Come back in a few hours or even the next day. Approach the thoughts again, and the solution will be more clear. Once you learn to breathe and let go, your stress will be reduced, and you will be able to live life with more positivity.

Michael Bonnell

7/6/2018

 

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