How to combat stress and improve your mental and physical wellbeing

Traditional Western approaches

In the West, we tend to use “external” approaches to handling stress. We have positive, largely passive approaches such as listening to music or reading. Less positively, there is also the cliché of using alcohol or smoking as an attempt to deal with stress.

For a healthier approach, people are increasingly using physical exercise to combat stress, very often driven by innumerable influencers on social media. Often though, there is a tendency to overdo these external measures, even the apparently positive ones. It’s clear that smoking and excessive drinking are bad for us, but so is regularly pushing the body beyond its limits during physical exercise.

Putting the body under too much stress or strain and following the mantra of “no pain no gain” to the extreme, is an approach that, in the long run, is more likely to exacerbate stress rather than reduce it. We would call this a Yang approach.

Traditional Eastern approaches

In the East, meditation, nutrition, yoga, Tai Chi, Chinese Health Exercises, deep breathing exercises, aromatherapy, and reflexology, have traditionally been used to relieve stress and anxiety.

Eastern philosophy emphasises finding some time just for yourself, to do what you want to do, with no demands. (When, if ever, in your home or work lives, do you find your still-time?)

Eastern exercise and relaxation techniques focus more on the inside of an individual to develop calmness and relaxation. This is what we would call a Yin approach.

Our exercises

Our Chinese health exercises are based on Qigong exercise. They can be performed standing or seated and use gentle, flowing, movement of the body. Our method encourages the smooth flow of energy that is necessary to maintain health, harmony, and wellbeing. Regular practice of these exercises can help to attain balance and form part of an ongoing healthy lifestyle. 

A balanced mind and body can lead to greater wellbeing, and our exercises are a powerful tool for maintaining long-term health. Physical exercise, or lack of it, can lead to a sustained disharmony in the body. Generally, moderate physical activity is considered an excellent way to move energy and blood around the body so that they can protect and nourish the vital organs.

Our movements exercise the limbs and gently massage the internal organs which most Western exercises do not. The controlled breathing and slow relaxed movement calm the mind and help your body fight back and rebalance itself, helping you to deal with the pressures of modern life. Our exercises get the body back on track, so that it can go about the business of repairing itself.

Many of the health problems in our society, from bad backs to high blood pressure, are a result of living unnaturally. Stress, chronic tension, lack of exercise and poor eating habits contribute to the plethora of degenerative diseases.

Becoming healthy in mind and body on the inside will help us cope with all the stress we are all bombarded with in our daily lives. Stress-related illness will be reduced, controlled, and hopefully eliminated.

Health benefits

Regular practise of our exercises can:

• Boost the immune system

• Reduce stress and anxiety

• Strengthen mental and physical resilience

• Restore harmony between mind and body

The exercises can help increase your body’s own healing energy and help to improve blood circulation. Coordinating movements across muscle groups in the legs, back and arms, they can also help to strengthen the heart, lungs, liver, and the digestive system.

With regular practise you will feel stronger and notice an improvement in your energy levels.

Please see our video below for some helpful information and tools to relieve stress and improve your mental and physical wellbeing.