Feeling Stressed? THIS Cool, Viral Trick Can Instantly Help Calm Down Your Anxiety
Dec 06, 2024
News
Touching ice can feel shocking for your system, triggering a lot of physiological changes that help you regulate stress
Anxiety does not see the time and place before hitting you. While having an anxiety attack feels completely out of control, it may feel embarrassing as well if you are among a group of people—with family or friends. However, the key to controlling it is calming down by grabbing a couple of ice cubes. Social media these days is loaded with claims that applying ice to the back of your neck can stop anxiety immediately.
According to experts, touching ice or anything that is cold can feel shocking for your system—it does trigger a lot of physiological changes that help you regulate stress.
How does putting ice help you calm anxiety?
Mental health experts say applying ice to the lateral part of your back neck helps prompt the vagal nerve stimulation—driving down your body’s fight or flight mechanism.
The vagus is the longest cranial nerve in your body, extending from the bottom of the brain down through the neck and into the chest and stomach. It forms a part of the parasympathetic nervous system which controls nonvoluntary functions like heart rate and digestion. It also helps your body relax and recover.
And so, when your body is in fight or flight, touching ice at the back of your neck stimulates the vagus nerve and parasympathetic nervous system all the way down the body and up to the brain. Once activated, it begins to counter the fight-or-flight response. This stimulation creates feedback loops in the body and brain reducing the heart rate – thereby lowering anxiety levels.
Other easy ways to lower anxiety
Apart from the ice method, a few other ways to lower your anxiety levels include:
Gargling
Gargling water is one of the most effective and quick ways to stimulate the vagal nerve in a way that really disrupts a panic attack. Since your vagus nerve runs through both the larynx and pharynx - as your vocal cords would vibrate, sections of the vagus nerve get stimulated, effectively moving the body out of fight-or-flight mode.
Exercise
Exercise can calm anxiety in two ways: first it lowers the levels of stress within your body and secondly, it makes people focus on the task of exercising, and this can distract them from ruminative thoughts.
Doctors say those who regularly work out see a reduction in symptoms of depression and anxiety compared with those who do not.
Practice diaphragmatic breathing
According to doctors, diaphragmatic breathing is a kind of breathing technique that reduces cortisol levels in healthy adults. To help relieve anxiety, you can do:
- Lie flat on the back with your knees bent and the soles on the floor.
- Place one hand on the upper chest and the other on the stomach, below the ribcage.
- Breathe in slowly and deeply through the nose.
- Exhale slowly through pursed lips, drawing the belly button toward the floor.
Listen to music
Music helps activate reward systems in the brain that increase feelings of pleasure and alleviate stress and anxiety.
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