Unfortunately, having anxiety doesn’t give you an automatic pass from all your adult responsibilities. Sure, you might be able to book some time off work or have others in your life take on some of your load. But eventually we all have to get back to reality, whether our anxiety agrees or not. And while there are soooo many great anxiety relaxation techniques that can help us to manage our anxiety, many of these are better suited to use at home or somewhere private.
Look, I get it. You’re probably not going to break out your yoga mat in the middle of a work meeting, or do some vowel chanting while waiting in line at the grocery store. (Although wouldn’t that be a cool world to live in if that was the norm?) Luckily, there are many fantastic DISCRETE coping strategies that we can use when we’re out in public that won’t have people staring at us. Read on to learn what these are!
Discrete Breathing Exercises
We literally breathe all the time, so nothing gets more discrete than this (assuming you’re not all stuffed up). I covered plenty of different breathing exercises in this post and this post, but here are some of the most discrete breathing exercises:
Notice Your Breath
This breath exercise is really easy – it simply involves noticing your breath without trying to change it. Focus on your breathing for a few breath cycles, noticing if your breath feels fast, slow, shallow, deep, etc. etc. Notice how the breath feels as it enters your nose and travels down your body, and if it feels any different as it travels back up and out through your nose or mouth. After a few rounds of breathing, notice if your breath has changed at all.
Diaphragm Breathing
As far as anxiety relaxation techniques go, this one is pretty important. Simply breathe in and out normally, while ensuring that your breath is coming from your belly instead of your chest. An easy way to do this is to place one hand on your stomach. Then, see if you can breathe in a way that causes the hand on your belly to rise while your chest stays relatively still. You might imagine there’s a balloon in your belly that you are inflating as you inhale and deflating as you exhale.
Count Your Breaths
If you find you are too distracted to simply notice your breath, intentionally counting your breath can be helpful. The goal here is to breathe in for a set number of beats, hold for a set number of beats and breathe out for a set number of beats. You might try 4-4-6 breathing (in for 4, hold for 4, out for 6) or 4-7-8 breathing (in for 4, hold for 7, out for 8). Or else pick numbers that work best for you!
Trace Your Breaths
Try matching your breath to something you can trace with your finger. For example, you could draw a square on paper and trace is with your finger (or simply trace the shape in the air), breathing in as you travel up one side, holding while you trace the second side, breathing out as you trace down the next side and holding again as you trace the final side. There are some cool stickers that you can buy for tracing your breath, or you could carry something with you like a keychain that you use to trace.
Starfish Breath
Some of my favourite anxiety relaxation techniques are ones that are easily accessible and immediately available. The starfish breath is a great example of this as it involves using your hands, which we typically carry around with us.
Starting at the base of your pinky, slowly trace up to the top of your finger while breathing in. When you get to the tip, pause, hold your breath, and name something or someone that you are grateful for (in your mind, not out loud – that would be tough while holding your breath). Slowly trace down the other side of your pinky while exhaling. Repeat these steps with the rest of your fingers, finishing with your thumb.
Bilateral Stimulation Through Tapping
Bilateral stimulation involves some sort of stimuli being delivered in a repeating left-right pattern. In this case, we are using tapping. For example, you might try crossing your arms over your chest and alternate tapping your right and left hands again your shoulders. For more discrete forms of tapping, you can try tapping the sides of your legs with your hands. You could also try tapping your thumb and finger tips together (alternating between your left and right hand), or even tapping your feet against the ground.
There is something inherently soothing about bilateral stimulation through tapping. Laurel Parnell, author of the book Tapping In, proposes that this may be because the tapping reminds us of our mother’s heartbeat while we were in the womb. Whatever the reason, this is a great, discrete anxiety relaxation technique to try because where you tap doesn’t matter. What’s most important is just that we are alternating between left and right.
Self-Holding
Research is now showing us that compassionate self-touch (or self-holding) can be just as effective at reducing stress as receiving a hug. And since we’re probably not going to run up to our boss or a random stranger for a hug, self-holding makes for another fantastic anxiety relaxation technique that can be practiced discretely.
To self-hold, you are simply going to place your hands somewhere on your body that feels soothing. For example, you might place one hand over your heart and one on your belly, then pause to notice how this feels. You could also give yourself a gentle hug, hold or massage your hands or gently cup your face. Play around with different hand placements until you find what feels best for you.
Sensory Presence
Many of my favourite anxiety relaxation techniques involve using the five senses. This is because they are typically just as accessible as our breath. Not to mention that they all connect to our amygdala, which is the threat detector in our brain setting off the anxiety alarm in the first place. What better way to turn that alarm off than by targeting it directly?
A great way to use our senses discretely is to pair them with mindfulness. By that I mean we can practice bringing our attention to one of our senses at a time. When we do this, we are fully focused on the present moment, which is a great way to calm anxiety. Here are a couple ways you can do this:
5-4-3-2-1 Exercise
You may have heard of this 5 senses grounding exercise before. Here’s how to do it:
- Notice and name FIVE things you can see around you.
- Notice and name FOUR things you can feel with your hands or against your skin.
- Notice and name THREE things you can hear.
- Notice and name TWO things you can smell.
- Notice and name ONE thing you can taste.
Play the I-Spy Game
To really help yourself focus, challenge yourself to notice things in a specific category. For example, try to find 3 things around you that start with the letter S, or that are blue, or that have a circular shape. Change up the categories and difficulty factor as much as you like here!
Sensory Tools
Yet another fantastic anxiety relaxation technique that uses our five senses is an on-the-go sensory soothing kit. This is a portable kit that will contain things that are immediately soothing for your senses. You could keep these items in your purse, your glove compartment and/or in a drawer at work – wherever is most accessible to you! Everyone’s kit is going to look quite different, but here are some examples of discrete, portable items for each sense:
Sense of Touch
- Fidget toy
- Something textured (scrap of fabric, rock)
- Reflexology ring or fidget ring
Sense of Taste
- Gum or mints
- Sour candies
- Tea bags
Sense of Smell
- Scented lotions
- Bottle of essential oil
- Lava bead bracelet
Sense of Sound
- Earphones
- Ear plugs
- Specific playlists cued up on your phone
Sense of Sight
- Find something pleasant to look at around you
- Set your phone’s wallpaper to a favourite picture
- Write your favourite quotes or affirmations on index cards
Conclusion
There you have it, discrete anxiety relaxation techniques that can be used almost anywhere! Give them a try next time you’re waiting in line somewhere, stuck in traffic or sitting in on your 5th meeting of the day. And let me know in the comments any other discrete strategies you like to use to manage your anxiety!
PS – looking for some more anxiety relaxation techniques to try out? Check out these posts:
