What relaxation techniques do any of you use?

[Chrissy1972]

Lately my anxiety has been manifesting in the way of stiff neckm shoulders, tight jaw  and my right eye twitches....Some days I feel like my head is going to burst!!!  When I get so tight its hard to get a stretch and breathing excercises make me feel a bit more lightheaded than anything.  As I am typing this I have  a bed buddy heat pack around my neck to help ease the tension. But I cant use this during the day when I am at the office. Id look like a moran!!!  Any good relaxation techniques would be helpful.

Thanks & God Bless!

[flob]

ok...well a lot of people think when your shoulders are stiff, you rub them...or if you have eye twitches, you rub your eye or head or pressure points in your head...etc. thats a rather direct method but one that really helped me was 'alone time' where i could put a really relaxing cd in and spend time by myself in a dark room maybe with candles and close my eyes and jsut listen to the music and let it take my thoughts wherever they'll go for a half hour or hour....or shorter if you want. the point is that your mind gets to relax and in turn, your body gets to relax.

music is my escape to everything, though. maybe it would be something different for you...but i think music can produce relaxation more effectively than other things. this will sound lame, i'm certain of it....but one cd i used to listen to was 'lets talk about love' by celine dion. now...this is REALLY not the type of  music i usually listen to...but there's no doubt that it was effective in helping me meditate or relax, or even fall asleep. i think even the most macho of guys would respond the same way, even if they wouldn't admit to it. ha. another relaxing cd is one by ray lamontagne....his first one. but you may already have ones of your own and maybe you already do this stuff. it doesn't help during an anxiety attack...but i think it does help prevent them. it gives you a better attitude and helps your mind just relax. i also write a lot. sometimes what i write is worth writing...sometimes not. it doesn't matter because one thing is sure, when i'm done writing i feel like i've accomplished something and it truly makes me feel good. you can get similar effects from writing a song or excercise or whatever. but these things are important too. lastly...i read on yahoo that one thing to try to help relax is a breathing technique where you sit or lay down and you take your hand up to your nose and breath in through one nostril and out through the other. i thought this sounded really stupid...but i tried it anyway and it really does help you go relax. i don't know why. maybe just because i think it does. supposedly breathing in through the left side stimulates the left hemisphere and the same if you were to breath in through the right and out through the left. that aside, it does help me fall asleep if i'm having trouble or to relax if i need to. but...this will look about as moronic as a heat pack around your neck if you get caught doing it at the office....