We had a great Lunch and Learn at the J.F. Hurley Family YMCA a week ago. It was about stress management and mindfulness techniques. Tai Chi Grand Master Craig and I were the speakers for this lunch and learn. I love teaching about stress management and mindfulness because when I do, I do so much better myself. We all have stress in our lives. When you try to eliminate stress, you will find out that stress will become so much worse. There is no way to eliminate it, however, there are ways you can practice to handle stress better. And of course, regular exercise is part of this plan.

Exercise is one of the four techniques to make you feel calm and focused. (I am mentioning all four but go more in depth on one of them.) Another one is breathing, concentrating on your breath’s rhythm. Another technique is your thoughts and feelings. Work to detach your thoughts from your emotions. Easier said than done, right? And the fourth one is to focus on the five senses. See, feel, hear, smell, taste. When you google Grounding techniques for mindfulness, anxiety reduction or grounding, the 5-4-3-2-1 grounding technique will pop up. You might already be familiar with this. But for the ones who are not, how do you start? Observe with each sense:

• For sight: Identify five things you can see
• For touch: Notice four things you can feel or touch
• For hearing: Listen for three sounds you can hear
• For smell: See if you can find two things you can smell
• Taste: Identify one thing you can taste.

Do this when you are feeling stressed, because the goal is to re-direct your mind from what is stressing you. One of my go-to techniques to re-direct my mind is the serenity prayer: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, please give me the courage to change the things I can, and please give me the wisdom to know the difference.” But I just started to use the 5-4-3-2-1 technique for slowing down a racing mind. Many times, I can’t shut off my brain unless I am with my horses, teaching classes or doing a lot of paperwork. I must say, I even tried this in the middle of the night, and instead of “seeing,” I imagined seeing five things; instead of “touching,” I imagined touching things (and yes, one of them was my horse). Of course, I actually still heard sounds. I imagined smelling and taste. And it absolutely calmed my racing mind, I turned over and went to sleep. One other thing I did is put my phone in another room. I had it right next to my bed, on silence but internally a phone never stops and my body felt it. Since I removed it from the room, my sleep has been so much better. And I just set an “old-fashioned” alarm clock.

Stress management and mindfulness doesn’t happen after one try. Like anything else, you must practice over and over. The practice of tai chi has been very beneficial for my mind and my body. Anyone can benefit from deep breathing exercises, moving your body and calming your mind. But you must put the work into it. I am confident you can do it, and as always, start today — tomorrow is always one day away.

Ester H. Marsh is associate executive director and director of healthy living at the J.F. Hurley Family YMCA.