Even though stress balls are specifically designed to be used as stress relievers, there are many awesome things you can do with them. Some of us believe in them more than others, but research shows that using them can enhance emotional stability and give you significant physical benefits. When we feel emotionally stress, whether it is at work or home, we tend to clench our muscles. This causes our body to tense up and feel even more stressed. But, squeezing a stress ball forces us to release and relaxed those tensed up muscles.
How to Use Stress Balls
While stress balls are fantastic for relieving stress, many health benefits come with using them on a regular basis. Let’s take a look at a few ways where you can use them.
- At work – Everyone gets stressed at work and it happens to the best of us. It can be extremely annoying and counterproductive. It also impacts your overall health. Although avoiding stress altogether is not possible, using a stress ball can help you. It can keep your hands occupied, relax your muscle and mind.
- At Home – Even though it is easier to manage and control your stress levels at home, there are still occasions that are impossible to avoid. Sometimes children can also be a handful and that is when having a ball close by will do wonders for managing stress.
Massage Your Feet
Most of us have only ever squeezed stress balls tightly in our hands, but did you know that you can use them to massage your feet? It is easier than you think. All you have to do is place one or two balls on the ground and roll your feet on them. The balls can increase the amount of blood flowing to your feet which can stimulate acupressure points that provide calming effects.
Final Thoughts
The use of these balls has been around since at least the early 1990s when the Japanese were observed to be using them during meditation. Nowadays, they can be purchased anywhere, from toy stores to online stores, and are used as everyday stress relief tools, for a variety of different applications. If you don’t have one, then we recommend using one for a few weeks to find out for yourself how helpful it can be. They are also believed to have more advanced health benefits such as improving blood circulation and long term benefits include a reduction in heart rate and the lowering of blood pressure. So, they can reduce your blood pressure, ease pain, improve muscle and joint flexibility and more. But they also have another important benefit – they can lower your anxiety. When you squeeze a stress ball, you are effectively doing physical therapy that helps to release stress and tension from muscles and joints. And, the more times you squeeze your stress balls, the more your anxiety will decrease.