Learning to relax requires constant repetitive input

While doing yoga poses, Jane, one of the yoga instructors in my gym repeats phrases like "relax your face, relax your jaw," "relax your mind," "breath," "relax your shoulders, relax your neck," dozens of times during the class. She can't repeat them enough because these are things that I forget to do and I have to be reminded of constantly.

Jane also tells us to breathe into the area where we feel tense.

In my daily life, I am gradually undoing the tenseness that my body has locked in over the years, by remembering to relax my face, jaw, mind, shoulders and neck in the hopes that these will become natural responses that will no longer require conscious effort and become part of my involuntary nervous system.

I remember Jane's voice during my daily life as I try to establish a more relaxing pattern for my body.

Release the tension; you don't need any of it

I listen to a relaxation audio program where the narrator repeatedly says "release all tension," "let it go; you don't need any of it."

The phrase "you don't need any of it" is interesting and worth repeating. We have to be reminded continuously that we don't need the tension that we are holding in our bodies because our bodies seem to want to cling to it.