💪What to Do About Muscle Hypertonicity?

😬 Have you ever noticed how your shoulders rise up to your ears, your jaw clenches, and your breathing becomes shallow when your thoughts drift into anxiety and worry, or when you need to do something ASAP?

📍 Our body and brain are wired so that when we experience stress, the body enters a state of readiness for "danger," literally "bracing itself." One of the first reactions is increased muscle tone (or hypertonicity): muscles are tense even when there is no real threat.

🧠 Constant muscle tension is not only discomfort but also increased energy expenditure. Our body uses resources to maintain tone that we don't actually need right now. That's why we get more tired during periods of stress.

💡 From a physiological perspective, when muscle tone is high, the sympathetic nervous system is activated in the body. It is responsible for the "fight or flight" response. And yes, it's useful in real danger, but unnecessary in all other cases.

😄 Sometimes it's even funny: we sit, drink tea, but the body is on edge, as if we need to urgently save the world. Sound familiar?

And to relax everything, we rush to stretching or massage. And temporarily, we do remove the consequence, but the cause remains. If muscle hypertonicity appeared due to stress, then practices of conscious relaxation, such as Savasana and Yoga Nidra, will help relax the muscles.