Progressive Muscle Relaxation: A Step-by-Step Guide to Stress Reduction

Life is stressful, and everybody wants to know how to reduce stress. Everyone’s different and should experiment to find the stress relief techniques that suit them best. 

People struggling to find effective stress relief techniques should consider practicing progressive muscle relaxation. Also known as Jacobson’s relaxation technique, this skill opens the door to controlling physical anxiety. As the body calms, the mind relaxes with it. The body can’t remain stressed or anxious in a relaxed state, which makes this technique a fantastic mind-over-matter method. 

How to do Progressive Muscle Relaxation (PMR)

PMR requires some practice. Beginners should start by breathing deeply and slowly. After a few deep breaths, clench muscle groups in time with inhales. Exhale long and slow, and relax the muscles as the breath leaves the lungs. 

Take a bottom-up approach to the muscle groups. Start at the feet, up to the calves, then the thighs, all the way up to the head. Some prefer to start at the head and move down instead—both methods work fine. 

Preparations 

Anyone with chronic pain or previous muscle injuries should consult a doctor before they try PMR.

After confirmation, find a quiet place to try PMR for the first time. Mute or turn off all phones, turn off loud music, and block out loud environmental sounds. 

Then, get comfortable. PMR practitioners can sit or lie down based on their environment and preference. Either way, meet all physical needs beforehand: 

• Have a light meal a few hours before to avoid indigestion, bloating, gas, or hunger 
• Avoid drinking or other drugs to facilitate a clear mind 

Most importantly, set time aside. A single session takes between 15 and 20 minutes. 

Deep Breathing 

Never hold a breath during PMR. Air should flow in and out of the body throughout the entire exercise—either inhaling while contracting or exhaling when releasing. 

Contract and Relax 

When breathing in and contracting, breathe in for 5 seconds. Do not strain the muscle. The group should clench, but only hard enough to feel the movement. Then, let the breath out slower than it came in, around 10-15 seconds. Savor the relaxation as tension drains from the muscles, then move on to the next body part. 

Move On 

Moving from top to bottom or bottom to top, move steadily from one group to the next. After tension drains out of all muscle groups, get up and go about the day. 

Muscle Groups to Target 

When practicing PMR, start with one body part and move to the next. It’s easier to start with a few easily-isolated muscles instead of huge chunks of the body. For example, starting at the feet is more manageable for beginners than the entire leg. 

With some practice, PMR veterans can combine muscle groups. For example, the core, shoulders, and chest can all flex at once, or the biceps, forearms, and hands can all tense simultaneously. 

The muscle groups engaged in PMR are, from bottom to top: 

• Feet 
• Calves—be careful to avoid a charley horse  
• Thighs 
• Hands 
• Buttocks 
• Stomach/core 
• Chest 
• Shoulder blades/upper back 
• Neck 
• Jaw—open as wide as possible; do not clench hard or grind teeth 
• Eyes—squeezed shut 
• Eyebrows—lift as high as possible  

Muscle Relaxation Progression 

Practice improves PMR as it does any other skill. Set aside between five and fifteen minutes every day. As time passes, flex larger groups at once. In time, serious practitioners learn “release-only” approaches to PMR. It transforms from a dedicated time for meditation into a stress-relief technique usable anywhere. 

Time 

Muscle relaxation takes as long as it needs to. Some people grasp it immediately and master it after a few attempts, allowing them to complete the exercise in a few minutes. Others need half an hour or longer to move throughout their body, and take several months to shorten the exercise. Never rush; relaxation takes time. 

After mastering relaxation techniques in each muscle group, accelerate the process. Use larger muscle groups in tandem to relax a larger portion of the body at once. With the same results in less time, the process becomes more convenient.  

Larger Groups 

The ability to flex larger “sections” of the body at once shows improved bodily control, which speeds up the entire process. While “slow is smooth, and smooth is fast,” not everyone can set aside time to relax daily. A 5-minute-or-less approach gets them the benefits faster. 

Release-Only 

Given enough time, PMR takes only a few seconds. “Release-only” is an even faster approach. Identify muscles tensed by stress, rather than manually during meditation, and release them. It may feel less intense at first, but as with the others, this final step requires practice. 

Conditions Progressive Muscle Relaxation Treats 

PMR helps treat many physical and psychological issues, though it is not a substitute for traditional medical intervention. Muscle relaxation does, however, alleviate the symptoms of sleep difficulties, chronic muscle tension, anxiety, high blood pressure, and much more. PMR also targets the stress from life with chronic conditions, thereby treating both the source and the cause of chronic stress. 

Insomnia 

Relaxation is critical for sleep. Performing progressive muscle relaxation while lying down in bed speeds up the falling-asleep process. The body unwinds after a long day, and the mind follows. 

Muscle Tension 

Fear, stress, and anxiety trigger the body’s fight-or-flight response. Long periods of tension without release cause these severe aches and pains. PMR forces this unconscious tension out of the muscles. 

Mood Disorders. 

Dr. Edmund Jacobson originally developed progressive muscle relaxation in the 1920s to treat anxiety. Though effective on many other conditions, it still shows remarkable efficacy when treating anxiety. Relaxation forces the body to release the unwarranted and uncontrollable feelings of fear and dread associated with the condition. 

PMR even reduces the symptoms of bipolar disorder, anxiety, and depression, whether co-occurring with anxiety or alone. 

Chronic Pain 

Reduced stress and physiological arousal from PMR alleviate minor chronic pain, especially pain with varied or ambiguous causes. While not targeted to specific body parts, multiple studies show Jacobson’s technique works on localized pain in various areas: 

• Stomach 
• Headaches and migraines 
• Back, shoulders, and neck 
• Jaw (TMJ) 

Patients should always use progressive muscle relaxation in tandem with more conventional medical treatment. 

Blood Pressure 

Stress often causes high blood pressure. Progressive muscle relaxation decreases stress. Reduced stress drops blood pressure, and as it drops, so do the chances of heart attacks or strokes. 

Call SoberMind Recovery for Sober Living Help 

SoberMind Recovery offers drug recovery and therapy services that help with issues progressive muscle recovery can’t treat on its own. Programs for sobriety and recovery that emphasize dual diagnosis treatment. 

Los Angeles residents ready for inpatient or outpatient programs should call SoberMind Recovery for more information about how it can help. It’s especially suited to vulnerable and underserved audiences, like its LGBTQ sober living initiatives.