Many people report an increase in anxiety since the election. Several articles have noted that this is affecting children as well as adults.

While it may take years to change our society enough to eliminate the reasons for this anxiety, we can do things to provide relief. When we reduce our stress levels and take our anxiety down several notches, we become more effective at planning strategies for making the changes we want to see.

Shiatsu, qigong, and chair massage are all very effective at reducing stress and anxiety. Getting regular shiatsu treatments helps us prevent many stress-induced health problems, and lessen others. People tend to feel far calmer by the end of a session, and the improvement usually lasts for at least a few days. Establishing a regular qigong practice helps as well. Other forms of exercise and meditation are also useful.

The standard advice is to maintain a daily practice that involves doing either the same practice or the same practice with slight variations daily, and for many people, this is a useful approach, as it allows one to deepen one’s understanding of the practice.

For others, however, doing the same thing daily, or even something similar daily, is simply anathema. That’s fine; if you do qigong on Mondays, yoga on Tuesdays, Tai Chi on Wednesdays, and jog on Thursdays, and have a shiatsu treatment on Fridays, you’ll have done something to address your stress every day for five days. You may not become as good a yogi or qigong practitioner as you would with daily practice, but you’ll be maintaining a practice that works for you, which is far more important. And you may be able to delve deeply into those aspects of your practice that are common to all the activities.

Increasing the nutritional profile of our diet is another important part of enhancing our ability to cope with stress. In particular, we want to make sure that our diets include adequate minerals and vitamins. Copious dark leafy greens, seaweed, and nettle infusion are excellent allies. A cup of chopped seaweed added to a pot of soup or stew increases the nutritional umph of your meal substantially. So does a handful of dried nettle, which also helps restore the adrenals. Nettle and seaweed are not specific remedies for anxiety, but by building us up and strengthening us, they help us handle the stress without becoming as anxious.

The nervine herbs are medicinal herbs that help with anxiety, depression, sleep, pain, and general emotional turmoil. Many herbs fall into this category, and they range greatly in strength. What herb or herbs will be best depends very much on the individual and the circumstances, and it’s easiest to figure that out through one-on-one sessions with an herbalist. Sometimes it takes a bit of trial and error to find the optimal herb or combination.

One herb that I find agrees with and relaxes most people is catnip. Put about half a cup of dried catnip into a quart-sized jar and then slowly fill the jar with water just off the boil. Let it steep for half an hour or so. The longer you steep it, the stronger it will get, and the more bitter notes in the flavor will come out along with the minty. If you’re steeping it for hours, make sure that it vacuum seals when you cover it. Serve with honey. My students request this so often that we nickname our Wild Herb Week program “Camp Catnip.”