On the eve of Valentines Day, I’m sitting here on my couch, alone, and scrolling through Reddit. The sun is setting and the angle it was shining into my window caused a reflection of my face on my phone. 

I was scrunching my entire face. 

Now, prior to this realization, I was feeling sad and lonely about being single on Valentine’s Day and having no friends to “distract” me or hang out with me to get my mind off being so lonely and isolated. That’s when I saw my reflection in my phone. Why am I so tense all the time?

When I was in the hospital, we would do these 5-7 count breathing exercises before / after every DBT session. I decided to try it because after my body scan, I noticed not only was my face completely scrunched, my neck, shoulders even toes are all tense. Relax. 

I’m sitting on my couch, everything is fine. Why am I so tense. I decided to do the breathing exercise.

Breathe in 1 2 3 4 5 

Breath out 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

I feel slightly more relaxed &amp; less sad that I’m feeling lonely. Wow. I need to set a timer or something because once I get in my thoughts even my body reacts without me even noticing.