Since our bodies are creatures of habit, we must practice these positive skills and enable them to prevail over the forces of negativism. Many are simple and easy to follow. In the latter cases the descriptions are very brief and incomplete, serving only to alert us to their potential effectiveness. Since performance anxiety will be a heightened version of daily tensions, we need to incorporate the art of relaxation into our everyday experiences. Once we are comfortable with attaining a relaxed state, we must then learn to activate this state at will.
Breathing exercises are also helpful in achieving relaxation.
Visualization, or guided imagination, is one of the most powerful methods of dealing with performance anxiety. Mental images of disaster can sabotage us very quickly, but positive images can be equally as strong. We can learn to use these positive images both to overcome anxiety and to achieve our goals. Again we must be careful to set attainable goals and resist fantasy and daydreaming. Numerous exercises pertaining to visualization are described.