Holiday Stress Is Real: How to Regulate Your Nervous System This Week

The week before the holidays is overstimulating for almost everyone. Extra noise, travel, last-minute errands, packed schedules, and constant pressure can push your nervous system into overdrive. Add in holiday cocktails, more sugar than usual, later nights, and disrupted routines—and it’s no wonder you feel tense, wired, or completely exhausted.

If you’re feeling off, it’s not a lack of discipline. It’s your nervous system responding to a lot at once.

The goal this week isn’t perfection. It’s regulation—small, realistic moments that help your body come back into balance so you can actually enjoy the holidays instead of just getting through them.

Start and End the Day with One Small Reset

One of the simplest things you can do is begin and close your day with a grounding moment. Even one minute helps. Stepping into cold morning air, taking a few slow breaths in the car before walking into a busy store, or sitting with both feet on the floor before bed sends a signal of safety to your nervous system. These micro-pauses help prevent your system from staying stuck in fight-or-flight.

Support Your Nervous System Around Sugar and Alcohol (Not Against Them)

Let’s be honest—holiday sugar and drinks are part of the season for many people. The issue isn’t enjoying them, it’s how they can dysregulate your nervous system by spiking cortisol, disrupting blood sugar, and interfering with sleep.

You don’t need to avoid them completely to feel better. What helps is supporting your body around them. Hydrating more than usual, eating protein earlier in the day, getting fresh air, and intentionally downshifting your nervous system can make a noticeable difference in how you feel.

Use Vibration Therapy When You’re Already Resting

When your body is overwhelmed, your mind can’t calm down until your physiology does. This is where vibration therapy becomes incredibly effective—especially when you don’t have time for a full routine.

The Feel Good Mat uses full-body vibration therapy to soften tension, regulate your breath, and help your nervous system shift out of stress mode. Even short sessions help interrupt the stress response and bring your body back into balance.

Let Familiar, Calming Movies Do Some of the Work

If your evenings are busy or social, you don’t need to carve out extra time. Use vibration only on the Feel Good Mat while watching a familiar holiday movie—something comforting and predictable like The Holiday, Little Women, It’s Complicated, or Love Actually.

Your nervous system gets a break from decision-making while the vibration quietly does its work in the background.

Use Deep Sleep Mode to Recover from the Day

As the day winds down, sleep becomes one of the most important forms of regulation—especially if you’ve had drinks, sweets, or a late night. Alcohol and sugar can fragment sleep and keep your nervous system activated long after you lie down.

This is where The Feel Good Mat's Deep Sleep Mode with sound is especially supportive. Using it before bed helps guide your system into parasympathetic “rest and digest,” making it easier to fall asleep and stay asleep. Think of it as helping your body recover from the stimulation of the day.

Lower the Sensory Volume at Night

Even small sensory shifts help your nervous system downshift. Lower the lights. Turn off background noise. Open a window for fresh air if you can. Warm showers, soft blankets, and familiar nighttime cues all tell your body it’s safe to rest.

A calmer holiday doesn’t require doing more or cutting everything out. It just requires small moments of support woven into the life you’re already living. If you want a simple tool that makes regulation easier—even during busy, indulgent, imperfect weeks—the Feel Good Mat fits into real moments and supports your nervous system when it needs it most.

Energy, stress relief, and better sleep don’t have to wait until January.

+ Managing Holiday Stress: A Nervous System Supportive Day That Fits Real Life

++ How Vibration Therapy Helps Your Body Reset