My sons took piano lessons when they were little, and somewhere along the line I decided that I, too, wanted to learn. Their teacher squeezed me in after their sessions, knowing full well that I wasn’t going to be able to practice as much as the boys did, simply because my schedule was incredibly full.

One day, the teacher told me that I needed to relax my wrists. I did and proceeded to play. She repeated herself, I checked myself, and again launched in to playing what I was supposed to play. Exasperated, the teacher grabbed my forearm, raised it in the air, and shook it. My hand followed the forearm, rigid in the air. She said, “THIS is not a relaxed wrist.”

I must’ve looked at her in puzzlement, because she sighed. She raised her own forearm, shook it as she had mine, and showed me that her hand flopped around. “THIS is what relaxation looks like,” she explained to me.

Finally, I got it. I THOUGHT my wrist was relaxed, but it was not. Her piano lesson that day taught me so much more than music. I realized that I was way more stressed than I thought I was, and that I hadn’t the slightest idea how to relax until she showed me how physical relaxation actually looked.

This brief interaction happened close to 20 years ago, and it started me on a journey that helped me understand that what we think is normal and relaxed is not necessarily either of those things. It isn’t what led me to neurofeedback, but I was finishing my master’s degree in counseling psychology at the time and knew an important lesson when I received it. I’ve remembered it all these years.

Knowing that sometimes, we are so stressed that we can forget what true relaxation looks and feels like helps me when I work with my neurofeedback clients. I understand that sometimes, when people tell me they feel sleepy during brain training, it is just their nervous system calming them and that the sensation is not a familiar one. I understand what it feels like to rediscover how wonderful a calm mind and body can feel.

I needed a piano teacher to teach me this lesson. I am not sure who or what circumstances in your life led you to realize that you’re too stressed and not at all relaxed. Neurofeedback is an important tool that can help dial down the ways in which you may be bracing yourself—both metaphorically and physically—against the world around you. And, believe me, it feels good to let go of that stress.