Anyone who has experienced anxiety understands the profound impact it can have on their life and even their personality.
Anxiety not only affects how you feel on a day-to-day basis but also how you behave and react to the world and people around you.
As someone who has personally experienced various types of anxiety, I am well aware of the problems it can cause if not properly addressed.
Throughout more than ten years of meditating, I have witnessed the transformative effect that natural meditation can have on anxiety. It not only helps you cope with anxiety but also facilitates healing and resolution.
Natural meditation is essential in managing anxiety due to its simple approach to dealing with pain and feelings.
Most people don’t know about the effects meditation can have on anxiety, and if they do, they don’t understand the long-lasting, healing effect it can have if you’re using the right meditation approach.
As of 2023, over 3.6% of the world suffers from anxiety in some form or another. That’s over 264 million people. So let’s see if this article can help some of those people heal and resolve their anxiety.
Let’s delve into it…
Meditation
Meditation is more than just a passing fad or a momentary escape from the world’s troubles; it’s a process where the individual can gain a deeper understanding and connection with their body and mind.
While meditation might seem complex to the inexperienced, its nature is simplicity. At its core, meditation is about coming back to the natural physical sense of yourself and living life from that. For many, the appeal of meditation lies in its effectiveness in managing and relieving anxiety and stress, providing a refuge amidst life’s storms.
Types of Anxiety
The first thing to understand is the two primary levels of anxiety.
The first level is the most common type of anxiety that arises in response to specific situations or events. For example, it could be the anxiety you feel before a job interview or upon receiving bad news. This type of anxiety tends to come and go easily once the situation is resolved or by acknowledging and allowing the feeling of anxiety to dissipate.
The second level of anxiety is trauma-based anxiety, which runs much deeper. Trauma-based anxiety is something that you experience almost all the time and it usually stems from unresolved traumas, either in your childhood or adult life.
Resolving this type of anxiety is more challenging because it requires addressing and healing the underlying trauma. This healing process takes time, as these traumas not only generate anxiety but also impact various aspects of your life, some of which you may not even be aware of.
As I said above these are the two primary levels of anxiety. If you’re sitting here reading this thinking you don’t really fit into either category that’s fine. You can heal and resolve all types of anxiety in the same way, just understand that some anxieties will just take longer, and need more understanding.
Either way, this article should help you start to understand your anxiety on a deeper level, allowing you to approach it differently.
And that is to feel your anxiety to resolve it, rather than to push it away and suppress it.
How Meditation Helps Overcome Anxiety
Natural meditation is the only thing that will help you completely heal and resolve your anxiety because it is about finding the root cause of the anxiety and healing that.
Anxiety is not something that needs to be fixed or changed, it’s a part of you, and through meditating, you gain an understanding of your anxiety, and its root cause. From this understanding, you’re able to heal and naturally resolve your anxiety.
You see, the feeling of anxiety in your body is a cry for help from something deep inside of you that needs your attention. The attention that part of you needs is simply to be felt. When you give your anxiety the attention it needs, it will calm down.
Most of the time, our immediate reaction when we start to feel anxious is to try to suppress or change it or to distract ourselves from it as quickly as possible.
This reaction is a thought reaction, and it is this thought reaction that makes the feeling of anxiety feel overwhelming and frightening.
Our thoughts will take the simple feeling of anxiety and magnify it beyond its untainted state, with worries, overthinking, and ideas.
Natural meditation will allow you to just feel the pure feeling of anxiety wherever it is in your body, without the interference of thoughts, reactions, and ideas.
When sitting down to meditate, the first thing you will feel is the reaction to the anxiety, the urge to escape, to move, or to get away from the feeling. Simply allow yourself to feel this reaction, this urge to escape, until it starts to fade away and the pure feeling of anxiety will start to come through.
This may take a while, so don’t expect this to happen the first time. Your reaction to the anxiety is part of the anxious feeling for now, so in order to resolve your anxiety you need to resolve this reaction first.
Every time a reactionary thought or urge to move or escape from that feeling arises, simply ignore it and return to physically feeling the anxiety.
Benefits of Meditation for Anxiety
When anxiety takes hold, it can feel like a shadow that never quite leaves, affecting everything from our thought patterns to our physical health.
One of the primary advantages of meditation is its potential for anxiety alleviation. Through meditation, individuals can learn to detach from overpowering anxious thoughts and heal their past traumas. By doing so, meditation breaks the chain of escalating negative thoughts, providing a reprieve and clarity.
Yet, the benefits of meditation extend far beyond just anxiety relief.
- Improved Sleep: As you gain a deeper connection with yourself through meditation, sleep becomes more restful and rejuvenating.
- Enhanced Self-awareness: Meditation allows the individual to gain a deep self-understanding.
- Combatting Addictions: Meditation allows individuals to heal and resolve the driving urges behind additions.
How Often Should You Meditate?
When people first start meditating there are two main questions they tend to ask; what is the right way to meditate? And how long should I meditate for? The truth is, there’s no one-size-fits-all answer. Meditation is a deeply personal practice, and what works for one person might differ for another.
However, for beginners dipping their toes into the world of meditation, a good starting point is consistency over duration. Start by dedicating a few minutes daily, perhaps during a quiet moment in the morning or before bed. These brief sessions can set the tone for the day or provide a peaceful end to it.
As you grow more comfortable and attuned to the practice, you can gradually increase the duration. Remember, it’s not about clocking in hours but about the quality and intention behind each session. The key is to make meditation a natural part of your daily routine, like brushing your teeth or having breakfast. Over time, you’ll find your rhythm and what works best for you.
How Anxiety Affects Your Body
When you feel anxious or stressed, it signals to your body that you are in danger, triggering a fight or flight response. This activates your adrenal glands and nervous system, causing an increase in blood pressure and heart rate.
Feeling anxious or stressed occasionally and naturally is perfectly normal, but if you are constantly anxious, your body remains in a state of fight or flight. This puts a strain on your nervous system and adrenals, throwing your body out of balance.
Your body being out of balance affects your overall health and how your body typically responds to life, stress, food, and people around you.
This can cause you to start to gain or lose weight rapidly, throw your feelings and responses to life out of whack, and sometimes make it hard for you to deal with everyday life.
That is why individuals who experience ongoing anxiety may struggle to cope with even simple tasks in life.
Difference Between Stress and Anxiety
Stress is a natural feeling in the body, similar to fear, sadness, anger, etc. It only becomes a problem or overwhelming when thoughts and reactions are added to the untainted feeling.
For example, when an animal is scared or being chased, its body goes into a fight or flight response, making the animal experience the natural feeling of stress and fear. Once the threat is over, the animal’s body returns to normal, the feeling of stress and fear dissipates and the animal continues with its life.
However, humans take it one step further. We like to add thoughts, ideas, and beliefs to our natural feelings, making them more exaggerated and extending them beyond their natural duration.
This is how we create anxiety.
So stress is a natural feeling in the body, and anxiety is the mental reaction and exaggeration of the feeling of stress.
We can then take it even one step further and that’s how we create panic attacks.
How to Stop Panic Attacks
Panic attacks are usually the result of unresolved trauma trapped in our body and our reaction when that trauma is triggered.
Something outside of us triggers a feeling of panic or fear within us. If this feeling is connected to an unresolved trauma, the feeling that is being triggered is a lot bigger than just panic and fear. This is why we can overreact, and start to panic about the feeling arising within us, which can then lead to a panic attack.
This is simply a reaction to the feelings being triggered.
The easiest way to stop or prevent a panic attack is, as soon as you feel it coming on (those who have had it before will recognize the familiar feeling), to not react; just stay with the feeling of panic or fear.
Don’t dwell on your thoughts or try to analyze them; simply stay with the physical sensations in your body.
In a public setting, placing your hand on the spot where you feel anxious can help maintain a connection with that sensation.
Should any distracting thoughts arise, gently shift your focus back to the physical sensations.
When you’re in a comfortable and private space, like your home, take the opportunity to meditate.
Simply sit physically still with the feelings of that panic attack. Don’t go into the stories of your thoughts, don’t go along with the panic feelings. Just simply sit as still as you can with those feelings and allow them to have their say.
Just like anxiety, these feelings are just crying out to be felt.
Do this every time you feel those feelings coming on, or if you don’t manage to catch them in time, then do this during your panic attack.
Just remember the main thing is to just feel, just stay with the feelings and don’t give the thoughts any importance, just let them go on in the background.
Over time, as you start to simply feel the feelings rather than react to them, the feelings of panic and fear will begin to dissolve naturally.
This is how you can incorporate natural meditation into your everyday life.
Tips to Help You Meditate When You’re Feeling Anxious
Meditating when you’re feeling anxious is crucial. It is during these moments that we often try to avoid the feeling by watching TV, using our phones, and so on. However, allowing yourself to feel the anxiety is the key to healing and resolving it.
Believe me when I say it’s never as bad as you think it will be.
There have been countless times when I did everything to avoid anxiety, including avoiding meditation. But in the end, when I finally gave in and meditated, the feeling was far from what I had anticipated.
In fact, it actually felt nice to finally feel that feeling, to just allow myself to be with it.
Most of the time, the anxious feeling we’re trying to avoid is simply the anxiety about feeling the feeling itself. As soon as you sit and allow yourself to feel the feeling you’ve been avoiding, all the thoughts and worries that make it feel worse gradually fade away, leaving you with a pure feeling.
When you start to feel anxious and catch yourself trying to distract from it. That’s the moment to pause and meditate as soon as possible.
Just stop and sit with the feeling, no matter where it is in your body.
You can do this for 5 minutes, 10 minutes, or even 60 minutes. The length of time doesn’t matter as much as the act of sitting with it. By dedicating that time to feeling your anxiety, you’re giving it a chance to just be heard.
Guided Meditation for Anxiety
If you find it difficult to stay with the feeling without distraction, I highly recommend using guided meditation.
The Undo meditation app offers various meditations specifically designed to address anxiety.
It also provides deep meditations on feelings and reactions, which can help you better understand your automatic response to feelings of anxiety and stress.
The Role of Undo in Combating Anxiety
The Undo Meditation app offers a wealth of content to help with understanding and resolving anxiety and stress. It includes guided meditations and dedicated chapters on various aspects such as reactions, feelings, moods, and emotions.
These chapters not only provide guided meditations for times when you struggle with meditating but also offer a deeper understanding of yourself and the reasons behind your reactions. This enhanced understanding will ultimately assist you in managing anxiety across all areas of your life.
In Chapter 3 – Feelings, there is an active meditation called “Understanding your moods”. While I highly recommend completing the entire chapter, this specific practice targets anxiety and stress.
Final Words
Natural meditation can help you completely resolve and heal your anxiety.
Anxiety doesn’t have to be a terrifying force that takes control of your life.
It’s just a feeling, a trauma that can be nurtured and healed by acknowledging it and feeling it in your body.
Instead of trying to change or reject it, understand that anxiety is a part of you. By attempting to distract or reject it, you’re essentially rejecting yourself and prolonging the feeling of anxiety.
Through natural meditation, you can develop a deeper understanding of yourself, allowing you to heal and address various issues and traumas.
Start by sitting still and simply allowing yourself to feel your feelings.
