Why Meditate for Anxiety? Unlocking the Benefits

When you know anxiety intimately, you understand that your mind can feel out of control. This can lead to stress and more persistent negative thoughts. The good news is there are meditation and mindfulness tools that can support you today. Understanding the link between mindfulness meditation and anxiety management changed my life completely. I hope that in this article, you will better understand the potential benefits you can gain from meditation and mindfulness and have a few tools to support feelings of anxiety. 

In this article, we'll cover the following:

• Benefits and importance of integrating meditation into your daily routine
• How to overcome common difficulties in beginning mindfulness meditation practice
• Using breathing techniques to find anxiety relief
• Understanding the concept and benefits of guided anxiety meditation
• Instructions for starting a guided meditation practice and links to short meditations
• Relevant apps and online resources for guided meditations
• How meditation and mindful awareness helped me with anxiety and panic

Types of Meditation for Anxiety

• Focused-attention meditation: Benefits and Techniques
• Body scan or progressive relaxation: Helps in becoming conscious of anxiety-inducing sensations in the body
• Mindfulness meditation: An overview of its usefulness for anxiety disorders

Guided Meditation for Anxiety

Addressing anxiety with compassion is one of the best ways to approach a guided or self-focused practice. Below are a few powerful guided practices you can try in fewer than 15 minutes. The value of guided meditation techniques is that they are excellent for beginners or people who are having trouble settling down into the moment. Guided meditations can also be an excellent segue into a silent, seated practice.

• This is a visualization that will allow you to confront anxiety and reframe your idea of a worst-case scenario. Instead of hiding or dodging, this 9-minute session will help you to mindfully address anxious thoughts with courage and compassion.
• Reconnecting with the beauty of the present moment is a beautiful way to come out of an anxious state and into more harmony. This is a simple guided meditation practice to help you come to the present moment now.
• Often anxiety is connected with worrying thoughts about the future. In this 12-minute meditation, you will find a way to persevere and push beyond anxious thoughts and experiences to better listen to yourself and find alignment. Anxiety and worry can either take a toll on us, or such feelings can offer us information about our values and remind us to return to grounded energy. This is a great meditation for times in which you feel a lot of pressure, personally or professionally.
• Mindfulness meditation for anxiety. Anxiety can often make meditation more difficult. This 12-minute talk with a few exercises will support you as a new or returning meditator to find ways that work even if you are feeling anxious or worried right now.

Breathing Meditation for Anxiety

• Alternate nostril breathing is a yogic breathing exercise that calms anxiety by balancing the body and the energy. To practice, begin by blocking your right nostril with your thumb and inhaling through the left slowly and deeply. Then block the left and exhale through the right. Begin again by inhaling through the left, blocking it, then exhaling through the right. Continue for a 2 minutes. Alternate nostril breathing takes a bit of focus and eases stress. 
• Breathing in four equal parts with box breathing is another way to regulate emotions and calm anxiety. Begin by inhaling to a count of 4, holding for a count of 4, exhaling for a count of 4, and holding out for a count of 4. If 4 feels too difficult, you can count to 3. Repeat for 3 rounds and notice any shifts. This technique has been taught to Navy SEALs to cope with stress, and it has been proven that repetitions of this mindful breathing exercise helps us find more balance in our day or release anxiety. You can find guided meditations for box breathing here.

Mindfulness Meditation for Anxiety Disorders

Mindfulness meditation means practicing meditation with a particular focus. Mindfulness has been proven to reduce stress and hypertension, reduce anxiety and depression, and increase overall well-being. Essentially, mindfulness means meditating with compassion and presence. 

According to John Kabat-Zinn, the creator of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), the practice can be enhanced with an attitude of gratitude and openness or what is often referred to as "beginner's mind." Mindfulness meditation can help manage anxiety disorders by bringing you out of the past-focused or future-focused thinking mind and into the present by redirecting thoughts to what is happening here and now. Mindfulness is often used in conjunction with cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) to help a person be more receptive to reframing anxious thoughts. 

1. To practice mindful meditation now, try the following:
2. Ensure you have a tall spine and a comfortable seated position.
3. Settle your gaze ahead of you on the floor and begin to tune into your breath.
4. As you breath, notice the sensation of your breath. Notice the temperature and the way the body moves with the breath. In this mindfulness meditation, you will use breath as the primary focus of awareness. 
5. Give yourself permission to simply be and watch the breath. If your mind wanders, that's fine. Bring the focus back to the breath with calm and compassion.
6. Continue for two minutes, and then blink your eyes a few times and come back to your day. Notice how you feel.

Other meditations you can try include loving kindness meditation, which is a quintessential mindfulness practice that asks you to send compassion to both you and others; body scan meditation; walking meditation; transcendental meditation (often referred to as TM), in which you repeat a mantra; and a general mindfulness practice in which you can practice mindful exercises during your day.

Committing to Regular Practice

Sticking to a daily meditation practice will support anxiety more sustainably. Meditation, like anything, is a practice that gets easier and feels more natural with repetition. You can truly pick any meditation or mindfulness practice that works for you. The more you personalize your practice, the better. Consistency is key in yielding measurable benefits for anxiety because with practice, you can train your brain to go to a meditative calm even in the midst of your day.

I started my own meditation and yoga practice in response to anxiety and panic attacks, and it has changed my life. I learned along the way that I had to make my meditation practice my own. I remember experimenting with some practices that didn't seem to stick, while breath practices helped to calm my mind like nothing else. Body scan meditation was challenging for me for years, but now it's one of my favorite practices. 

Whether you are new to meditation or have been practicing for years, approaching your practice with the compassion and awareness of mindfulness with support your journey. Meditation can augment the positive effects of therapy, and increased awareness can support healthier relationships. Remember that focus will waver, and meditation will be easier on some days than others. If you find yourself distracted, notice the distraction and bring attention back to your practice. By getting in the habit of redirecting our focus, we learn to control emotions and see through the cloud of anxiety.

For me, meditation has led to better sleep, less reactivity and stress, mental strength and resilience, and a stronger nervous system. I find myself better able to relax on days off and focus when I am at work, and I attribute this to exploring different types of meditation and finding what worked right for me. I wish you a similar journey. 

Mindfulness meditation resources:

• Get a free 6-week mindfulness meditation certification at the Palouse Mindfulness. This course uses Jon Kabat-Zinn's mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) method of meditation training. 
• Join a meditation group in your area. They are often posted on Meetup or other community boards. 
• Seek out therapy from a practitioner who uses mindfulness and meditation practices. This can often be found in their statement or reviews.
• Try a mantra meditation or kirtan mantra practice to settle your mind. Here is a mantra meditation that focuses on seed (one-syllable) mantra meditations.
• Explore one of the largest libraries of various types of meditation at Aura Health.
• Find resources at Stanford Health, including Mindful Meditations and readings. 
• Enroll in a yoga class, where you will get the benefits of savasana meditation and often learn breath techniques.
• Read more about the benefits of meditation and mindfulness here. 

At Aura, 97% of people find calmer in just three days, which speaks to the power of meditation and mindful practices for anxiety and stress. If you’re looking for more guidance, community support, and resources to support anxious thoughts, join me at Aura, the most holistic meditation app on the market, for 30 days free.