Relieving your anxiety and stress through natural self-care practices like meditation continues to gain popularity.
Stress is a normal reaction to stressors in your life, whether they be good or bad. When you experience stress, your body releases chemicals called hormones that prepare you for action. You experience this physically as increased heart rate and blood pressure, increased respiration rate, and more.
These physical responses help you respond quickly to stressful situations. However, when you experience sustained levels of stress over time, your body begins to produce excess amounts of stress hormones which can lead to a host of health issues. Stressful situations can also trigger negative emotions such as anxiety and fear.
Being able to identify the triggers that make you anxious is the first step toward relieving it or working through it so you can move on with your life free from the burdens it brings.
Relieving your anxiety and stress through natural self-care practices like meditation continues to gain popularity. Read on to learn why this is the case and how you can begin to experience relief from your anxiety today.
What is anxiety?
A girl facing excessive anxiety.
Anxiety is the expression of fear at different intensities. The expression can range from mild to excessive. You experience anxiety when you react to a perceived or real threat you are experiencing now in your present, imagining you will experience in your future, or reliving one you experienced in your past.
Like most people, you will experience anxiety at some point in your life if you haven’t already. For these reasons, it’s important to recognize its signs and symptoms so you can get relief from it with meditation as soon as you feel it coming on.
What are the signs and symptoms of anxiety?
You may experience anxiety as physical sensations of a racing heart or shortness of breath. You could also experience it as feelings of excessive fear and dread.
Anxiety can be experienced in multiple ways. You may experience anxiety as physical sensations of a racing heart or shortness of breath. You could also experience it as feelings of excessive fear and dread.
You may experience anxiety as mental or emotional reactions. It is also possible to experience anxiety when you are faced with overwhelming responsibilities, or when something feels like it is missing from your life.
Whatever form it takes, anxiety can be a burden that weighs on you physically and mentally. Even while handling the most mundane tasks, a bout of anxiety can cause your mood to vary more than usual; making it difficult for you to be social.
What causes anxiety?
The causes of anxiety can vary greatly and can include anything from environmental factors to personal relationships.
The causes of anxiety can vary greatly and can include anything from environmental factors such as changes in weather patterns and global events. Interpersonal factors such as personal situations and relationships can also lead you to experience anxiety.
Either way, the causes are what trigger your body’s response of releasing chemicals into the bloodstream which leads to physical responses associated with stress and anxiousness like increased heart rate, blood pressure, respiration rate, and more.
How are anxiety and stress related to each other?
Anxiety and stress are often intertwined. When you experience anxiety or fear, the physical effects of stress kick into gear. This can leave you feeling overwhelmed and unable to cope with the situation at hand.
It’s important to recognize when you feel anxious or afraid because it’s often a sign that something is out of balance in your life, which is causing you stress and needs to be addressed.
The more stress you feel, the more likely you are to experience anxiety. If you can relieve either one, you’ll find that you positively impact the other.
How does meditating help with anxiety?
Meditating helps relieve your anxiety by slowing you down and directing you to focus on your body and breath instead of your thoughts.
The benefits of meditation for anxiety are extensive. Meditating helps relieve your anxiety by slowing you down and directing you to focus on your body and breath instead of your thoughts.
By practicing a short, five-to-ten-minute meditation, you can significantly reduce your stress levels. This is great because reducing your stress level is another effective way to alleviate the effects of your anxious mind.
Besides the physiological benefits of meditating, it can also positively impact your emotions.
Imagine you are experiencing anxiety and you start to feel like there is no escape from it. While this may feel overwhelming and unbearable, there is always a way out.
A great way to do this is to distract your mind from its current thought pattern. You could practice deep breathing exercises or do something else that helps you relax within the moment rather than think about what is causing your anxiety.
Doing something physical gives your mind a bit of rest. This ensures you won’t feel overwhelmed with negative emotions for the time being. After a while of not dwelling on what’s causing your stress, you’ll often spontaneously arrive at a solution.
Read on to learn more about how meditating helps you deal with your anxiety.
Six Benefits of using mindfulness meditation to relieve anxiety.
Remember who you truly are.
Mindfulness meditation is a practice with many benefits, including helping people like yourself cope with anxiety, stress, and depression by providing a sense of peace. It even helps relieve symptoms associated with pain and chronic stress such as insomnia, headaches, and muscle tension. All of which can cause you anxiety.
Below are additional benefits of mindfulness meditation on anxiety.
1. Cognitive benefits.
In addition to the physical and emotional benefits of mindfulness meditation, it also has an array of cognitive benefits. This means regularly practicing mindfulness meditation can help you reduce negative thinking patterns. Naturally, this will reduce your experiences of anxiety and stress brought on by dwelling on future fears or past fears.
2. Self-regulation benefits.
Mindfulness meditation improves your ability to self-regulate. This is great once you identify what causes your anxiety and you decide to stop exposing yourself to it. Surely you recognize this may be harder to do than it sounds as many factors affect your ability to successfully avoid your stressors.
3. Increased attentiveness & control benefits.
Other ways mindfulness meditation is effective at relieving stress include its benefits in helping you complete tasks requiring high levels of attention and control. These types of tasks are highly stressful and often cause you anxiety. The easier it is for you to complete them, the less anxiety you’ll experience.
4. Remember who you truly are benefits.
Mindfulness meditation is great for helping you remember who and why you truly are. It helps strengthen your identity and the concepts of yourself in relation to the entire universe. This naturally reduces your stress and anxiety, too.
5. Increased open-mindedness benefits.
Mindfulness meditation increases your tolerance for ambiguity or uncertainty. This is key for dealing with change and the unknown, which are both leading causes for you to experience anxiety and stress.
6. Increased empathy benefits.
Lastly, mindfulness meditation increases your empathy for yourself and for your other selves (those in your personal and professional relationships). Without a doubt, having empathy for yourself is great when dealing with experiences of anxiety or stress. It allows you to move past trying experiences faster through forgiveness.
Two easy ways to implement mindfulness meditation in your life.
There are many ways you can implement mindfulness into your day-to-day life. One way is through audio-guided meditations or meditation videos available online.
Another way is through mindful breathing exercises that not only keep you calm but also prevent stressful situations from causing you anxiety. You can begin to experience this benefit by taking deep breaths throughout the day, whether or not you feel anxious or stressed out.
Using audio-guided meditations to relieve anxiety.
If you are comfortable following directions and like to listen to soothing voices and relaxing sounds, this is a great option for you.
An effective way to calm your mind and reduce your anxiety is by listening to audio-guided meditations. If you are comfortable following directions and like to listen to soothing voices and relaxing sounds, this is a great option for you.
There are many different types of guided meditations available, and they range in length from 15 minutes to an hour. Some people find that shorter meditation sessions are more helpful than longer ones, but there is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to guided meditation.
There are also many different styles of meditation; you may prefer a more mindful approach while others might like a more imaginative approach.
To explore a myriad of options, try searching “guided mediation for anxiety” or “mindfulness meditation for anxiety” on InsightTimer and see what appeals to you the most.
Using breath-focused meditation to relieve anxiety.
In addition to focusing on your breathing, try adding your other senses to the exercise ‑‑ such as listening to music or smelling a flower-to enhance the effect of your practice.
Breathing exercises are my favorite and most effective way to relax, reduce anxiety, and relieve stress. Breathing is a natural way to quiet your mind and calm your body. It’s a practice that you can do anywhere, anytime. And again, it is what keeps you alive!
To do this meditation technique, simply sit in a comfortable position and focus on your breath. As you inhale and exhale through your nose, take note of how your mind wanders and bring it back to your breath. This will help you identify some of the triggers that lead you to experience anxiety while also providing relief from those triggers.
In addition to focusing on your breathing, try adding your other senses to the exercise ‑‑ such as listening to music or smelling a flower-to enhance the effect of your practice.
Doing so will help you better recognize what causes stress in your life without any negative consequences, really. You’ll be allowing yourself to explore who you are through multiple aspects of yourself.
Six Ways to enhance your meditation for anxiety.
Enhanced meditation.
If you are serious about using meditation to relieve yourself from anxiety and improve your stress levels, you can make things easier by doing the following things that will enhance your progress.
- Avoid the stressors that cause you to feel anxious, such as certain people or certain places, sounds, or images.
- Eat a healthy diet including lots of vegetables and fiber.
- Exercise regularly and stretch before and after your workout.
- Drink plenty of water throughout the day.
- Avoid drugs and caffeine completely as they tend to increase anxiety levels.
- Practice proper sleep hygiene to allow your body time to recover.
Conclusion.
Meditating continues to gain popularity as a reliable form of natural self-care. Any form of meditation, whether breath-focused or mindfulness meditation, is an effective way to help you find relief from anxiety and stress.
Meditating can help you feel more centered and grounded and has a host of other benefits (which I discussed in this post). Knowing all of this is not enough, however. The key is to find a type of meditation that works for you and to do the practice regularly with the intention that it helps you relieve your anxiety. Enjoy exploring meditation as a proven and effective way to relieve your anxiety and stress.
