Meditation on anxiety

[Redmar112]

Does anyone have a succes story about how the release their anxiety trough meditation?

3 years ago I had a severe anxiety that I was going to die.. It pretty much came from me not letting my feelings go and having much stress at that time. However somehow I was able to block it. Now the last year I had glimpses op that anxiety coming back. And last month I was pushing my body to the limit by doing a lot of fitness and I didn't meditate that month. I got a severe blatter infection and my "brown stuff" is trapped in my body so I have to take laxation. Almost every day I feel sick and since 2 days I hear a sound in my right ear. I don't pay much attention to things when I meditate now, but obviously there's something going on in my body. Can meditation help me? I am using lifeflow while I watch tv, is this a bad thing? (I do this because of my anxiety, i pretty much leave the tv on all day)

I just feel stuck, at the moment. Thinking i'm going crazy. I used to think this will never happen to me, well think again..

I had a time in my life that I blocked emotion and hearing cool music in order to be a super relaxed guy, but that got me sheaky and my blood preassure was like crazy high, I don't now how my friends can do it, but I can't.

But sometimes I think i'm also blocking my feelings by meditation, but with meditation there is no high blood pressure. And I am able to love a girl like I never loved before when I was all ego.

She's like wow so beautiful and I just want to be better so I can go to public places and be with her again i miss her.. damn this is hard

I hope someone could give me a few tips

love,
Redmar

[Ta-tsu-wa]

Nice to have you join the forum.

First off, I think if you take some time and read through the existing posts on this forum you'll see there are many people who have experienced anxiety issues and many who have overcome them. I'll offer you a few thoughts to consider.

Anyone who suffers from anxiety, particularly if there are definite physical symptoms in addition to the feelings of anxiousness, should go to a physician and get a complete physical. Anxiety is an epidemic in our society today, and the vast majority of people who experience it are just dealing with an anxiety disorder and not something that is physically dangerous. The reason I suggest you get a complete physical is not because I think you're going to find some big, frightening medical problem. Get a physical so that you can have a little peace of mind. If the doctor gives you a thorough checkup and clears you, then you know that all those fears of impending physical failure you're having are just manifestations of the anxiety and not symptoms of some horrible physical condition. So get a good physical and give yourself a little peace of mind.

The next thing I notice is that you do have some physical issues. You mentioned a bladder infection as well as constipation. If you're not getting sufficient water that can lead to both of those problems. My guess is, your diet needs some improvement and the place to start in your case sounds like proper hydration and adequate water intake.

You might also want to consider getting in a few sessions with a trained counselor; someone who is skilled in working with cognitive behavioral therapy. Repeated anxiety and panic attacks are usually the result of going through the same patterns of thought over and over again. This leads to the anxiety appearing over and over again. Your thoughts normally have triggers that set them off. A good therapist will help you figure out what those triggers are, and then they'll help you establish new and healthy ways to respond to your triggers rather than responding to them with escalating anxiety.

Meditation can be useful in dealing with anxiety because over time it retrains the body in ways to relax both physically and mentally. However, it isn't going to make your problems go away over night and it probably won't make them go away all by itself. It's a great tool, but don't expect it to be a complete cure. By your own admission, you've dealt with it in the past by trying to force it down, block it, and distract yourself away from it. Those strategies might work temporarily, but eventually the anxiety overwhelms such tactics if the problem is not corrected from a deeper level.

Consider meditation as just one of the tools in your toolbox. Other tools are going to be needed, too. Take a look at your lifestyle. To overcome anxiety you're probably going to have to make some pretty broad lifestyle changes. As I mentioned a moment ago, you probably need to look at your overall diet and see what you can do to improve it. Do you have a balanced diet? Do you get most of your food from fresh sources? Do you routinely read and understand the nutritional labels on food? In our world today, there is so much unhealthy garbage that passes itself off as food, reading, understanding, and planning our meals based on those nutritional labels isn't optional any more. It's a requirement. If you aren't routinely making your food selections based on regular reading of nutritional labels, I can pretty much guarantee you that your diet is unhealthy. In our times, a healthy diet won't happen unless you plan it out, and that means reading those labels (have I repeated that enough that it's beginning to sink in?)

That's something you can start doing right now, today, that will help your body immensely, and that will begin to give you the proper foundation to get rid of the anxiety.

Here's something else you can do. If you're into any sort of recreational drugs, or even alcohol, cut them out. Don't cut them down, cut them "OUT". So many of those chemicals act directly on the central nervous system that to try to get a handle on anxiety while at the same time ingesting chemicals that throw your moods all over the place is like trying to put out a fire by throwing gasoline on it. Hopefully, those things aren't a part of your life, but if they are, get rid of them. In the long run they aren't helping you and in fact there is a good chance they are a contributing factor in your anxiety.

I've written a lot about anxiety in other threads so rather than trying to repeat that all again, I'm going to post a couple of links:

Help please.

Help please.

5 weeks in

Use the thread search engine and you can locate posts by others who have dealt with, or are dealing with anxiety issues. Fortunately, anxiety is one of those things that can be successfully overcome.

Hope this has helped.

[Panthau]

Hi Redmar,

As always, very good tipps from Ta-tsu-wa. I like to add my 5 coins, as i suffered from anxiety too. I still have anxiety here and then, but i dont suffer anymore. Why? Because anxiety is an expression of our thoughts. Our brain has the function to judge things for our physical survival. If it wouldnt, we couldnt tell the difference between a dangerous snake, and a harmless worm.

In our times, the brain often judges things as dangerous, which in fact arent dangerous at all. Therefore it sends thoughts in specific situations, which again create those feelings of anxiety. Meditation helps to learn to let go of thoughts, so it is a tool, like Ta-tsu-wa said, which can help dealing with your anxiety.

Some concrete tipps to deal with it:

- In a situation where you feel anxiety, watch your thoughts. What are you thinking? Are your thoughts telling you the truth? Whats going on in your body? Watch it, and most important dont block it.

One day you will be able to let go of your anxiety. It will arise, but you wont identify with it. You will feel it in your body, you will notice how it changes your perception, but you wont react to it. Thats what meditation helps us to achieve... to let go.

[Redmar112]

First of all I want to thank anyone for posting.

@Ta-tsu-wa Thanks!

I agree with you about getting a test to see if there's trully something wrong. 3 years ago I had heart rithm problems so I did the tests and it turned out my hearth was completly fine, and that helped me to understand that I don't have any problems with my hearth. Somehow I think this whole anxiety started again because I had physical sensations. I saw your other posts and the one where you described GAD about that guy inside of you always watching and red alerting(fun wordplay ), is 100% whats going on with me!! I never understood this so good. Right now at this moment I hear him saying: Redmar you still have that sound in your right ear! you could have a bleeding in your brain!

Currently i'm on the same medication I had 3 years ago(Alprazolam) exept I don't really need it right now. I took it the last couple of days because I need that constipation to dissolve first. I'm not addicted to the medication like 3 years ago I just have it "just in case I do freak out". That time I didn't knew meditation or releasing so that was a very scary experience at that time I can assure you! Oh and the Alprazolam is ofcoure to relax the muscles and therefore my whole body.

about dieeting and lifestyle:

It's truth that I didn't drink enough, but when I drink it's 9/10 times Water. And ofcourse with the docter's warning I drink a lot more! I'm not like super healthy but I eat salads with my mother and I usally eat 2 white bread with Ham in the morning, once p/week I eat like chips or that stuff not that much.. And lately with my physical sickness I didn't have a lot of appetitte so I only eat 3 times a day.

I don't use drugs and I stopped drinking alcohol 5 months ago beceause I get to sick the day after.


about releasing energy:

Before meditation I already knew about Sedona and Release technique. And for me altough I had some succes with it, I can never make a technique like that my lifestyle and I explain why: If in every situation youre in, you need to keep releasing and frustration that comes from it youre in my opinion not in the moment. Asking those questions could you, would you, and when, all day long makes me crazy and unhappy. I had some financial succes with the release technique but I can't do it al the time it brakes me down. Not just me a friend of mine also just can't stick to those principles.

Lifeflow is so much better it trully let's you LIVE! it helps you relax before the day starts and that day every situation people around you change to your relaxed state. I never had a technique where i could trully be myself only better! Because this is what I always wanted to be me but the relaxing way, not the forced one.

I think if I could overcome these anxiety that I could do great things. I have so many plans. Chasing my dreams, beeing with the one you love etc.

At the moment i'm not that sick anymore but I am going to the docter this week to check my ear. It's a pitty that happened in the progress of becoming better.

The stress also came from not choosing a direction in my life. I'm 22 years old and I have to make the choise to study or work and I keep setting that choise for the future I had a year of doing nothing to think about it.

by the way when I used the releasing techniques I noticed the energy going away from my body, and I wonder how that works with Lifeflow because I feel the energy in my body but where does it leave? and is it natural to feel the body tinteling sensations during and after meditation? sometimes i'm so far into my body that I get up and i'm a bit dizzy in my head.

@ Panthau
It helps me that you were able to change your reaction to those anxiety's!

[Ta-tsu-wa]

Just remember that the little "Red Alert!" guy sees everything through the lens of "this might be something serious". If you cough a bit more than usual, he'll immediately suggest to you this could be the first sign of lung cancer. If you feel some tingling in your fingers or toes, he'll whisper to you that this is what diabetics feel because their diabetes leads to impaired circulation in the extremeties. If you have a headache that seems to center itself behind one particular eye, he'll remind you that is often how pain is experienced in cases of brain tumors.

The vast majority of the time, a cough is just a meaningless cough. Tingling sensations have nothing to do with any serious issue. And a headache can happen anywhere on your head and it doesn't mean a thing in terms of serious health issues. If you've felt anxiety and panic before, you've no doubt become almost hyper aware of even the slightest deviation from what feels "normal" to you. It isn't really that you're having more aches, pains and twitches than you used to. They were there all along. You're just more aware of them now than you used to be in your carefree days.

The Red Alert guy is the supreme pessimist. He will always, always, always come up with the absolute worst case scenarios whenever you feel anything unexpected. Just knowing that fact about him is half the battle. The Red Alert guy is a liar. Once you've had your doctor check you over and he's ruled out any serious physical conditions, then you can be assured that when the Red Alert guy talks, it is to lie to you and deceive you. Don't fall for his lies.

The truth is, our bodies are amazing, self-repairing organisms. Most of the time they heal us without our even knowing there was anything that needed healing. That's how incredible these bodies are. For the most part, all we need to do to heal is just not interfere and put obstacles in the way of our natural healing processes.

For example, when you get a cut on your hand, can you make that cut heal? Do you have to think about which cells to order on scene to defend against potential invading bacteria? Do you have to know which enzymes act as catalysts to produce actions within the body that relate to the healing process? Do you have to think about ordering your cells to get in there and cart off dead cells so they can be replaced by new, live cells? Do you have to know how to instruct your cells to knit together into new skin so finely that no one will even know there was ever a cut there when the process is complete? You don't have to know any of those things. In terms of the healing process, you don't have to know a thing. The body and its natural healing system and innate intelligence is going to repair the damage regardless of how clueless you are about all that it's doing.

What you can do is make sure you keep the would clean, so that bacteria doesn't slow down the healing process. You can refrain from picking at the scabs that will form during the healing process. But these are things you do by way of not interfering, or allowing anything else to interfere with the healing. The actual healing process itself is automatic. Your body has intelligence and it knows exactly what to do.

The same is true of pretty much any sort of healing. Just stay out of the way and do your best to keep other things from getting in the way and the body automatically does all the work. That's why I strongly encourage you to look at your lifestyle and, in particular, to begin by looking at your diet. All of the life sustaining water, vitamins, enzymes, fats, proteins, carbs, minerals and phytonutrients need to be made available to your body on a daily basis. If you give your body those things, and make sure they are high quality, that's half the job. The other half is avoiding taking in things that become obstacles to good health.

We've become so used to eating toxic foods and drinking toxic beverages that most of us have absolutely no idea how much we truly burden our bodies with anymore. Once you begin studying about these things you quickly come to understand that for most of us, the cells in our body are swimming in accumulated toxins. It is so prevailent that there is virtually no way we can exist in this world free of them. So the object has become reducing them to levels our amazing bodies can cope with. We do have toxin removal systems in the body. For most people these systems are in a state of perpetual overwhelm. We take in far more than they are able to purge us of. If we can just begin to limit those toxins to a significant degree, our amazing bodies will be able to finish the rest of the job by eliminating what's left.

That would be my suggestion to you, Redmar. You're a young guy. Your body is right in the middle of its prime. Treat it right. Feed it high quality nutrition and cut way, way back on feeding it toxins. Learn how to read nutritional labels. Do some serious research on health-conscious websites. Many of them post fantastic information about healthy lifestyles that is understandable by the average person. You won’t find that information in the mainstream media. Unfortunately, those government agencies whose job it is to look after us and protect us from harmful things are no longer in that business. Most of them have changed focus and now work mostly on behalf of corporations and monetary interests. It is up to us to learn how to watch out for ourselves. Do that, and your body is good not just for a long life, but for a healthy, feel-good, long life.

Take advantage of reputable sources of information that will help you learn exactly how to do that. Some of the more reputable sites I like to pay attention to include:

Natural Health Information Articles and Health Newsletter by Dr. Joseph Mercola This site is run by a doctor who has broken with the mainstream medical establishment in many areas. He provides loads of information about health, nutrition, exercise and other related topics. He has a free news letter that is second to none. If I recall correctly, it is the largest non-mainstream health-related news letter online.

Health Ranger Homepage This site is run by Mike Adams. He is not a medical doctor but he has spent a great deal of time studying and collecting health information that the mainstream press refuses to cover. Occasionally he does express some political views, which I don’t always find all that interesting, and some of his health perspectives can be a little excessive. But on the whole, his site is a great resource for health information. Adams also has a free news letter that’s very good.

DrWeil.com - Official Website of Andrew Weil, M.D. Is the website of Dr. Andrew Weil. He is a physician who graduated Harvard medical school and has since begun incorporating alternative health therapies into his practice along with mainstream medicine. Dr. Weil is more in the middle. He accepts much of modern medicine while at the same time recognizing there is more to healing than what the corporate medical world would have us believe. Dr. Weil tends to be more mainstream oriented than Dr. Mercola. He has several newsletters that are free, and which address different areas of health and wellness depending on your interests. If I had to put him in just one category I would say his emphasis is strongest on nutrition.

These are just a couple of the sites I think you would find of great benefit. By the way, both Dr.s Weil and Mercola have information that addresses the problems associated with anxiety and panic attacks.

Let me touch on the idea you raised of releasing as interfering with living in the present moment. I understand your point, but let me offer you a different way to look at it that makes releasing a part of living in the moment rather than something that gets in the way.

Living in the moment does not mean you don't think about the past or plan for the future. You live in the moment even while you're considering one or the other of these things. The way to do that is to keep in mind that I am here, in this moment, and in this moment I am planning something in my future. I'm not in the future planning it. I can't be in the future planning it because this moment is the only place I exist in (existential issues aside for now.) So, even as I am working out my future plan, I remain aware that I'm doing that right here, right now.

Thinking about the future or the past is always done in the present moment. If you keep that idea in mind, then you are still grounded in the present. You're not lost in daydreams of the future or mindlessly reliving fantasies or regrets out of the past.

If you have studied the course material for either the Sedona or Release technique, then you may recall that one of the first things you do is scan yourself to identify what it is that you’re experiencing right now, here, in this present moment. That’s a “now” activity. When you begin asking the questions about “allowing it to be” or “embracing it” or “allowing it to leave” and so forth, you are still focusing on that present moment’s experience. That “now” experience is the object of your questions, and so you never have to leave the present moment to answer them. Maybe it’s easier to rephrase the questions just a little to something like, “Can I allow this feeling just to be here as it is right now? Can I let go of what I’m feeling and experiencing right now?” and so forth. As you are monitoring yourself to the sensation of the release, you’re not monitoring for the future or past. You’re monitoring changes in how you’re feeling “right now”. If anything, using something like Sedona should be a tool to keep you more focused in the present moment. Think of it that way and I believe you’ll find it far more useful.

One more thing in your post I wanted to comment on. You said that you think you could do great things if you could just overcome the anxiety.

I have news for you, young fellow. You are capable of great things even with the anxiety. Never, ever sell yourself short. Part of living in the present moment is avoiding that illusory “some day” that never arrives. “Some day, when I have anxiety under control, then I’ll be happy. Some day, if I beat my anxiety issue, then I’ll start doing great things. Some day, when anxiety and panic attacks are just a distant memory, then I’ll have the relationships I know I’m capable of having.”

Each time you allow yourself to dwell on one of these kinds of thoughts you’re distancing yourself from living in the present moment. Give yourself permission to do the things you’re capable of right now, even if there are still issues about anxiety yet to be resolved. Find those stepping stones that lead to all the great things you’re capable of; the stones that are within your reach right this moment. Find them and step on them. Get the ball rolling. Perhaps there are practical matters relating to the anxiety that put limits on your ultimate goals, and which you’ll need to work your way up to, but there are certainly many great things you’re capable of right now, right in this moment. Do them. Nothing helps chase anxiety away like being successful at tasks you set your mind to on a regular basis. Those little success stories will fuel your progress towards being done with anxiety once and for all.

[Mr Monkey]

Hi Redmar,

To add a something to a typically helpful, insightful and positive Ta-Tsu-Wa post, I just want to focus on one thing you said:

Originally Posted by Redmar

The stress also came from not choosing a direction in my life. I'm 22 years old and I have to make the choise to study or work and I keep setting that choise for the future I had a year of doing nothing to think about it.

Sometimes reframing things can be good, let’s try looking at what you could do instead of beating yourself up about what has passed, have you really wasted a year?

Taking positive things forward from this situation:

1. You have established you don’t want to miss another year making this decision, realising you’ve missed an oppertunity is one thing, to do it again, you’d have to be a bit naughty
2. You have established you want to work or study, ie do something productive
3. Now is an opportunity to reflect on what your good at (put you’re feet up and have a think )
4. Now is an opportunity to reflect on what you want out of life (put you’re feet up and have a think )
5. Now is an opportunity to look at how you can achieve your aims (are they all material ?)
6. Now an opportunity to consider travel before taking on your ‘master plan’
7. When you start to work or study you’ll appreciate the steps you’ve taken to do it.
8. When you start to work or study you’ll be able to help people in the same predicament you were in a year previously
9. You are young (you are trust me ) training will be available to you and you can look for remote academic opportunities (ie, something like ‘The Open University’ in UK which I know very well) or employment oppertunites.
10. You appreciate that even though you thought things were bad, sometimes a different perspective can help (well hopefully you can )

How bad is this situation?

• Can you survive it?
• Can you get out of it?
• Can you use your current situation to help drive/energise you in the future?
• If you got out of your situation could you use it as an example to help others?

If all answers were yes (and they should be!), then happy days

A few positive steps (no matter how small) now could make a significant different in the future. You maybe thing “yeah, whatever ” (and I would have many years ago too!), but consider if you had started something last year – you wouldn’t be where you are now… BUT before you beat yourself up about that, forget it and simply appreciate that you can make changes NOW to prevent yourself being in the same situation next year .

Hopefully you can see that things aren't all bad , plus if you wait another 5, 10, 15 year to pull you finger out, to term a phase, "it'll just become a sh*t* site worse!" , so simply use that as a positive incentive

I guess you've had enough reading for now, so I'll leave it there.

Paul

[Redmar112]

You have giving me a lot to think about, thanks guys!

I want to share with you that i'm doing a lot better, today I had a couple of sensations but I didn't pay a lot of attention to it because I was relaxed and I had an attitude of whatever, I have something better to do than worrying about this! When youre relaxed the red alert guy seems to sleep as wel.

[Redmar112]

Ok so i'm back

What have I been up to?

I'm no longer scared of the body sensations by using the panic away program. I used the affirmation: I have a great life. For the last 3 weeks and I since then I have never given the anxiety any thought.

Ok so now I want to go back to lifeflow. Why? because Lifeflow is awesome! it's so relaxing

A couple of years back I supressed the anxiety and by using lifeflow it came up again, it makes sense if you think about it. Something you just haven't dealth with. And now I did and I think I can grow now as a person

In the past I went from one selfhelp to another selfhelp program. Just to deal with my anxiety's and not really living.

Affirmations are great but there also ask for a lot of energie, at least that's how it feels. I think if I could use both meditation and affirmation. I could relax and have happy thougths as well. What do you think? (the one who is reading this)

Btw sometimes I like to listen to lifeflow while i'm watching TV. It seems to relax me just the same way that normal meditation does. Am I the only one who does this? Is it harmfull in any way?

Great to be back on the ride!

[Bryan555]

I just wanted to say how much I appreciate the posts by Ta-tsu-wa. Really thoughtful and helpful...to all of us, actually.

It is rare to run across so much wisdom, so well and simply stated.

Thanks again...

To Redmar...I must say that I've never tried watching TV while listening to LifeFlow. Do you just turn off the TV sound and watch the video? With LifeFlow as the soundtrack, so to speak?

[GilesC]

Originally Posted by Redmar112

Btw sometimes I like to listen to lifeflow while i'm watching TV. It seems to relax me just the same way that normal meditation does. Am I the only one who does this? Is it harmfull in any way?

As long as you're not driving and watching TV and listening to lifeflow, I can't see that it would be a problem.

Seriously, it's perfectly ok to listen to lifeflow while you do other stuff, just as long as it's not something that could put you in danger such as driving etc. Treat it as if it were some sort of medication that can make you drowsy... "do not use this product whilst driving or operating machinery etc."

Hugs

Giles