Meditation to help with my Anxiety/Fear of Death

[Newff]

I have been struggling with Anxiety for about 4 years now and the source of the problem is my fear of death. Right now I am trying many things to try and help myself be more relxed and happy and I've heard great things about meditation.

I have tried meditating a few times for about 15-20 minutes each time and I definitely felt better after even though I'm not sure if I was using the right technique. I basically just sat on my bed with my eyes closed and tried to only focus on my breathing. My mind kept wanting me to "think" about things though and I kept trying to go back to focusing on only my breathing.

So here is my first question.. When my mind wonders into thinking about things, am I supposed to immediately try and go back to focusing on my breathing? Also I saw a Youtube video where a guy was saying we should say in our mind things like "fear in, fear out" or something like that. Any tips would be great.

How much do you think meditation can actually help someone with my problem? I have more question but don't want to make my first post too long, thanks.

[pollyanna]

Hi there and welcome to the community

First of all, you are not alone, there are quite a number of people here who suffer or have suffered from anxiety. Here are a couple of links that may help you...

Anxiety symptoms

Help please.

Also, you can download the free Discover Meditation course at the top left of the community - Michael will talk you all the way through it and it has helped thousands of people. Once you feel comfortable, you can play the LifeFlow demo while you meditate.

Hope this helps and I wish you much peace and joy

[Panthau]

Please do me a favor and read a bit of the posted experiences here: Current NDERF Near Death Experiences

To convince yourself that death as we know it, just does not exist.

Atb,
Phil

[Newff]

I totally understand all of that. I am convinced when we die it's the same as before we are born, which is not painful and there is no suffering of course. It's not death itself that I am afraid of, but the "thought" of not existing bothers me a lot.

Not sure how to really put it into words lol

[GilesC]

Well it's either that a) you believe you stop existing when you die, or b) you are referring to the existence of the physical self and all the attachments it has to this material world.

In the buddhist teachings I had, they emphasized the point that "You came into this world with nothing, and you will leave with nothing, so there is no point in being attached to things".

It's not a bad thing to be free of attachments, in fact the opposite is true, it can lead to a much happier life if we let go of them.

Hugs

Giles

[Panthau]

Mhm. I think i know what you mean. I had this fear too (is there any i had "not"? lol) when i was younger. The mind just cant handle non-existance, and i believe thats why it creates big fears.

It helps to understand what fear is... the primal, real fear - when you face a big danger, and the fear of events in the past or future, which is created by thoughts/mind.
The second fear is not real, its just one or more thoughts. So its all about letting go of these thoughts.

There are several ways to do this. A very effective would be, to face the thought-created fear, and experience that its not real. This takes the fear away immediately. Another one is to get to the ultimate conclusion, that thought-fears are not real, and to deeply believe it.

Well, im writing a novell... maybe it helps a bit.

Atb,
Phil

[GilesC]

What you say is true Pan,

Fear is a believe about a future which has not yet happened based on ideas of what has happened in the past. In the present moment there is no fear.



Hugs

Giles

[Panthau]

Originally Posted by GilesC

What you say is true Pan,

Fear is a believe about a future which has not yet happened based on ideas of what has happened in the past. In the present moment there is no fear.



Hugs

Giles

Glad we agree on that.