Meditation and stress

One of the most common reasons that people cite for wanting to learn meditation is to reduce stress.

Stress is of course unavoidable, and the point of stress reduction and stress management programs is not to eliminate stress from our lives entirely. Life is always going to be full of challenges, and a life without some turmoil is not only impossible but is also undesirable.

Many stress therapists, of course, recognize that regular meditation and relaxation can be of significant help in reducing stress to manageable and healthy levels, and relaxation and meditation exercises are now widely taught. Many therapists and psychiatrists are taking up meditation themselves, not only so that they can teach it more effectively to others but in order to deal with the very stressful demands of their own jobs, which can result in burnout.

A considerable amount of research has shown that meditation has benefits on mental health, including a reduction in proneness to depression, an increase in emotional positivity, and an increased ability to deal with life’s inevitable stresses.

People often think of meditation as being nothing more than relaxation, and there is a famous book on meditation and health entitled “The Relaxation Response.” Meditation, however, not only involves relaxation (the cessation of unnecessary effort) but promotes mindfulness, which helps the stress-sufferer to recognize unhelpful patterns of thought that give rise to the stress response, and also involves the active cultivation of positive mental states such as lovingkindness, compassion, patience, and energy.

This section explores how meditation can help you to deal with your stress, and gives information on a program called “Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction”, or MBSR, which is a program developed at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center by Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn, and which uses the principles of mindfulness meditation to help long-term pain sufferers learn to deal with their afflictions.

  • How Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction works
  • Meditation and stress quotes
  • Understanding stress
  • How meditation can help with stress
  • Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction and health
  • Taking responsibility for our responses
  • MBSR and chronic pain (1)
  • Other stress management tools
  • MBSR and chronic pain (2)
  • Meditation for the very, very busy
  • MBSR and chronic pain (3)
  • MBSR and anxiety disorders (1)
  • MBSR and psoriasis
  • MBSR and anxiety disorders (2)
  • MBSR and fibromyalgia
  • MBSR and depression

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    • HI, Just came across your website,at this moment I am going through a very rough patch, a relationship of 8 yrs just ended,he just closed the door shut without giving an explanation also things snowballed because i left my job to start my own business.Now I am so restless and anxious that i cant sleep and suffer from griping stomach and shortness of breath. i have tried hypnotherapy but it hasnt helped can you suggest a meditation that would help me rise above the pain and be peaceful and relaxed in everyday life. Thanks in anticipation. Shar

      • Hi Sharmila,
        I'm sorry to hear about all your difficulties. It does sound like you have many things going on that would cause you restlessness and anxiety. First of all, I'd like to say that the pain you're feeling is a perfectly human and natural reaction to the loss of your relationship -- there's nothing wrong with it at all! Grieving is a necessary part of healing ourselves after a loss.

        But I sense that things have snowballed for you because now you've become anxious about the anxiety as you try hard to make the pain go away.

        I'm sorry to have to say this to you, but meditation will not make pain go away, nor will it make you peaceful and relaxed if the pain and grieving is real and necessary. It's not an anesthetic, nor should it be. What it DOES do is help us to see into our minds more clearly -- so that we can separate out what is real pain and grieving (that we need to work with directly) vs the added anxiety that we put on ourselves by worry about it. As such, there is no meditation that will make the pain go away in and of itself. The closest I can suggest is the mindfulness of breathing, which is simply about slowing down our minds enough so that we can see more calmly and clearly.

        I do think your situation is very complex, and I don't feel it can be fully addressed in a simple blog comment or a meditation practice suggestion. I would suggest that you seek professional help, such as a therapist. If you think it might be helpful to speak with a Buddhist life coach, I would also be happy to talk with you further. You can reach me through my website at http://www.mindfulpurpose.com.

        My best wishes to you,
        Sunada

    • Hi:

      I just came upon your web site today. Looks great. I was wondering what your thoughts were about using meditation to help with OCD (which as you probably know is an anxiety disorder). I've also heard that "Left nostril breathing" for 20 minutes a day is also beneficial (but difficult). Have you ever heard of such a thing (I understand it's 15 seconds in, hold for 15 seconds, exhale for 15, then inhale for 15, etc)? And what would YOU recommend for OCD? Can I obtain it from your site?

      Thanks very much for your help!

    • Hi Drew,

      OCD isn't something I know much about, I'm afraid. ("That isn't something I know much about" could be my personal motto!). Certainly meditation generally, and the kind we teach here (mindfulness of breathing and lovingkindness meditation) help with ordinary anxiety and also with impulse control, which I'm guessing is a component of OCD.

      The technique you mention is something I've heard of and I believe it's from yoga. I'm not confident it would be of much use. What we need in order to overcome anxiety is to become more aware of how the mind functions to produce an anxious state, and even more to find out how to work with the mind to produce non-anxious states). The two meditations I mentioned would help in that regard. Mindfulness of breathing isn't a breathing exercise, but is a way of using an awareness of the breath as the center of our experience so that we can let go of unhelpful thinking (or investigate our thinking, if that seems necessary).

      You don't mention if you've tried any therapies, but there are "therapeutic modalities" that include mindfulness training. MBSR is one, and MBCT is another. I'll leave you to Google those...

    • I am a designer and I would appreciate if you could help me what type of meditation I can use in oredr to overcome my stress?

      • Hi Mona,

        Have you look at the mini-meditation techniques listed on this page? https://www.wildmind.org/applied/stress/meditation-for-the-very-very-busy

        Or if you're looking to take up a more formal meditation practice, I'd suggest you start with the Mindfulness of Breathing. You can find instructions for that on this site, or you could also sign up for one of our online courses if you'd like the help of a teacher (that's me) and the support of classmates.

        No matter how much we try to convince ourselves otherwise, we can't do more than one thing at a time. And we can't sustainably keep running all day long from one thing to the next. When we practice of mindfulness, we begin to learn how not to jump on every impulse of urgency. We can slow down and do things more deliberately, without all the extra baggage of anxious thoughts adding to our stress. Practicing mindfulness is a good place to start learning how to go about things in this way.

        Best wishes,
        Sunada
        http://www.mindfulpurpose.com

    • Hi,

      I am wondering if there are any specific meditations that might help me overcome claustrophobia, I tried to do mindfulness of breathing , but somehow focussing on my breathing made my lungs and breathing feel more difficult, especially when having a claustrophobic attack. I guess it exaggerated my reaction?

      Thanks

    • I should say that I meant the approaches above as a way of dealing with controlling the breath. I don't know much about claustrophobia as a condition, but the expansiveness of the latter exercise might be helpful. Lovingkindness meditation -- especially the expansive fifth stage, might also help.

    • I have struggled with anxiety most all my life. I have practiced mindfulness meditation for eight years now and that helps. I try to sit two to three hours a day. I have also found the lovingkindness meditation very helpful, but that does not help my anxiety problem. What would you recommend?

    • Hi, Neil.

      It's impressive that you manage to meditate for two to three hours a week.

      I've certainly found that doing lovingkindness practice as I go about my daily affairs has a big effect on my anxiety levels. I find it's impossible to be cultivating lovingkindness toward people and simultaneously be worrying about what they might think of me. I'm talking here not of sitting practice (which no doubt helps too) but of cultivating lovingkindness as I walk around, etc.

      Making sure that you breathe fully into the belly helps as well. It centers our experience and slows the mind.

      Self-compassion is a vital practice: notice that you're suffering when you're in a state of anxiety. Locate the source of suffering in the body as specifically as you can. Send it thoughts of lovingkindness: "May you be well, may you be happy, etc."

      We have a couple of recent articles by Rick Hanson that you might find useful. One on Noticing that You're Alright Right Now and another on Using Appreciation to Generate Inner Nourishment.

      Along the lines of "Noticing that You're Alright Right Now," one thing I've been doing recently is to count my blessings. As a meditation practice, I become aware that I am in a building, safe and protected from the elements, and I say (inwardly) to the building, "Thank you." I notice that I have plumbing, and electricity, and internet access around me, and I say (inwardly) to all these things, "Thank you." I notice that my body is whole, and basically functioning, and even if there is illness present I know my body has the resources to heal itself, and I say to my body, "Thank you." I notice that my senses are intact, and I say "Thank you."

      It's important to actually make the sound of the words in your head. There's something about articulating gratitude in the form of words that makes the emotion of thankfulness more real.

      By focusing on what's right in our lives, we take our awareness away from the things that we image to be wrong, or that we imagine could go wrong.

      By there are many forms of anxiety, and sometimes they're very specific and can be addressed with very specific antidotes, so it would help if you could identify your core anxiety. What is it that you most commonly fear? What's your worst-case scenario? (For me, I used to suffer anxiety when giving talks. My fear was that people were bored with what I was saying. My worst-case scenario -- nightmare scenario, really -- was that people would start chatting amongst themselves, or would get up and walk out! I found ways to avoid that fear arising.)

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