Brain Based Therapy for Anxiety by John Arden

Author:John Arden
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Brain Based Therapy for Anxiety: A Workbook for Clinicians and Clients
ISBN: 9781937661816
Publisher: PESI Publishing & Media
Published: 2014-03-04T16:00:00+00:00

MEDITATION AND PRAYER

Most religions have literature, including manuals, on meditation and prayer. Within Hinduism, Buddhism, Sufism, Judaism, and Christianity, meditation and prayer have a long tradition and have been practiced for thousands of years. The practitioners generally had pious intentions, and the psychological benefits were not well known until the twentieth century, when the positive effects of meditation and prayer were thoroughly researched and found to have a wide range of health benefits, including anxiety reduction. For example, experienced meditators were found to be talented at lowering their blood pressure and slowing down their brain waves. Today, meditation is taught in many medical centers, including my own.

Most types of meditation involve allowing your mind to clear while focusing on your breathing. Clearing your mind occurs by concentrating on a few words, referred to as a mantra, such as Sat Nam. For example, you repeat the word “Sat” on the inhalations and the word “Nam” on the exhalations. By concentrating on the mantra and on your breath, your mind clears and your body relaxes.

Meditation and prayer are embraced by most religious traditions, which suggests that shifting your attention beyond personal concerns, in an attempt to lose a sense of self-identifying awareness and appreciate a wider consciousness, holds great value. The effort to move beyond the personal to the transpersonal is consistent with a theology that conceptualizes our existence as only a small part of the totality of existence. In meditation, when you sense the “wider reality”—that you are but a small part of a greater whole—you detach from the day-to-day attention to your worries. Prayer, when practiced not to achieve some reward, but to simply be closer to God, promotes a deep sense of inner peace. Many methods of praying involve repeating a phrase or entire verses, such as the Lord’s Prayer. Like mantras, these phrases serve to direct your attention away from your worries and tension.

If you belong to a church, temple, or mosque, go often to engage in prayer for the purpose of relaxation and the peaceful feelings that you get from the experience. Or you can practice prayer anywhere you choose. Use the seven relaxation principles and give yourself the time to enjoy the anxiety reduction.

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