Meditation and addiction go hand-in-hand. How can something that seems so simple, like meditation, play such a big role in your overall wellbeing and even help you to fight off one of the most challenging diseases in your lifetime? Meditation is an exceptional tool that supplements traditional science-based treatments for addiction. With the right support and guidance, you can learn to overcome not just the cravings you feel but also the underlying factors that may have put you on the path to substance use disorder.
Meditation and Addiction – How It Can Help You Heal
What can meditation do to help you see improvement in the way you feel and think? During addiction treatment, you’ll learn a wide range of skills to help you with negative thoughts and behavioral patterns. Meditation is a bit different. Here are some of the ways it can positively impact your journey to recovery.
#1: Finding and Maintaining Your Peace
Meditation and addiction recovery often are linked because of the peace and focus it can bring into your life. During addiction recovery, you’ll be faced with many “what if” moments and times of turbulence. Having a way to ground yourself and focus on the good can help you to work through those challenges in a meaningful way. Having inner peace is an incredible tool that can help you avoid relapse as well. You’ll find that mindfulness meditation is particularly helpful in aiding you in relieving your mental suffering throughout recovery.
#2: Reduce Your Avoidance of Problems
Many people use drugs and alcohol as a way to avoid their past trauma and pain. They may use these substances as a way to help them deal with anxiety or get through the stress they are facing. Every situation can be intense, but meditation can help you to zero in on what’s really happening, create clarity, and help you deal with that past pain or difficulty.
Meditation can help you overcome a critical mind, too. It helps you to step outside of that feeling of being on autopilot, where you cannot control your thoughts that are spinning out of control. For many people, having control over this can help ensure long-term recovery success.
#3: Meditation Helps Your Brain Heal
The use of meditation can help your brain to heal from the damage brought on by substance use disorders. That includes helping you to stabilize brainwave activity and patterns. It can help you to work through the challenges that you’re facing while encouraging the brain to function in the way it should, in a natural and positive manner.
Remember that the brain needs time to heal, but it also needs the right environment and positivity. Meditation and addiction recovery, then, can be linked to your brain’s ability to heal.
#4: Overcome Urges
Urge surfing is a term used to describe the power of being able to surf or overcome the urges to use drugs or alcohol. The urge, which is often an overwhelming experience to use, is hard to overcome. With meditation, it is possible to recognize the presence of that urge, focus on it, and then allow it to fade into your past. Instead of fighting against you, you ride it through.
Meditation enables you a way to move through the urge and not fall into its trap. You do not have to feel powerless against them any longer.
#5: Build Emotional Intelligence
Meditation and addiction recovery skill training can help you to build emotional intelligence. That is, it can help you to learn how to better control your emotions, so you remain more in control over the outcome and the way you use them. That may include feelings of anger, frustration, anxiety, and other negative emotions that sometimes lead people down the wrong path.
With meditation, you can learn how to overcome challenges and better regulate the emotions you have in a meaningful way.
#6: Find Relaxation
Meditation is also uniquely able to help you relax. A great deal of your healing process will come in your ability to do just that – to heal thoroughly from your addiction. Yet, it can feel downright impossible to relax when your mind is racing and you’re facing numerous challenges on a daily basis.
Meditation teaches you how to calm your mind and thoughts. It enables you to step back, realize what’s really happening, and then find a way through the challenge in a meaningful way. Mastering meditation can change your outcome.
Find the Help You Need for Substance Use Disorder
When you’re facing addiction head on, you need professional support and guidance. Meditation and addiction are linked, but there’s no substitute for professional guidance and support. Contact 1st Step Behavioral Health or call at (855) 425-4846 to learn more about how we can help you. Speak to an admissions counselor to get started.
