Can Guided Meditation Help You Reduce Stress?

Stress can be a real threat to your quality of life. When you're busy rushing around, it's easy to slide into a sense of feeling overwhelmed, and find yourself becoming irritable and short-fused with your loved ones.

Occasional spells like this aren't really a major problem, they may ruffle a few feathers here and there, but if stress levels recover again, things usually settle down - until the next time.

When stress becomes a real problem is when it goes unchecked and starts to build up without respite and without release. Once that starts to happen, tempers fray, and poor choices are made due to lack of clear thinking. And it's here that stress can start to cause significant damage in your life. Poor decision making and hasty choices, usually lead to messy complications which then cause further stress.

In this podcast Shann talks about guided meditation and whether or not it's a useful way to get relief from stress.

Listen here:

Related Articles You Might Enjoy:

• How Yoga Breathing Exercises Can Help You Control Anxiety
• 3 Anxiety Breathing Techniques You Can Practice Anywhere
• Can you Practice Meditation on the Go?
• Restful Awareness: Guided Relaxation Exercises

Related Resources:

• Unwind Guided Relaxation for Stress Relief
• Guided Meditation for Anxiety Relief
• Yoga Meditations for Stress & Anxiety Relief

Heart Centred Meditation

Every Tuesday evening I head off to a beautiful candle lit barn to teach a meditation class. One of the favourite meditations our group enjoys is a very simple process called the Heart Centred Meditation. For this gentle meditation you sit quietly with your hands crossed over your chest, and send your awareness to your heart center while you notice your breath and feel your chest gently rise and fall.

In is podcast, I'll talk you through the process so you can it for yourself.

For more relaxation experiences like this we invite you to visit the Anxiety Slayer Store, where you will find a collection of stress and anxiety relief downloads and gentle yoga for stress and anxiety relief. Our audio is recorded with love and care and each meditation is available for the price of a cup of coffee.

photo by Alegrya

Fluid Meditation

About two years ago I came across a wonderful meditation called "fluid meditation" by Swami Satananda, it's a wonderful practice if your feeling overwhelmed, overstimulated or creatively blocked.

We begin by creating a very simple altar on a low table if you have one, if not that's fine, you can use a desk, or a kitchen table, or even a window sill. On this altar place things that remind you of water energetically, things like sea shells, or coral, or stones that you picked-up along the beach.  You might even want to include a small bowl full of water, that may help you dredge up some things that might be buried in your subconscious.

Next, in preparation for meditation, take a nice shower or warm bath and really focus on what it feels like to be in the water - to be covered, submerged, and safe in the bath. Allow yourself fifteen minutes or more to just soak and contemplate on what it feels like to be in the water.

When you get out of the bath I suggest drinking a large glass of water, just before starting to meditate and really witness and focus on what it feels like to have that water flowing through your body. Then come back and settle in front of your altar. I recommend sitting on the floor with your legs crossed and your back straight, or if that's not comfortable for you, you can sit in a chair with your feet firmly planted on the floor and again with your back straight and your head held high, resting the backs of your hands on your knees or your thighs.

Close your eyes and think of the qualities of water, feel as though you are as fluid as water, and mentally repeat an affirmation such as: "I release ideas that are no longer useful" or "I trust myself to follow my dreams". You can create your own affirmation if you want to.

I suggest spending thirty minutes or more on this exercise. If you don't have thirty minutes it's OK, even five minutes makes a difference, ten or fifteen is just fine - whatever works for you.

Then after your time is up open your eyes and stretch your legs and breath in the fluidity of a new day.

photo by Glamhag

Restful Awareness Guided Relaxation Exercise

One of the challenges in relaxing the mind is that it's practically impossible to think of nothing. Our thoughts come and go constantly, when we're feeling anxious and we try to relax and meditate our mind sometimes tunes in to our anxious thoughts. We can feel even worse as the distractions we use to keep unwanted thoughts at bay fade away and we're left facing our fears without diversion.

Fortunately, there's a middle road between trying to think of nothing and feeling uncomfortable and using things like the TV and internet, or rushing around and keeping busy to try and distract your self from anxious thoughts. This middle road is called Restful Awareness. It's a mindful breathing exercise that draws your mind in to specific points of focus that keep your mind distracted and help it come away from anxious thoughts and settle into a state of relaxation.

In this podcast Ananga talks you through a simple restful awareness experience that you can enjoy for yourself:

For maximum benefit from Restful Awareness, we invite you to download our guided mp3 complete with relaxing music from the Anxiety Slayer Store

Image  and words by FLICKR artist alicepopkorn

I am here - here I am

am I here? yes I am

"a wordplay came into my mind - I saw it in the London underground years ago....and I never forgot it"