Meditation for Addiction and Relapse Prevention

Meditation for Relapse Prevention - Meditating Group

Did you know that meditation can help you avoid compulsive cravings, and relieve mental health symptoms such as anxiety and depression? It can also improve overall life quality.

The fact is meditation is an excellent tool when it comes to reducing or preventing relapse. 

Benefits of meditation

Meditation becomes more and more popular each day, as people uncover its list of benefits. Meditation is basically learning how to train your mind to focus and be able to redirect your thoughts towards whatever you want. It can help you increase your awareness of yourself and everything around you, reduce your stress and improve your concentration. 

Stress Relief

When we get stressed, the main question we need to ask ourselves is whether or not there’s any need for response. If you’ve noticed that stress makes you worry, get anxious or tensed and could possibly lead to a relapse, then meditation is the right choice for you. It will help you tackle these issues and finally be able to face them head on. Find the meditation technique that’s right for you and help you restore your inner peace.

Improved Concentration

Did you know that humans make up to 10,000 decisions a day, and still up to 90% of those could be on a subconscious level? That’s why meditation is quite important, especially when it comes to addiction recovery and relapse prevention. You need to learn a bit of self-discipline, in order to relax your body and mind and adapt new, simpler and healthier behaviors in your life. 

Meditation can help you train yourself to be present in every moment, no matter which activity it is you’re performing.

Living a Healthier Lifestyle

Maintaining a healthy lifestyle is a big part of recovery and sobriety. Meditation can encourage just that. You’ll learn how to take care of your body better than you did before and learn new healthy habits that you can incorporate in your everyday life. Once your mind and body are relaxed you’ll immediately start to feel better about yourself, and start eating healthier, which is a big step towards long-term recovery. 

Increased Immunity

The stronger your immune system is, the stronger and healthier your body will be. Meditation steps in after the most crucial part of rehab, which is the detox part and helps your body heal itself and become strong yet again. 

Your body is constantly working on protecting itself and meditation helps speed along that process. Meditation helps you become more conscious of your mind and body and helps you establish a better connection with it and always be aware of what it needs.

Improved Quality of Sleep

One of the most important part when it comes to getting healthier and sober is improving your sleep quality, and getting enough rest so that your body can heal properly. A lot of us have struggled with some kind of sleeping disorder at some point of our lives. If left untreated sleep disorders can lead to much more than just sluggishness. Not getting enough sleep will complicate your whole recovery process and might even lead to a relapse.

Guided meditation can help you learn how to focus on the present and will help you get a good night’s sleep in the days when you need it the most. 

Meditation can help you manage your thoughts and your brain so that your focus can shift from worrying and stress to comfort and peace — bringing you closer to a relaxed state of mind and helping you in your recovery process.

Can You Prevent Relapse with Meditation?

Although meditation is not some sort of a magical cure for drug addiction, it can help strengthen and re-form the opioid-damaged neuropathways so that they are more capable of responding to stress. 

Using guided meditation alone can’t lead to a full addiction recovery or prevent the withdrawal symptoms and a relapse. It can, however, be used to prevent relapse with the addition of other helpful methods, medication, group therapies and so on. 

Guided meditation has tons of benefits for people in recovery. It can help people release their tension and all of their unpleasant emotions and de-stress. Stress and anxiety are the number one cause of relapse and can be avoided with the right meditation program.

Meditation can be healthy and helpful for each person, but it plays an especially relevant role in addiction recovery.

Here are some more of its benefits: 

  • Learn how to handle emotional stress
  • Improve your communication skills 
  • Learn how to notice your cravings and urges, but avoid acting on them, and let them pass on their own
  • Stop focusing on everyone else and focus on yourself
  • Forget the constant need to control or fix each situation that arises, and learn how to let things go

How Can Meditation Be Incorporated in My Recovery?

If you’re ready to give meditation a chance in your long-term recovery, here’s what you need to know.

First of all, incorporating meditation in your aftercare recovery plan is easier than you think. It’s not that difficult to master the meditation practices that you’ll learn here, and they do not require more than 15 minutes of effort a day. The most important thing that you can do for your body and soul is to stop being critical of yourself and always make sure to set your own pace.

It will be common for your mind to wander at first, but after you keep practicing meditation for a bit longer, you’ll start to get better and better at it every day.

There is no right or wrong way to meditate. Meditation therapy is a good way to clear your mind, de-stress and avoid triggers that can possibly lead to relapse.