Have you been prescribed medication as an anxiety disorder treatment to control the effects of anxiety? Have you wondered whether there are alternative treatments for anxiety and cures without medication? The answer is “yes”, there are alternative treatments for anxiety disorder and yes, there are cures for anxiety without medication. There are in fact cures for anxiety that are 100% natural and without the side-effects associated with the medications that are prescribed for anxiety.
Medications are commonly prescribed for people who are affected by anxiety and panic attacks. These medications include:
- Xanax (alprazolam)
- Klonopin (clonazepam)
- Valium (diazepam)
- Librium (chlordiazepoxide)
- Ativan (lorazepam)
These medications are typically prescribed for people who are having extreme bouts of anxiety including panic attacks. And for anyone who is dealing with the crippling effects of anxiety, these medications can be very effective anxiety treatment and initially help someone. They can be essential aides to help a person return to their daily routines.
However, all of the medications above have various side-effects with some being more extreme than the others. A person whose life has been dramatically impacted by anxiety discovers within a short period that even though these medications can reduce and eliminate panic attacks, they also make the person feel separate or disassociated from their body. They literally feel at times like they are floating. People commonly report other side-effects including:
- Drowsiness
- Dizziness
- Constantly feeling tired
- Sleep problems
- Slurred speech
- Dry mouth
- Nausea
- Headache
As the Director of The Compassion Center, I have met hundreds of people who have anxiety and panic attacks who have either been prescribed medication or their doctor has discussed with them the option of taking medications. Each person has explained to me that they either wish to stop taking their medication or they do not want to start taking medication.
This is the typical starting point of the conversation where people tell me that ‘they have heard that Meditation can help someone affected by anxiety’. When asked if Meditation can help someone affected by anxiety, my response is a resounding “yes”!
Regardless of whether a person is taking medication or not, I want someone who has been affected by anxiety to experience how Meditation can very effectively bring them into a calm, quiet and relaxed state.
What’s the First Step?
The first step is to clarify, for anyone affected by anxiety, what meditation is. There are many who think that Meditation is some weird religious practice that only young people and ‘odd’ people do. These same people imagine a swami or guru sitting cross legged, with flowers in his hair, long hair, white hippy clothes, and sandals. Maybe this stems from the 60s when many people got introduced to Yoga and the Beatles were seen going to India to study with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi where they learned Transcendental Meditation (TM), which is a form of Meditation.
Many people are quite surprised, and quite happy, to learn that most people learning Meditation are taught by a regular looking guy, who wears regular clothes, who speaks quite normally, and possibly even sits in a regular chair. Meditation is a practice that is taught to and learned by all people regardless of age and any other factors.
With that being said, we teach the person suffering from anxiety how to meditate. We walk the person step by step through this process. After teaching someone how to meditate, we then provide a guided Meditation. Without fail, at the end of the guided Meditation, a person who has been dealing with anxiety feels very relaxed, calm, peaceful and quiet.
When you begin a Meditation practice, you will be exploring and ultimately addressing the root cause(s) of your anxiety. Within two weeks of starting a Meditation practice, you will experience a decrease in your anxiety symptoms. If you have been experiencing panic attacks, within 2 weeks, they will have decreased and within anywhere from 4-6 weeks, they will be eliminated. Within 8 weeks, your anxiety will be completely under control.
Why Is Medication Prescribed for Anxiety?
Taking medication for anxiety, that is prescribed by a professional, is sometimes necessary. However, we need to understand that medication is only intended as a short-term solution to alleviate the symptoms of anxiety. No Medication will remove anxiety and it and will not help address the root cause(s) of the anxiety.
Typically, taking prescription anti-anxiety Medication is coupled with therapy. It is through therapy that the opportunity exists to get to the root cause of anxiety and address the root cause. But does seeing a therapist guarantee that a person can be free from anxiety? Unfortunately, the answer is “no”.
For many of the people that come to The Compassion Center seeking relief from anxiety, they have been seeing a therapist for anywhere from one to several years and they still have anxiety symptoms as bad, and sometimes worse, than when they first started to see a therapist.
Meditation Effectively Resolves Anxiety Disorder
We have a high success rate of helping people reduce the symptoms of anxiety and completely removing anxiety(*). Of course, we are not perfect. Meditation does not work 100% for everyone. In instances where Meditation has not helped someone, the usual reason is that the person did not practice Meditation on a regular basis. For Meditation to be effective, it must be practiced daily.
If we understand that anxiety doesn’t simply appear out of nowhere, that the symptoms increase over time, and that the root cause of the anxiety may stem back to possibly childhood, we should then understand that it takes patience, work and determination to free yourself of this crippling illness. Meditation works slowly to free us of the effects of anxiety. As much as we want to be free of these horrible feelings, we must allow a couple of weeks to start noticing the positive effects of Meditation.
We encourage you to attend at least one of our group Meditation classes so that you can accomplish two things. You can experience what Meditation looks and sounds like. You can meet others, just like you, who have been suffering with anxiety. People in these classes will be very happy to talk with you about how they were before learning to meditate and how they feel now. You will have an opportunity to meet some amazing people whose lives have been completely transformed by Meditation.
To read more about how Meditation can help someone with anxiety and consider the solutions that we have to offer, please read our page on Meditation Solutions for Anxiety.
(*) These statements are based upon experiences with people who have come to The Compassion Center and either enrolled in one of our Meditation Programs for Anxiety or have come to our center on a regular basis and made a commitment to meditating daily.
