Meditation

Meditation involves training your mind to focus, and encourages mindfulness, awareness, and thought control. After hundreds of studies, it is becoming scientifically evident that meditation has both physical and mental benefits.

Types of Meditation

With many schools of thought and practices when it comes to meditation, we are going to focus on those we have found most useful as a trauma healing tool and are commonly used at The Bridge to Recovery.

Visualization Meditation

This technique involves visualizing scenes, memories, images, and even desired outcomes.  This technique is beneficial because:

• It can help us connect to subconscious memory.
• It can help increase our confidence and coping skills.

Mindfulness Meditation

This technique involves free thinking, or letting thoughts freely pass through our minds as they come and go.  This practice focus on being in the present and connected with the world around you in the moment. This technique is beneficial because:

• It is simple to practice and can be done anywhere.
• It helps us learn not to judge or be fearful of our thoughts.
• It helps us pick up on patterns of thinking we may not have known existed.

Love-Kindness Meditation

This technique promotes love, kindness, empathy, and compassion by practicing opening our minds to giving and accepting these gifts that we so often deny ourselves.  This technique is beneficial because:

• It encourages self-love, kindness, and acceptance.
• It encourages us to accept love and kindness from others.
• It allows us to release harbored anger and resentment.

Movement Meditation

This technique involves allowing your body to move the way it is guided to.  This often includes walking or dancing.  This also involves free thinking, but while also letting your body respond.  This technique is beneficial because:

• Physical movement can release trauma from our body.
• Movement can trigger our endorphins, creating a state of calm and relaxation.

Focused Meditation

This technique, which we often refer to as “grounding” at The Bridge to Recovery, involves placing focus using your five senses – what you can see, feel, taste, smell, and hear.  This technique is beneficial because:

• It diverts your thoughts to the present.
• It strengthens our mind and thought control.
• It helps us reframe intrusive thoughts.

Concentrative Meditation

This technique involves placing focus on an object, item, or behavior while focusing everything else out.  This technique is beneficial because:

• It allows us to place focus on one thing and improve at it, such as our breathing patterns.
• It can help us get rid of intrusive thoughts.

Progressive Relaxation

This technique involves slowly focusing on individual tasks, such as relaxation beginning with a focus on resting our fingertips, then our arm muscles, until we have covered all muscle groups. This technique is beneficial because:

• It can help release physical tension. 
• It encourages calm and restfulness. 
• It aides in better sleep and rest.

Meditation Intimidation

Practicing meditation can be very intimidating to some.  Sometimes it is not taken seriously or people are not sure where to even begin.  Our wonderful team of therapists work with our clients where they are at and with the techniques most beneficial to them.  

Don’t worry, you will not be sitting around chanting mantras at the moon at midnight.  But if you attend our program, you will be guided through meditation techniques at some point during your program.  

Meditation used at The Bridge to Recovery is mostly about:

1. Learning to focus our minds to get intrusive thoughts out, or keep positive thoughts in.

and

2. Learning to be present in the moment and not held captive by our thoughts.

To learn more about our program, we invite you to reach out to us today.