Over the past six months I have developed a significant interest in meditation and the potential of a daily practice to make a noticeable impact on one’s life. Previously, I wrote a post about Dan Harris’s book, app, & podcast all sharing the same name, ‘10% Happier.’ While listening to one of his podcast episodes he made an announcement that anybody interested in the subscription membership service who did not have the financial means to pay for it, to simply reach out and say so. So I did just that, and true to his word I was given a complimentary promotional one-year subscription to 10% Happier, giving me full access to all of the courses, guided meditations, and talks that are included in the service.
It took me a little while to get into it. I explored the app slowly, doing a guided meditation here and there, probably once a week or so, and I eventually ordered his book. After reading his book, I definitely took a little heavier interest in the subject. It caught my attention because there were no lofty promises of freedom from all suffering, only a light-hearted story of his personal experience of his own growing interest in the subject of meditation and the benefits he was able to gain from building a daily meditation practice, as well as some solid scientific evidence that went a long way towards proving his point.
I started with just 10 minutes a day for the first several weeks. This was enough to keep me engaged with it, but not too much to the point where I was overwhelmed by it. It was a good way to start for me; It didn’t take too much time out of my day and I didn’t feel like I was biting off more than I could chew at any point. I simply chose the ‘Daily Dose’ guided meditation (there is a highlighted guided meditation every day taken out of the catalog that they call the Daily Dose) and set the timer for 10 minutes and I was able to successfully make it a part of my daily routine.
It doesn’t sound like much, and it’s really not, but very quickly I started seeing effects of it in my life. I choose to meditate early in the morning when I wake up, and very quickly I started to notice that I wasn’t nearly as anxious in the mornings afterwards as I normally am. This feeling of subtle calm lasted throughout the day! I wasn’t getting frustrated or flustered as easily— I was staying calm in the face of what would typically be mildly stressful scenarios for me. It wasn’t anything earth-shattering, I hadn’t become ‘enlightened’ (lol), but something had definitely changed in me. It was subtle, yet substantial.
This was enough to really grab my attention. I have been trying my whole life to find something that would take away my anxious tendencies. Despite what can be a rather crippling amount of anxiety, something that has had tremendous impact on my life at various points, I have never sought serious medical attention for it.
When I think about it, I think that this actually played a huge role in my interest in recreational drugs at a relatively early age, and I know for certain that heroin was something that I found that worked. Unfortunately, the cost of using heroin creeps up quickly on you. At some point you end up penniless, jobless, possibly with a criminal record and you are hooked on a dangerously powerful drug that leaves you unbelievably sick when you don’t have it. I learned the hard way that heroin is not a viable option in solving any of life’s problems.
When I first got clean, I was hit was a brick wall of anxiety. That feeling in the pit of my stomach was back with a vengeance in the absence of the drugs, and I spent day after day in its grips. So when I started meditating and noticed a significant change in myself I realized that meditation was extraordinarily powerful. I don’t want to say that my anxiety is gone, because it is not, but it has dropped to a very manageable level and no longer is a force that shapes my day to day life. Through meditation, I have found a healthy way to curb it, and this is what has really propelled my growing interest in the subject.
I am continuing to do my research into the subject, and I am continuing my daily meditation practice. If you are in the early stages of recovery, or about to enter recovery, please do yourself a favor and give this a try. I have struggled to find a way to communicate to people my newfound interest in the subject without sounding like a dbag, but all I can say is that the advantages of meditation in your life are subtle, but substantial. Do your own research and give it a shot, I promise if you give it an honest effort that you will start to enjoy the benefits that I have.
-G.M.C, 5.23.2020, Day 185
Daily Recovery 