As someone who used to suffer from terrible anxiety, I’ve always wanted to help people who suffer from this awful condition. That’s why I created the marvelous meditation script that you can find below.
It’s a short meditation session that helps us to relax and unwind. You will find that it helps you to stop worry and fear, and to connect with the present moment.
As well as the method below, you will find these meditation scripts helpful.
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Meditation Script for Anxiety
You might also like to try these meditations to reduce anxiety.
1: [1 minute] Sit or stand with good posture so that you feel a sense of stability
It is always important to have good posture when meditating. But it is especially important when meditating to relieve anxiety.
You want to sit or stand with a straight spine, with your feet shoulder-width apart.
You will know if you have good posture because you will feel a sense of stability and strength.
This is important. Proper posture allows your breathing to slow. Plus, it releases GABA neurotransmitters that reduce the symptoms of anxiety [1].
2: [5 minutes] Start square breathing. Breathe in for four. Hold for four. Exhale for four. Hold for four. This is great breathwork for anxiety
The next part uses Square Breathing (or “Box Breathing”).
This is done in four parts, each part lasting for four seconds. Inhale for four seconds. Hold for four seconds. Exhale for four seconds. Hold for four seconds. Repeat.
Box Breathing is helpful because it slows the mind, deepens our breathing, and creates feelings of serenity. Basically, it will calm your worrying mind.
I personally like to use Box Breathing throughout the day too. I’ll take five minutes now and then to stop and do Box Breathing. It prevents me from developing anxiety in the day.
Box Breathing is a highly effective method devised by American physician Edmund Jacobson in 1938. Research shows that it can help to reduce the symptoms of anxiety and stress in healthy adults.
3: [5 minutes] While Box Breathing, meditate on your breath moving around your body
Already you have started to calm the mind through Box Breathing. You are starting to feel more relaxed. But you might still have stressful thoughts.
Now it’s time to deal with those pesky thoughts. To do this, we will be practising mindful breathing for five minutes.
Continuing to Box Breathe, focus on the space between your top lip and your nose. Let your awareness rest there. Observe the sensations of your breath moving through that space. Continue to focus here for a few minutes.
Now, change your focus so you are aware of the motion of your breath from your nose down to your pelvis. Focus here for a few minutes.
Technically this method is called Anapanasati. We know from research that Anapanasati helps with anxiety because it stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system. This produces feelings of relaxation. [2]
4: [5 – 10 minutes] Calmly observe your thoughts as they occur, and label them to reduce your anxious thoughts
By now, you will be feeling relaxed, and most of the symptoms of anxiety will have reduced.
However, you might notice that you are experiencing thoughts and worries. Sometimes your mind gets lost in those concerns, and it affects your meditation.
That’s where this part comes in.
Continue to focus on your breath moving through your body.
Now begin to label what is happening in your mind. If you experience a thought, say, “This is just a thought”. If you experience a feeling, say, “This is just a feeling”. When your mind gets lost in your thoughts, say, “Mind getting lost”, and when the mind returns say, “Mind returning”.
This makes us more conscious of the movements of the mind and mental phenomena. In turn, we become less reactive to different states of mind. This is an adapted form of Buddhist Vipassana.
If you can’t stop overthinking, use this meditation script for overthinking.
5: [10 minutes] Slowly and consciously move your awareness down your body, from your crown to your toes. Meanwhile, observe sensations and ask each part of your body to relax.
We have now relaxed the mind, reduced anxiety, and increased our conscious awareness. All of this is making us feel much better.
Next, we need to deal with physical sensations.
There is a direct relationship between anxiety and physical sensations. Anxiety can cause physical symptoms like raised heartbeat and shortness of breath. And the mind can misinterpret physical sensations to mean that something is wrong.
For instance, I sometimes get a quivering sensation in my chest. When I notice that, I feel like something is terribly wrong. But it’s just a momentary physical sensation.
What we need to do is learn to not react emotionally to physical sensations. And to do this, we perform a Body Scan.
The Body Scan was devised by Jon Kabat Zinn as part of his Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction course. It is a method in which we scan the body up and down.
What you want to do is very gradually move your conscious awareness from the crown of your head to your toe. The whole process should take approximately ten minutes.
While you do this, calmly observe the sensations in your body. If any sensations cause you to feel anxious, say to yourself “this is just a sensation”. Then ask that part of your body to relax.
It can help to imagine breathing fresh air into tense parts of the body.
Research shows that Body Scan can help to lessen the symptoms of anxiety because it progressively relaxes the body and makes us less reactive to physical sensations [3].
6: [2 minutes] Meditation finished. Sit, breathe, and relax for a couple of minutes
You should now be feeling much more relaxed. Now is the time to simply sit and be. Let yourself simply exist for a couple of minutes. Enjoy the experience of being.
Final Thoughts
Anxiety is an incredibly common problem and a complicated one. The problem is that there are so many different elements that affect anxiety.
The way we hold our body, our style of breathing, our thoughts, and our physical sensations can all affect anxiety. That’s why we covered all those things in this script.
I sincerely hope that you are feeling relaxed and that you enjoyed this meditation script for anxiety.
Paul Harrison BSc is a qualified meditation teacher who believes in genuine, authentic meditation. He has more than 15 years experience in teaching meditation and mindfulness both to individuals and to corporations and is the author of four books on meditation. He has been featured in Psychology Today, Breathe Magazine, Healthline, Psych Central and Lion’s Roar.
Paul studied meditation in beautiful Oxford, UK, and Hamilton Ontario Canada, and earned his degree at Staffordshire University.
Paul’s biggest inspirations include Thich Nhat Hanh, Jon Kabat Zinn, and Jack Kornfield.
“My goal is to provide the most authentic meditation sessions so you can harness the power of your own mind for personal transformation” – Paul Harrison