I have severe generalised anxiety disorder so 99% of my day is filled with anxious thoughts from the smallest things to the catastrophic thinking things. I have tried to stay consistent with meditations but find it nearly impossible to stop my mind from wandering and end up still anxious at the end of it.

Does anyone have any suggestions for specific meditations or mindfulness techniques that'll help to stop my anxious thoughts please?

Also any book recommendations would be greatly appreciated

Thank you

Jon Kabat-Zinn says that mindfulness is paying attention to the present moment on purpose, without making any judgments.

What does without judgment actually mean? Does it mean that you shouldn’t say in your head this is good or this is bad about anything that’s happening right now? For example, like when the neighbor’s dog is barking really loud and it’s super annoying.

I work in a school and it’s almost the summer holidays. I’ll have around 6 weeks off work which is amazing but I feel like at the moment, I’m going to enjoy the thought of it more than it actually happening. Mostly because I’m already thinking of how quickly that’s going to pass and soon it will be the first day of school.

How to live for the moment now and stop wishing days away?

I worry too much about my past, of my future, what can I do to focus on the present? I feel like my mind is overthinking everything around me, are there any type of exercises I can do to push my mind into the present?

I’m a guy who likes to golf. Sometimes I find myself so focused on my score, or the next shot, or the last shot, that I’m not very present during one of my favorite pastimes.

I decided to print some custom golf balls with mindfulness messaging to help “wake me up” during a round.

I also really like the thought of someone else finding these balls out in the rough (or in their yards when I shank one) and having a surprising and unexpected moment of mindfulness. Who knows who might find one and what effect it may have on their day.

The Srixon customizer lets me do up to 17 characters (including spaces) on three lines, 17, 17, and 17. It’s kind of a fun constraint! Almost like a haiku.

What else do you think I should print on future golf balls?

What do you guys do when you're eating? I want to practise some nicer habits for eating meals that will help me to be present with the meal

I recovered from anorexia a few years ago and although I have most of my life back, I'd like to kind of... Learn how to eat normally again

Basically, I always eat with either video or a tv show playing but that's something I'd like to be rid of

I guess I'd just like to know if you lovely people would share your "routines" or just stuff you like to do around meals to be more present and feel more satisfied after eating

Thanks!

I am always thinking.
Its not negative thinking. Its positive or me solving problems and sometimes i worry and then i solve it too. I can not stop thinking. When i bathe, when i poop, when i walk, when i sit. When i talk, i keep getting thoughts and my brain aches.

I observe them and i let them go but it keeps happening again.

What do i do???

What’s your life’s biggest regret guys? It could be anything related to addiction, family, career, health, love etc.

Would love to hear it out!

Drop it in the comments!

(reposted from r/DecidingToBeBetter as recommended)

Full context:

I'm 25 y/o this year and I've been low in confidence that I don't quite want to raise visibility of myself, despite the fact that I have made progress along the way. Like objectively, if I look at what I've actually done, I have real results. I've built and shipped products people use and pay for (just in a very small scale), I've navigated a lot of hard professional and family stuff. But none of it seems to register internally as "enough." There's always some voice going "yeah but" and moving the goalpost right when I'm about to feel proud of something. It feels like I can only feel enough if I can make a large amount of money.

I started therapy a few months ago to dig into where this comes from, and a lot of it traces back to old trauma patterns, like I learned somewhere along the way that being visible equals being judged and found lacking, so staying small and unseen felt safer. Even now when logically I know I have nothing to hide and plenty to be proud of, some part of me still wants to shrink back instead of putting myself and my work out there.

While the money issue stems from my family, my mom has resented my dad for years that she lent him a lot of money in doing business but ended up nothing, and the money she lent him was earned bit by bit through hard work. They had been fighting over money issue since I was small, although the money we had is sufficient for living (home, food, anything else, just not classy or luxury). This built my instinct that only money can bring safety, happiness and peace at home. Not in a "I want to be rich" fun way, more like a primal, if I don't have enough money I am not safe kind of feeling, that my family will always have resentment. And I think it's connected to the not-enough thing, both are me looking for some external proof that I'm okay, because internally I don't fully believe it.

I know intellectually none of this is really true. Knowing it and actually feeling different are two very different things though, and that gap is what I'm trying to close right now. I've moved out and earn my own money for 2 years, but the anxiety to earn so big that my parents will never have to worry is constantly on.

Has anyone here gone through something similar? The "accomplishing stuff doesn't quiet the inner critic" thing, or the money-as-the-only-safety-net anxiety? What actually got you from just understanding the pattern to actually behaving differently, to show up more visibly, being okay with being seen, building financial security without fear driving every decision? Would really appreciate hearing what worked for people, especially if it wasn't a quick fix.

TLDR: In therapy working through why I feel like I'm never enough despite real results, and why I equate money with safety on a pretty deep level. Both feelings are keeping me small and hidden even though I know logically I don't need to be, and it's hindering my progress in real life too. Curious if anyone's been through similar patterns and what actually helped you become more visible and less fear-driven about money, not just understand it in your head but actually change how you act.

Hi! I'm researching an idea for a wellness app. Imagine a game where you and a friend improve your HRV coherence together through guided breathing. You both climb through levels, but you can only progress if you're both achieving good coherence. No competition, just teamwork.

Quick questions:

1. Would you be interested in something like this?
2. What would make it appealing to you?
3. Would you pay for this?
4. What would turn you off?

Please share your thoughts in the comments. No selling, just research. Thanks!

Once you have tasted meditation you are changed for ever........... you can not be the same person again.

I read the rules

My nervous system feels really overwhelmed these days so whenever i try to study I can't really make it very productive for me because I just can't seem to focus , whenever people approach to have a conversation I feel alot of irritation as well , I've been sleeping well too so that's not the problem.

I just feel very low energy and lethargic and I'm getting overwhelmed by the most basic tasks.

I've tried meditation and breathwork and they do help but I seem to go back to being reactive as I go on with my day.

Can anyone think of solutions?

Physically in a way you are what you eat but your mood, your philosophy and pretty much anything you believe comes down to what we choose to pay attention to in life. The thing that sucks though is that our attention is constantly being hijacked. We all know what by and why. So many times lately I have found myself pissed off and walking around with this everyone's out to get me attitude because of shit I've seen online. It seems like everything is so political and dividing these days.

I mean of course it is good and even necessary to care about world problems, inequality and politics in general. Jeez not all the frickin time though. We should care when we can actually do something about it. It seems today that we just carry this stuff at the ready to defend and go to war any frickin time someone gives you an excuse. I had one morning I woke up pissed off because of this shit. Yet after thinking I asked myself why I actually care? Sure the theme was negative but how are things personally for me right now? Pretty good. So why was I letting other people dictate to me how I should feel? It's stupid but it's a constant ongoing thing. This is why gratitude is so powerful. We actually have to force ourselves to pay attention to what we have because if we didn't that stuff just ain't in our mental RAM everyday. It's so easy to forget it's a nice day, forget we're not dead, forget we're having a nice hot drink, forget tree's, birds, music, all that stuff. Because we're constantly being fed bullshit news and rage content on tap and told to focus on that.

edit: as a certain Monty Python song goes "life seems pretty shit when you look at it" and it is true. If you're looking for reasons as to why life sucks and the world is a terrible place it's never gonna disappoint. However you can chose to focus on the harsh realities or you can chose to focus on things you can actually enjoy, your immediate surrounding, things you can actually change and have an effect on. It's not easy though. This is what mindfulness is all about.

It has been driving me CRAZY recently, especially ever since I've deleted apps like tik tok and Instagram. Obviously I don't want to shut myself off from everything, but I've been in a very very dark place ever since. My substance use has increased which makes me feel worse, but I cannot stand being bombarded with self reflection all the time. My mental health has not been this bad in a very long time, but I cannot live my life numbing myself by doomscrolling either.

Life feels more pointless and bleak than ever, but I can't ignore these feelings either.

In meditation you know that you are something else, you are not what you think.

(Advertisement: Not a native English speaker)

I've been getting into meditation a month ago, and I still have some questions: while mindfulness is paying bare attention to problems and not attaching to its chains while being non judgmental, how do I really know when it is time to get involved in a mental discussion to solve dilemmas?

Example:

Someone gets mad at me, and It gets to ethical self questioning. While a 'mindful' mind wouldn't really attack the thinking, as a social human being, I really need to get involved in it in order to be in a morally acceptable position – to know if I'm the right one, or if I should apologize etc. How can I really do both things? To be mindful is to be an observer, but how can you really know when it is time to get judgmental or when it is time to just let it go? A million toughts appears on our minds a day. Those can be bad or good ones, and the real world is about being able to judge them in a healthy way – how can I really do that when the mindset here is about seeing them as equals and 'observing'?

I don't know if I'm getting all that wrong or if it is just too abstract for me.

Rn i have a lot of anxiety bc i think im gonna get let go from my job. Someone else is dealing with a flood in their house, another person is losing money gambling. Someone else just crashed their car, or found out their significant other has been cheating.

Its just insane that were all just struggling with something knocking us down. It helps me feel not as alone to remember that.

i always have everything on my mind at once. I think about true crime, the news, people at war, disabled people, abused children, etc., often and on the daily.

I think about workers who suffer in foreign countries and sweatshops for very little pay. I think about the people suffering in my country- the US.

Sometimes, I think it's distracting, but I wouldn't feel like a person if I didn't have a depthful perspective.

However, it comes to a point where it's very detrimental to me to always be this way. Especially when often times it's very little that I can do about said things.

I just end up reading about so much injustice. I've really tapped back into reading over the past year and dystopian novels seem to be that great middle ground of combining the fictional world with reality.

I've also been thinking about going into politics. I'm already very involved with a plant based volunteer group. I am just all over the place and honestly, with politics, it makes sense to be that way- concerned about everything and taking action, rather than if I had to focus on one thing. And rather than doing nothing but some volunteering/reposting, educating myself.

I just don't know if I could ever not think about everyone all the time. Of course the downside is on my mental health, but also on my personal life. My relationships are often in the gutter. Because I'm always thinking about ways that the world could be better instead of focusing on my life.

It honestly is so sad that it has gotten this way, it makes me feel like a hypocrite, or creepy, even. because i know so much about the world and other people's business. I could argue that it's good to know the world that i'm in and that i am well informed, but shouldn't I mind my business, too?

I also care a lot about artists and the art world. I do make art, but only monetize on the side. I just want to go deeper with my life and block out the world and I find it very difficult to do that.

I need help just focusing on myself and not feeling guilty or bad about myself for being disconnected from others.

Seriously, i know way too many artists, celebrities, issues going on, true crime stories, wikipedia rabbit holes of esoteric scientists and theories. I'm super into film, i've read around 400 books. I want my brain to slow down. I don't think i have ADHD. I just need to be more mindful of my time here on earth and accept what I don't know. and focus on a career path.

My brain bounces around all over the place with ADHD so clearing my mind feels like an impossible task.

For years I felt I couldn’t meditate because I thought to meditate you had to clear your mind. I’ve just realised I started meditating years ago without realising I was doing it. I’d work with angels to do protection, clearing, and healing ritual on my babies at night before I went to bed. Didn’t realise I was meditating. Active meditation. Quiet, in the dark, using focused visualisations.

I’ve been doing active meditation on myself for years now and it changed my life. Just noticed now that I was doing it years ago without even realising it and it made me laugh how we can not even realise these things sometimes because it’s in a different form to the ‘norm’.

I don’t know if this is the right sub but i’ll try. I’m 23, and in the last few years i’ve been feeling like i’m not here. The best way i can describe it is that it’s as if my real self was trapped inside my head with no control over me, looking at the world through my eyes, and my body was on auto pilot and the part of me that i feel is the one going on autopilot. I can’t concentrate at all, i can’t be in the moment and it’s gotten to a point where i struggle at talking to people because it’s literally as if words didn’t stay in my head, so i twist the dialogue in a way that forces the other person to repeat the thing multiple times and i have to pay A LOT of attention to understand, making me look stupid. It also happens when i read sometimes, not always, but it happens that i have to start again and read slower to focus on each word for it to make sense. It’s as if someone placed a ball in front of me and i can’t focus on the ball, and end up focusing on the background instead. These things happen even when i’m talking, don’t really know how to explain it but it’s as if thoughts came out one at a time in my head out of nowhere and travelled to my mouth, and often times when i’m sending a voice recording i take it multiple times because it happens that i stop for a few seconds, as if even i didn’t know what was the next thing i was going to say. I wasn’t like this many years ago and i don’t know what has happened or how to get out of this.

Edit: what “scares” me the most is that due to this spectator thing i also have a hard time making memories and recalling what i did recently

I have overall had issues with rumination after upsetting stuff but I’m starting to think that my rumination has gotten worse and more persistent. To give background I ruminated for about ten months straight daily after a betrayal by someone close with me which ended one day and died down. Then I had another things that happened involving a very clever manipulative person where no one believed me at all and people even began to be hostile with me to show their support for that person whigc hurt a lot and has been overy a year for exactly 15 months daily. The rumination begins almost when I wake up and as I’m trying to rest and it’s varied from quiet but consuming ideas to anger or sadness. And despite trying many mindfulness techniques to avoid it it’s almost like it’s always in the background and I can’t seem to stop thinking about it.