From Breakdown to Breakthrough: How Meditation Saved My Life

A few years ago, I had a nervous breakdown. I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t sleep, and every moment was torture as I battled with the seething pit of pain and fear inside. I wanted to jump out of my skin, be anywhere but where I was, do anything to avoid facing how I felt. But as I sat in my shuttered room, watching in horror as everything I had worked so hard to build crumbled around me, I realized that I couldn’t run away anymore.

For so many years I had been running from the things I didn’t want to face, pushing down the pain and insecurities that drove me to act in ways that were alien to my true nature, to do things that I wasn’t proud of, and accept treatment that I didn’t deserve. This, along with the many major life changes and pressures I experienced that year, pushed me over the edge. I hit the breaking point and there was no way out but through. I was prescribed a cocktail of antidepressant and anti-anxiety meds but refused to take them because, ironically, I was too anxious about the side effects wary of becoming dependent upon drugs, numb to life, and of losing what little was left of me. I was willing to do anything to avoid that, so I made a promise to myself: I would try Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, and if I still felt the same after the 8 weeks it took to complete the program, I would take the medication.

The decision made, I sighed in relief, and then dove right in. After weeks of casting about in tortured confusion, this program was the lifeline that I so desperately needed. Following the instructions outlined in Full Catastrophe Living and using the corresponding CDs, I finally had something to structure my empty days around. It begins with simply cultivating awareness of your breath, your thoughts, and the sensations in your body. You then spend two weeks learning the Body Scan Meditation, a powerful tool for easing pain, anxiety, and insomnia. Next, yoga and sitting meditation are slowly incorporated, along with other mindfulness practices. The program slowly builds upon itself, so that by the end of 8 weeks you are empowered to craft your own practice using the techniques you’ve been taught.

For several months, my personal practice consisted of: waking up and doing yoga for 40 minutes, then sitting in meditation for another 40 minutes, then spending hours forest bathing or on my bike. At the end of each day, I would do the Body Scan Meditation until I eventually drifted off to sleep. There were many ups and downs but I stuck with it. Over time my practice has evolved naturally, some things falling away, others being added, as my life has changed. The one constant is that I sit for meditation every day. Not everyone can dedicate this much time to their practice, and that’s okay. It’s all about making it work within your own life, although for the duration of the program Kabat-Zinn suggests that you set aside an hour a day, 6 days a week.

I wont sugarcoat it—it takes serious dedication to complete, especially on your own. Most benefit from guidance, and fortunately for them, affordable programs are offered around the world by instructors certified in MBSR. Some health insurances even cover it, so thats definitely worth looking into if cost is a barrier.

In my case, I was too anxious to leave my room so going to a group wasn’t an option. However, I was fiercely determined to stick with it, because in many ways I felt as if I were fighting for my life. I couldn’t accept the idea of a tortured life filled with endless misery, cut off from everything that I loved. In my mind there were two options: to give up, or to fight. Thankfully, I had the strength to fight, and the support of many people who loved me and wanted to see me get better. Ultimately, though, it came down to me, and the effort I was willing to put in to get better. Change didn’t come right
away, and I didn’t feel a significant reduction in anxiety, but I did feel something shift after the first few weeks. That was enough to know I was headed in the right direction.

Those first sitting meditations were the hardest thing Ive ever done—anyone who has experienced anxiety can attest to the fact that sitting still and facing the feeling is the last thing you’d ever want to do. What you want is to run, faster and faster, to the other side of the world if need be. You want to numb yourself into a state where it doesn’t hurt as much anymore. You’re desperate, vulnerable, and willing to do anything to feel normal again, even for a just a moment. But none of that will help you to get better in the long run. In fact, it will only make things worse.

Sadly, many people do this for years, grasping at every external “cure” within their reach, never knowing that the answer is right there inside of them. Torturing themselves and losing years of their lives to fear. I’m convinced that the only thing that truly works is to face it head on, preferably with the help of a licensed therapist trained in MBSR. That said, medication has its place, and can be incorporated into any mindfulness practice, as long as you are aware that it isn’t solving the problem for you, but rather lifting some of the burden so that you can do the important work of healing.

As John Kabat-Zinn himself says during one of his many guided meditations “How you are feeling is how you are feeling right now. Just accept it, just feel what you are feeling..” Theres an important lesson in that. Often we dismiss our feelings in the hope that they will just go away, but that only gives them more power. The only way to release their hold on us is to face and accept them, and meditation gives us the tools to do just that.

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