Meditation is a great way to cope with anxiety and depression. When I recommend mediating to people I feel can benefit from it, they look at me like I’m crazy. But really, I find meditation to be extremely beneficial. Although everyone is different, and some methods of coping may work for one person but not the other.
Meditation is the act of bringing your racing mind to a calm level. When meditating you focus on a sound or a guided session and only focus on what you hear.
It’s okay if your mind wanders off a bit, but the key to a successful session is realizing that your mind is wandering and getting back to a peaceful state. Meditation can improve clarity, decrease levels of stress, and open you up opportunities of creativity and happiness.
To me, guided meditations are the most helpful, especially where I’m still practicing and tend to slack off a bit. If you’re a beginner, I recommend guided meditations to start off. Once you’re a pro, you are capable of listening to sounds or meditation music in your sessions.
Fortunately, nowadays you can use meditation apps that provide guided or music-only sessions. Meditation apps are also great for keeping track of your progress and seeing how far you’ve come from the beginning.
Most of the apps recommended below offer free trials and in-app purchases. They are also compatible with iOS and Android phones.
Smiling Mind
The cool thing about Smiling Mind is that it targets a younger audience ranging from ages 7 to 11. Although, anyone of any age can still use it!
Since mental health conditions like anxiety can begin at such a young age, I think it’s great that this app is meant for kids. Especially since they all seem to have some sort of tablet or device that allows you to use apps!
Headspace
Headspace is an inviting guided meditation app that is designed to help people, no matter who you are, get into a mindful state.
Once you’re signed up with Headspace, you can choose an area of your life you want to improve. Better sleep? Reduce anxiety? Pain management? There are a bunch of categories to choose from.
When you pay for a subscription you get access to hundreds of guided meditations that will improve your health and life.
Calm
Calm is a meditation app that is similar to Headspace but what makes it different is how the meditations are.
For free, you can access different “scenes,” which are natural settings with natural sounds to meditate to. For example, there are “planet earth,” “fireplace,” and “foggy stream.” These play in the background of your guided meditations.
Your Calm profile keeps track of your meditating streak including the total of days, sessions and hours.
Omvana
Omvana is another great way to get into meditation. One feature that sets it apart from the rest is the “mixer.” The mixer feature allows you to choose different sounds along with your guided meditation.
This app offers music only meditations too, if you’re a pro and can get into a mindful state just by listening to sounds.
Omvana also provides “self-hypnosis” tracks that allegedly help you lose weight, find love and achieve wealth.
Buddhify
The beauty of Buddhify is that it gives you access to meditations tailored to what you’re doing that day or are in the middle of doing.
With Buddhify you can pick exactly what you need for the moment ranging from a boost of motivation or a minute of relaxation.