Fear of dentists is a serious problem for a significant percentage of the population. As this fear becomes more recognized, new techniques are being used to treat it. The important thing is to beat him so you can get into the meat and take care of your teeth. A great method that works easily is meditation.
Meditation is something that is seen in a strange light in Western cultures. However, it has great benefits for all areas of your life, including stress reduction, clearer and more focused thinking, health benefits, and overcoming phobias like the one that prevents you from going to the dentist. This is how you can use meditation to overcome your fear of visiting your dentist.
Step one: where do you feel it?
When you think about visiting the dentist, you get a physical reaction somewhere in your body. Just this simple thought brings a butterfly in your stomach or an anxious feeling down your spine. Imagine yourself going to the dentist and visualize yourself sitting in the chair. When you do this, where do you feel your anxiety? Locate the part of your body that reacts.
Step Two – Put It In Place
Once you have identified the location of your fear of dentists, visualize it. Imagine that it is a person and give it a name. Tell him that you will control him and that he will not control you. It doesn’t matter how you visualize your fear of dentists, but what matters is that you isolate it from the rest of your being. This separation is really important, because once you can separate it, you can successfully save it.
The key to why meditation works is that it allows the mind to focus on one thing. Throughout the day, your mind is bombarded with stimuli and this creates a disordered state. By concentrating on one thing, meditation teaches you how to control your mind. We are going to focus on your fear of dentists so that we can learn to control it. Fear possesses you; instead, you’re going to own it. Tell him he’s not going to bother you today.
Step Three: Practice
Finally, you are going to practice. Bring up that fear just as you did at the beginning of the exercise and focus on it. Give it a picture or a name to make it easy to see and separate it from you. If you do this repeatedly, it will be easier to do and easier to control. Keep doing this until you can instantly remove that feeling of fear from your stomach or back, and expel it completely.
Meditation isn’t magic and it won’t make you feel completely comfortable with a dentist instantly. However, it gives you a tool you can use to take that anxiety and put it in the back of your mind so you can continue with your visit. It may still be there, but it will be a small thing that won’t stop you from making your appointment. For most people, simply getting over this anxiety once and missing an appointment makes them realize that there is no reason to fear dentists at all.