What Exactly Is Tinnitus?
Tinnitus is the persistent impression that a sound is present when it is not in fact present in the room. Specialists estimate that at least one in ten adults in the U.S. is affected by tinnitus, but some think the real number might be closer to 50 million people, more like one in every six. And every one of these unfortunate people struggles to endure it.
The sound is most often described as ringing in your ears, but is also frequently described as chirping, buzzing, hissing, whooshing, whistling, or roaring. There are many psychological, emotional, and mental strains to living with tinnitus, but unfortunately there is not yet any cure to tinnitus itself. Meaning, there is no dependable way to actually stop the transmission of the perceived signal from reaching the brain.
Treatment, therefore means treating the underlying condition that has provoked the tinnitus. These underlying conditions are diverse, ranging from high blood pressure to impacted ear wax neck strain. Left untreated tinnitus often leads to social isolation, depression, and even cognitive deterioration. Hearing aids can be a great comfort, and even white noise machines, vents, fans, and talk radio can diminish the relentless irritation.
It is very common for those who suffer from tinnitus to feel out of control. Many people have found that taking control of their own mind best they can is the greatest defense they have against tinnitus’s constant barrage.
How Meditation Works
Meditation can refer to many different techniques and approaches and only you can determine what works best for you. But the common factor is a concentrated mental exercise to focus your attention for extended periods of time. This is always trickier than many people may assume because our minds constantly meander. Many of us are hardly aware of the chattering monologue endlessly running in our minds and come to mistake that for consciousness itself. But meditation is a means of accessing the awareness beyond this awareness.
The habit of daily meditation can profoundly change your life in that it changes how you feel in the world. Quickly after beginning, many people feel deep calm and relaxation, fully inhabiting the present moment in a brand new way. Stick with it and the longterm benefits are even greater. It is hard to overstate how greatly decreased stress and improved concentration change everything for you.
Meditation’s Effect on Tinnitus
It is likely pretty apparent already how a practice that focuses on cultivating inner peace and concentration can help those who suffer from a disability that is rooted in the mind and creates cascading anxiety. The costs to your quality of life that tinnitus causes can be counterbalanced by the improvements to your quality of life that mediation provides. And the key to doing so is analogous to judo.
In judo, you are trained to use your opponent’s momentum against himself. Similarly, many people find meditation tough, continually returning their attention to a concentrated point as it drifts over and over. And many people find living with tinnitus difficult, constantly battling against the ringing in your ears. But what if instead of fighting against the ringing, you could focus on it and use it to focus your mind?
Meditation commonly uses your breath as an omnipresent pattern to center your attention. But for those with tinnitus, the ringing is also omnipresent. If you could focus on the sound in your ears, then your attention wanders away from it. Like mediation focused on breathing, you bring your attention back to the ringing over and over and each time it drifts again.
By doing this, by shifting the meaning and role of the ringing in your life, you can take power over it. The ringing itself will not diminish because the ringing itself was never actually even there. Your impression of the ringing will diminish because that is all that was ever really bothering you. And by focusing on it with concentrated attention, you shift the power dynamic between you and the persistent sound. It is no longer so powerful. You are empowered.
As you get in the habit of doing this meditation it normalizes the ringing. You will not overcome it all at once and in fact you will not overcome it at all. But you will make peace with it.
To be clear, this will not be easy. But in the long run it will be easier than constantly living with the tension of attempting to overcome it. There is no reason to wait. Start today.