Mindfulness-oriented therapy reduces your cravings for opioids

Mindfulness It is an approach to live with more conscious attention, intention, and skills based on specific practices that promote this experience. These practices help people develop their own internal and external experiences, a current-centric awareness, whether painful or fun, without acceptance and without judgment.

Mindfulness practices have been shown to be reduced anxiety, depression, Chronic pain Strength, trauma symptoms, and emotional responsiveness, and increased psychological flexibility, ability to pay attention, and ability to maintain attention; Resilience.(1) By helping to regulate emotions, mindfulness practices reduced and reduced the effects of negative thoughts and thought patterns. stress And anxious level.

A wide range of practices for fostering mindfulness include yoga, tai chi and Qi Gong, but the most well-known are meditation. Meditation refers to a variety of self-aware practices that focus on training our attention Unconscious The autopilot process under spontaneous control, along with calmness, clarity, and such specific abilities, develops greater mental and emotional balance and happiness. concentration.(2)

Other specific benefits of mindfulness include:

• Improvements Emotional regulation. By learning to observe and accept thoughts and emotions without judgment, people can more intentionally manage their emotional responses and reduce their reactivity.
• Mindfulness develops a more conscious connection with one’s thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations, leading to greater self-awareness and self-compassion.
• Mindfulness helps with the idea of ​​a quiet race, reduces anti-mination, promotes relaxation, and leads to better quality and amount of sleep.
• By changing people’s pain, discomfort and relationships, mindfulness helps individuals better cope with chronic pain by reducing the subjective suffering associated with it.

In addition to this set of benefits, new research shows that enhanced mindfulness-oriented recovery (and others) can help rewire the brain’s response to natural, healthy pleasures. The survey results were published in April 2025 American Medical Association Journal (Jam).(3)

Combining more mindfulness training, Cognitive behavior Treatmentand positive psychological elements to address Addictiveemotional distress, and chronic pain. Mindfulness skills help you regain your ability to regulate cravings/impulses, reduce pain, enjoy natural and healthy joys, and experience greater joys and meaning in life.

Too often, opioid use disorder (OUD) occurs through the use of opioids prescribed for chronic pain. This is a condition affecting approximately 50 million people in the United States.(4) Due to the inevitable physiological effects of opioids, even if adopted as prescribed, over time, the brain and body become increasingly used, endured and dependent on them. As a result, past certain points, people simply need to take opioids to feel “normal.” The need to replicate the pain relief provided by opioids avoid the need to avoid the deep discomfort of withdrawal.

In this deviation-amplification dynamic, people gradually lose the ability to experience joy in activities they previously enjoyed. The ability to find joy in naturally rewarding experiences such as diet, through continuous opioid use; Sexand being with friends and family is becoming less and less.

A recent study by researchers at the University of California, San Diego included 160 individuals with chronic pain who were compensated from primary care and pain clinics. Participants completed positively Feelings Regulation (ER) tasks and surveys. A subsample of participants at risk of opioid misuse was randomly selected in one of three different treatment courses. One-on-one counseling, an additional 8 weeks or supportive group therapy was performed, and the same ER task was completed after treatment and questionnaire through 3 months of follow-up.

Participants with OUD showed difficulty in demonstrating positive emotions, as seen in weakened brain responses, when they tried to taste images that represent naturally rewarding objects and experiences, such as smiling babies, puppies, and beautiful sunsets. This slowing of positive emotions was directly linked to a higher opioid craving. However, more treatments were associated with opioid cravings 50% lower than supportive group therapy, so much so that they were unable to heal this taste by increasing the brain response to positive stimuli. The results show that people with OUD can play more beneficial roles in helping people with OUD reset emotions, control their cravings, and reduce opioid misuse.

The current study is consistent with the 2023 study published in Jama Psychiatry, It has been found to add more to standard addiction care Telehealth And as a result recurrence Compared to standard addiction care alone, 42% is 42% less, and 59% is 59% less treatment dropout rate.(5)

Enhanced recovery in mindfulness orientation helps effectively rewire the brain’s response to natural, healthy pleasures, leading to improved emotional balance and reduced opioid cravings. These findings suggest that this may be a particularly promising approach in the treatment of opioid use disorders.

Copyright 2025 and Mager, MSW