What does a panic attack look like:
When someone is going through a panic attack, the apparent symptoms mimic a heart attack. Their heart is racing, and breathing becomes very fast. The body is trying to consume more and more oxygen to prepare for a fight-or-flight response.
Adrenaline pumping increases to a maximum, and then comes the chest pain. This is enough to convince the person going through it that they believe it to be a heart attack, and immense fear of death takes over the whole body-mind system.
Shortness of breath comes over until you feel like you are sinking, drowning and you fall on the ground, all while helplessly trying to fight for your life, trying to make yourself calm but nothing works.
What goes on in your mind & body: how panic manifests:
Every one of us has some anxiety over one issue or another. Anxiety is basically a loss of control, real or perceived. Loss of control over people and situations, etc.
In most cases, people who suffer from panic attacks are the ones who have some history of anxiety. Let’s see how it all happens in your mind-body system.
Our brains have a primitive organ called the amygdala, roughly the size of an almond. It has played a vital role in the survival of humankind for billions of years. Have you ever seen a snake only to find out it was just a rope? This is the amygdala at work.
This organ has different levels of activation in each brain it lives in. If a person has anxiety, it’s already activated to some level. It will keep showing you images of how this situation is getting out of hand and what doom it could bring to you. If you walk near the edge or roof of a tall building, it will start showing you how you could fall. Not only that, it will inform your somatic centre to trigger feelings of fear, which are powerful enough to control your behavior, and you become careful or even step back.
How is it related to panic attacks?
Anyone who has gone through a panic attack remembers a few things after coming out of it. A clear, loud inner voice saying, “You are going to die”. This is what death feels like. You are dying. This is the work of the amygdala, not that it’s working against you, but it’s trying to motivate you to get out of the situation.
It will start producing relevant internal images, but the pace will become so fast that you won’t be able to really see or make sense of any of them. This will, in turn, activate your fight or flight mechanism so strongly that the whole system will collapse, and you will feel like dying. This feeling will activate the amygdala even further, and the viscous loop will start.
Dealing with panic attacks:
1. Can you put a handle on it?
We, as humans, feel in control when we understand things. This understanding basically gives us the ability to put a handle on things.
Can you track your anxiety even before a panic attack? Can you Focus and clarify the inner voices and images in your mind? Can you feel the emotions produced as a response to these thoughts?
If you can keep track of these, chances are that the panic attacks will not manifest most of the time.
You might think it’s just avoiding something, but it’s not. It’s like you are so close to the process that it’s right there in your awareness without any conscious or unconscious interference.
See the thoughts and sensations as they are. Well, what happens if you don’t see them? They multiply. You can observe this by intentionally taking your attention away from them for a few minutes. As the Buddhists say, see everything as it is. If you don’t, they will multiply, and the perceived impact will be huge.
All you are doing is observing, not trying to calm down, not trying to fight what’s already here, not trying to stop anxiety or panic attacks. Just observing.
2. Cognition and CBT:
Cognition is our habitual thought patterns for anything that happens. We are conditioned to repeat this in our minds according to the situations.
We were given these thoughts when we were little, but the good news is that we can change them. Our mind-body system works on repetition and believes what is repeated to be true.
Find out what triggers severe anxiety in you and replace it. You will have to intentionally create positive thoughts and repeat them for a long period, at least for 30 days. This gives enough time for neural condensation to take place in your brain.
If you can’t do it on your own, you can opt for CBT, which is Cognitive Behaviour Therapy. The above explanation can be used to understand how CBT works.
3. Reduce external stimuli:
Why do you make your life so complicated? If possible, why not reduce the external noise for at least some time? Why is almost every news important to you?
It’s the mind’s desire to consume more and more, which also manifests as media consumption when you are too tired for physical consumption.
Can you see how your amygdala and somatic system processes this information? It’s depleting your energy and putting a lot of stress on your mind and body system. Can you give it up for at least some days in a week? Give your mind a chance to see the activity on one side and peace on the other. It will decide what’s best.
4. Self-care (Physical & Emotional):
Some people totally focus on their physical side when they are advised for self-care. It is a big part of self-care, but it’s not all. I will not go into details here about how you should sit in a bathtub; everyone knows what physical self-care means.
The point I am trying to make is to listen to yourself. Have all the self-help gurus convinced you that thought is the enemy? I want you to put this all aside for a moment and consider this. What will you
do when a little child comes to you feeling distressed? Will you not listen to him or her? Will you not comfort them? Will you not let them feel their emotions?
Your mind-body system is actually absolutely like this child. Will you not listen to your internal thoughts? Will you not allow yourself to feel the emotions? Will you not take the time for it?
Your internal dialogue might tell you that it’s mean. Let me tell you, self-care is the best thing you can do for this world. All you are doing is reducing a bit of chaos in this world. You are taking care of yourself, and at least at this time, you are not causing anyone any real hurt or pain.
5. Take a deep dive:
Let’s say that you are observing your anxiety, and you can start getting a glimpse of a panic attack; just let yourself slide into it. I encourage you to keep your focus on internal voice, images or body sensations. Choose one and see what is really happening.
It’s like if you are drowning, dive deeper. See things as they are. Don’t interfere; just let the panic come over and pass away. Nature is capable of manifesting a panic attack, and it’s capable of pulling you out of it. Don’t make yourself all responsible for it; let nature do what it does.
Conclusion
Surrender to the conditions that come up in your life.
Whether it be a panic attack, anxiety, depression or anything for that matter. Just surrender.
The need to control is basically a need to feel secure. Need to feel secure means you are insecure. Why are you insecure? You feel like a detached little particle, but you are whole.
You are part of nature. In fact, you are nature.
Your mind tells you that the more control you have, the more secure you will be and the less anxiety you will have. But it’s the other way around, isn’t it? The more you try to be in control, the more you will set yourself up for failure, the more insecure you will feel, and the more anxious you will become. Let go of the need to have control.
