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What is a panic attack?
The first thing to realise for you start controlling panic attacks, is that you don’t have to be afraid of them, as they will never kill you. It is an incredibly scary experience and it may seem like you’re having a heart attack or dying but take comfort from the fact that everything is fine, it’s just an extreme version of what is called the ‘fight or flight’ response.
The fight or flight response is an inbuilt mechanism that helps us cope with dangerous situations. It is there for our survival. When you experience a panic attack, you’re essentially experiencing the fight or flight response, only this is an exaggerated version of it. Strangely, your panic attack is trying to do good thing!
Whenever we experience a rational dangerous situation, we go through some incredible physiological changes. These changes may seem very familiar to you. Typically you will notice your heartbeat pumping blood around your system quicker, breathing shallow and faster, adrenaline levels going through the roof and stress hormones being pumped into your system. You need to experience these changes to be prepared physically to either fight the threat or flee (the fight or flight response).
A panic attack only differs in intensity and in the absence of any immediate or apparent danger.
Begin controlling panic attacks
Typically during a panic attack, you begin to focus on your internal experience. What this means is that you begin to amplify the experience and the intensity begins to worsen. You’ve probably found that the harder you try not to focus on your panic the harder it becomes and just like a vicious circle, it gets worse and worse. You will more than likely begin to catastrophize the situation. This means you begin to think in a very negative way. Thoughts such as “I’m going to die”!
When you begin to notice a change in your awareness that means you begin to notice the onset of a panic attack, here are some things you can do immediately to diffuse the situation:
1) Breathe slowly from your abdomen (not high up in the chest)
2) Focus your attention away from yourself. You can easily do this by striking up a conversation with somebody else.
3) Your nervous system is overly active, so why not do something where you can release the anxiety. You can decide to go for a short walk or even do some press ups or an exercise of your choice.
4) Take control of your thoughts, they have such a massive impact on your experience.
Remember panic attacks are not dangerous, realise this and turn any catastrophic thoughts around e.g. instead of “I’m losing control”, say to yourself; “I can handle this confidently and calmly”. Do this and you’ll begin controlling panic attacks.
Control your panic
If you want to learn a very powerful approach for controlling panic attacks and eliminate them for good, then have a look at cure panic attacks today.
