Calming the Rush of Panic (8 page)

S.T.O.P. is your free “time-out” ticket—time for just you, time to observe what’s going on inside, and time to breathe. Your mindful awareness of your breath and your body is exactly where you’ll discover your balance and equilibrium so that you can face the rest of your day with calm and ease.

Get a Good Night’s Rest

Panic can affect your sleep. At the end of your day, you may feel like a bundle of tired thoughts, feelings, and sensations, tied up in knots in various parts of your body. You may have difficulty falling asleep even days after a panic attack has subsided. If so, you’re not alone. Long after the panic has faded, your body still struggles to let go of tightness in your chest, jaw, or hands. Wherever you hold your bodily stress, the following version of the body scan will help you find some of the relief you need in order to feel more at ease and hopefully get a restful sleep. With regular practice, three to four times a week before bed, your mind and body will begin to look forward to it and you’ll experience a more peaceful sleep.

1. Locate a quiet space. Turn off electronic devices such as your cell phone, computer, radio, or TV. Feel free to dim the lights, if you prefer, or to set an alarm for ten to fifteen minutes—be sure to set the volume of the alarm to low. Wear comfortable, loose-fitting clothes, if possible.
   
2. Feel free to sit or lie down. Be comfortable but also be alert, aware, and mindful of your experience.
   
3. Begin by breathing slowly and smoothly and naturally.
   
4. As you continue to breathe, pay attention to your legs. When you breathe in, scan up and down your toes, feet, calves, thighs, and hips. Wherever you feel tension, continue to slowly breathe in and out, allowing yourself to feel the waves of sensations and acknowledging what you’re feeling physically, mentally, and emotionally. Do this for three full breaths, and let it all be.
   
5. Bring your attention to your torso. With each in-breath, scan up and down your pelvis, belly, chest, and spine. Wherever you notice stress, slowly breathe in and out. Do this for three full breaths, wherever the muscles are holding on, and let it be, offering no resistance, allowing nature to run its course.
   
6. Remember to pay attention and observe what’s happening with your body.
   
7. Move on to your arms. With your next breath in, notice any sensations in your fingers, palms, wrists, forearms, biceps, and shoulders. With your next breath out, breathe naturally in and out and let the sensations be, neither pushing them away nor holding onto them. Follow this pattern for three full breaths. With each breath, imagine that you’re slipping into a more peaceful space in your body.
   
8. Finally, scan along your neck and head. Notice any sensations in your throat, face, mouth, nose, eyes, forehead, and scalp. On your in-breath, continue to examine every muscle for places holding stress or tightness. On your out-breath, let the sensations be, following their own course like waves in the sea.
   
9. Breathe and scan. Sense and be aware. Notice how connected everything is right now, as you are resting gently. Continue to breathe and connect with your body.
   
10. If you start to feel sleepy, that’s good. It’s okay to surrender to your need for sleep.
    

May you have a restful and deep sleep.

Here We Are

As we come to the end of this chapter, you’ve been introduced to two MBSR foundational mindfulness meditations to help you deal with panicky feelings in your body: mindful breathing and the body scan. You’ve also learned the mindful practice S.T.O.P. We recommend that you continue to work with these as well as try incorporating some of the applied practices into your informal practice of mindfulness as outlined in the Foundation chapter. This is a recipe for a daily maintenance program to help decrease panic and live with more ease in your life. In the next chapter we investigate how mindfulness works with the strong emotions that panic evokes.

chapter 2

Calming the Rush of Panic in Your Emotions and Feelings

P
anic affects you not only physically, but also in your emotions and feelings. The body and mind are integrally connected, and often when one is affected, the other is too. Learning how to work with the powerful emotions and feelings that come up with panic—such as terror, a feeling of impending doom, anxiety, worry, fear, anger, sadness, or shame—can be enormously liberating to the panicked heart.

As human beings, we are all affected by emotions. Most of us love to feel good and hate to feel bad. We want to be liked and accepted and despise or fear being disliked or discounted. There’s a beautiful saying that people will always remember how you made them feel. Human beings are feeling beings, and it may often appear that your emotions are affected first before your thoughts. You can walk into a room and get a feel of a person or situation before you start thinking and assessing the situation to determine whether you feel comfortable or not.

Within the body, the feelings of panic are very distinct and visceral; there may be rapid breathing, a pounding heartbeat, and many other pronounced physical sensations. Equally, panic affects the mind with a strong array of emotions, feelings, and thoughts. Panicky feelings can arise as quickly as a flash of lightning and send powerful waves of impending doom that render you feeling out of control and not knowing what to do. Sometimes those feelings are beyond reasoning, for it feels as though they come out of nowhere. Other times, there may be unacknowledged emotions, wounds, or traumas from your past that have yet to be worked through with meaning and healing. Whether the origin of your panic is known to you or not, panic affects your body
and
mind.

In this chapter we would like to introduce you to mindful inquiry meditation, for your formal practice of mindfulness, and R.A.I.N., for your informal practice of mindfulness. Both of these can help you deal with emotions and feelings of panic. Let’s begin with mindful inquiry meditation.

Mindful Inquiry

Mindful inquiry meditation is a very useful way to work with panic-stricken emotions and feelings. It is a meditative process of inquiring into the nature of what may be fueling or driving your panic. This type of inquiry is a form of investigation; it is not a process of analyzing, trying to figure things out, or making you feel better through positive thinking. It’s a deep exploration of your body and mind, with a willingness to be in the unknown and the curiosity to see what’s actually there.

This type of practice takes some willingness and courage, but if you really want to know what’s fueling your panic, an investigation may sound quite reasonable. After all, what do you have to lose? It seems the only thing you have to lose is your panic. As President Franklin D. Roosevelt said, “All we have to fear is fear itself.”

As a way to prepare you for this meditation, we would like to introduce you to two important aspects of mindful inquiry for working with panic. The first aspect is acknowledgment, and the second is letting be. You will discover that each supports the other in this process of investigation.

Acknowledgment and Letting Be

Acknowledgment is similar to one of the mindfulness attitudes: allowing. It is the practice of validating whatever’s in your direct experience in a matter-of-fact way, just as a meteorologist reports the weather: it’s 35 degrees, raining, and overcast; or it’s 75, calm, and clear. In the same way, if you are feeling panicked, scared, or fearful, you directly acknowledge those feelings in your body and mind whether you’re okay with them or not. Acknowledgment is this ability to see things just as they are without the filters of avoidance or grasping (disliking or liking).

Letting be was also discussed in the Foundation chapter as well as several places in chapter 1. It is another important aspect or quality that you can bring to acknowledgment. Letting be is different from letting go. Letting be is cultivating the ability to let things run their course rather than trying to push them away or adding on to them. How many times have you told yourself to let go of panic and it didn’t work? If you could let go, you would have. Letting be is much more accessible, since you don’t have to change anything. Letting be is learning to ride the waves of panic that are affecting you physically, mentally, or emotionally and allowing them to run their course, just like ripples from a rock thrown into a lake.

In the practice of mindful inquiry, please acknowledge whatever feelings of panic you may be experiencing in the body and mind and let them be. Learning how to go with the flow of life is a much more skillful approach to dealing with panic than fighting it. There’s a wise saying: “Whatever you resist, persists.” Although at first it may feel counterintuitive to turn toward your panic and acknowledge it and let it be, you may discover soon enough that as you learn to go with it rather than fighting it, it will begin to dissipate.

It’s also important to note that when you begin to acknowledge feelings of panic, they may actually feel as though they are getting stronger. Please know this is a normal reaction. The reason it may feel like that is that you’re actually bringing your light of awareness to the panic, rather than turning away from it. You will, however, discover that if you continue to ride its waves, acknowledging the feelings and letting them be, they will gradually subside. In time, you will grow in confidence, you will feel empowered, and the panic will not be able to consume or control you as much as before. You will learn that you don’t have to be frightened and held hostage by your panic and fears and realize that you can live your life with greater ease and peace.

Deepening the Investigation

Mindful inquiry meditation is an investigation into what’s fueling your panic, fear, or anxiety. The more you understand what’s driving it, the more you can be free of it. When your awareness and understanding grows brighter, the darkness of panic and fear diminishes. So after acknowledging your panic and letting it be, you are welcome to proceed further into a deeper investigation into what’s driving the panic. This is called mindful inquiry.

When you practice mindful inquiry, you may first want to try to calm your body and mind with some mindful breathing and then begin to acknowledge and let be whatever you’re feeling physically, mentally, and emotionally. In this meditation you are going to stay and investigate those feelings of panic by bringing attention to the fearful feelings themselves. This is done by bringing awareness to the feeling of panic in your body and mind and letting yourself experience and investigate it nonjudgmentally, just the way it is. Allow yourself to acknowledge what it feels like in your body, emotions, and feelings, and let these feelings be. There’s no need to analyze or figure them out; just ride and observe and experience the waves of emotions and feelings as they come and go. In time you may discover that within those feelings of panic lie important insights into what may be fueling them. You may also realize that within you are tremendous resources for resiliency and healing—that you can learn to overcome those powerful and captive feelings of panic and live with more freedom and ease in your life.

Below is one poignant story of mindful inquiry. Although this story illustrates the recalling of childhood memories and trauma that fed into panic, we should mention that there are other kinds of insights and realizations you can gain from meditation, ones that may not have to do with repressed memories. Consider Marcos’s story in the last chapter, in which his panic attacks seemed to come for no apparent reason. There are many reasons why people experience panic: past experiences, physiological or biological imbalances, diet, medicines, or drugs. Sometimes panic is truly enigmatic. What is of the utmost importance is how you respond and deal with it. That makes all the difference in the world.

Joe’s Story

For many years, one of my clients, Joe, had experienced panic when going over bridges. In session, I (Bob) suggested that we explore these feelings, and he agreed. I told him that he could stop at any point if it felt too uncomfortable. Joe began with mindful breathing, and then I gradually encouraged him to reflect on what it felt like to get near a bridge and to report any physical sensations, thoughts, or emotions that came up. He soon said that he was feeling tightness in his belly and chest and was beginning to feel scared. I instructed Joe to acknowledge those feelings, and in time he began to settle down. I invited him to move further into those feelings of tightness and to notice and acknowledge what it felt like physically and emotionally and to not analyze them. He was quiet for some time, and then he blurted out, “I remember! I remember when this all happened. I saw my sister get pushed off a bridge when I was a little boy.” He went on to explain that it hadn’t been a very large bridge—actually a culvert near where he grew up in a farm area—and that his sister fortunately had not been injured. Yet this was such a frightening experience for him that he had repressed this memory and developed a panic and anxiety disorder about going over bridges. This awareness helped free Joe from the panic.

In mindful inquiry you’re invited to bring nonjudgmental awareness into any panicky emotions or feelings, whether they are related to memories (as in Joe’s story) or not (as in Marcos’s story), and to fully acknowledge and experience them in your body and mind and let them be. You may discover that within the panic is a whole plethora of feelings and experiences that are causing the agitation or whatever emotion you are feeling. When you begin to acknowledge what has not been acknowledged, the doorway of understanding can begin to open. By learning to turn toward your panic, you may experience more freedom than you could have ever imagined.