How I Transformed a Panic Attack Into Divine Joy …
… in less than 5 minutes.
If you’ve ever had a panic attack, you know how debilitating it can be. The adrenal gland surges, pumping an overload of energy through your body. This usually can be felt most intensely in the chest area. If you’ve never had one, I am happy for you. Read on and hopefully it might help you have even more empathy for others when they tell you they are experiencing them.
I had my first panic attack when I was 25 years old, but I didn’t know it was called a panic attack. My brain learned to put me in “fight or flight” during encounters with a business partner. A part of me viewed this person’s behavior as threatening to my safety and security (in my case, mostly emotional safety … all that matters is how you perceive it, not that a “real” threat is there, by the way).
When I was 33, someone came into my life, only this was a boyfriend. His behaviors mirrored those in the way they made me feel, so my brain said, “I’ve learned that when you have this feeling, you’re not safe! Here’s some adrenalin so you can sprint like a superhero! Now, run!” This was the first time that I developed a real problem with panic attacks. And still, I didn’t know there was the name for what I was experiencing.
A few years later, yet another person did behaviors that mirrored those of the two prior people. This time, the over-reaction by the adrenalin in my body was debilitating. I would sometimes go an entire day in this state of fight-or-flight, heart pumping, pains shooting through my chest, tightness in my throat. Imagine when you’ve had a near-miss car accident, and how you felt right after the car almost hit you. Now imagine that in two minutes, you haven’t calmed down, but that it goes on all day or all week. At least by then, I had learned there was a name for the extreme discomfort I was feeling!
Luckily, by that time, I had learned how to direct energy, and that energy waves exist in a state of polarity. In other words, at the exact same moment you have an unwanted feeling or a bad experience, the exact opposite of the feeling you’re experiencing is available to you. The thing is, you’re only perceiving one extreme.
In Eckhart Tolle’s The Power of Now, he discusses how the act of observing something causes it to act differently. This concept was also addressed in a fascinating experiment in the DVD Down the Rabbit Hole. A crude analogy is this: have you ever been at a wedding, and someone was walking around the reception with a video camera? And at some point, they would be filming your table? You would be aware that you were being filmed, but you were supposed to go on with your conversation like you weren’t being filmed. It’s pretty hard to pretend the camera isn’t there. You know it’s there. You act differently because you know you’re being observed. You DO alter your conversation, sit up straighter, smile, etc. It’s kind of like that.
So one day, something triggered me, and I was having a whopper of an all-day panic attack. Feeling desperate, at lunch, I went out to my car and did meditative breathing (meaning I became aware of my breathing – I aimed for breathing in deeply), while I sat and observed my body. And I saw that all of this excess energy my adrenal gland had shot through my body was sitting in my chest.
I laid back in my seat, and I observed this going on. This is where your real power comes in your life: when you become the watcher of your experience rather than being overtaken by your experience. When you can focus with laser precision without your mind wandering. I watched my chest and what was going on. This wasn’t easy, because there was such discomfort, the urge was to “look away” so to speak. But I kept at it. I didn’t wish it was gone, or say, “I’m tired of having these stupid panic attacks!” I watched it from a completely neutral, accepting place. And you know what happened? Within about two minutes, that ball of energy sitting there, causing me discomfort and chest pains, transformed into a ball of energy that felt like pure divine joy. You know when you see someone do something really nice for someone else, and your heart will kind of bubbles over with love and joy? It was like that, only on steroids. I had accessed the polar opposite of the energy’s potential.
Three other times, I used that same method to transform panic attacks into that feeling of euphoric love and joy. (Eventually, through daily meditation, living in the now, and recognizing I was stuck in a pattern with relationships, I virtually eliminated panic attacks from my life.)
I don’t know why or how it works, but all I can tell you is that YOU control how you feel and feeling good is available to you. You can use the observation method whenever you have persistent negative thoughts or persistent unwanted feelings. Of course, ultimately, you’ll want to discover what’s driving the pattern, right? But if you’re willing to stop and get really present, no matter how bad you may feel, you ultimately hold the power to feel good.
I hope it was helpful that I shared this with you. Feel free to leave a comment – I’d love to hear what you have to say. Also, if you think it would be helpful to others to hear about my experience, you can share this post by clicking on the Share/Save thingy below if you’d like, or the Tweet This button. Have a great day!
Elizabeth
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