“I am not what happened to me. I am what I choose to become.” – Carl Jung
On this episode, I talk about the 4 big DONT’S when panic pops its ugly head. Know these to better understand whether or not you are adding fuel to your panic. I also go into the opposites of these points and why you need to practice them to eliminate panic attacks for good. Below are the key points discussed in this podcast episode.
- What is the amygdala? This part of the brain initiates our fight, flight, or freeze response. Its role is to attach emotional significance to situations and form emotional memories. The amygdala receives outside information before the cortex (our more critical and rational brain). Thats why it can seem confusing when your amygdala detects danger and you don’t even know why your feeling the way that you are
- Do NOT leave the environment you are in when feeling panic. When you do, the amygdala immediately makes associations between the environment and what should be avoided. The amygdala goes: “ohh, you are the pray and the situation you just ran from was predatory and should be avoided.” The things is, you will start to avoid any environment/situation that is similar to the one you just fled from
- Do NOT call family for support. If they lack knowledge of anxiety and what it is, they will only coddle you and keep you dependent. This will not make you braver in the face of your fears but dependent on their comfort words.
- Do NOT Google your symptoms. Google only opens up more ‘what ifs’ (possibility) and the anxiety sufferer does not need any more unknowns in their existence.
- Do NOT Use distracting agents like Netflix, food, weed, social media, and alcohol. Numbing or distracting the amygdala with these things is only a temporary fix. The fear will only linger and lurk around the corners until you actually confront it head on. During panic, you must be in the pain ride the wave of anxiety until it subsides. The amygdala will then make new associations like: “oh, this situation is not harmful. I see that you did not die here.” Also, if you are distracting yourself with these things, then you are not using rational self talk to calm down the amygdala. Yes, that rational dialogue such as: “if it kills me let it” or “so what” does reach the amygdala.