KNOW YOUR PHYSIOLOGY
Often people say everything happens for a reason, but those who are not willing to see the bright side, cannot really get it. We tend to misunderstand incidents that are happening to us, because we don’t see that are going to benefit us in the long-term. We must see beyond what pops up into our lives. In fact, all personal development comes through these moments.
As we are all human beings, all made by the same material, the below examples and information will make total sense and will help you look beyond the ‘’reality’’ you had so far. Everything will be linked and connected with stuff that before were driving you crazy… Just by understanding your mind and body!!!
Normal Panic Attack Vs Panic Attack
The result and symptoms of panicking?
Extremely high heart rate within seconds, sweat, breath speeds up, shaking, maybe you feel hopeless and in general the whole body is into a state of hyper alertness.
Why there is so much mess and confusion in our bodies in these occasions? Our wise, divine body is clearly trying to protect us from possible threats. When the sensory system detect stress your mind signals to throw ‘’tons’’ of buckets of adrenaline.
Let’s analyse this together.
Normal Panic Attack
Normal panic attack can happen to anyone, anytime even at the MOST peaceful time of your day. Here is an example.
Normal panic attack can happen let’s say, when you are in the high way, driving your TOYOTA Vitz like a boss, and you decide to change lane. Suddenly, a car races you out of nowhere, and they cut you off, forcing you to change again back to the lane you were at the first place.
This is called a nearly miss experience. It’s when you are being part of a dangerous event and your mind thinks you will die. As a result, the body starts releasing adrenaline which is responsible for all the symptoms mentioned above.
The body is officially in high tense, and now is mind’s turn to take action. The mind now is responsible to find the reason why the body is making such a mess.
Eventually the mind acknowledges the danger, were in this case is the car accident, and it labelled it as: THREAT-FREE… mission complete. When the mind is capable to detect the threat it won’t escalate the anxiety, and slowly-slowly the body will go back to normal.
Panic Attacks
Again, it’s possible to happen anytime, even at the most peaceful moment of the day. Here, a ‘’near miss experience’’ is not needed, and anxiety escalate really fast without any reasonable reason either. It can happen while you are listening to music, or while having your dinner, or coffee, etc.
Suddenly, a big wave of adrenaline starts running through the body and of course you get all the symptoms. Now as the process does not change, you understand is mind’s turn again to find the reason why the body is agitated. Obviously the mind cannot find a reasonable answer, and it thinks that you are in real danger.
The mind will start doing its job, as it tries to protect you, thus it will escalate the fear considering that danger will occur very soon. The heart starts to race, so the same does the mind in order to make sense of all the chaotic environment until it understands how to protect you.
The mind thinks:
Am I going to have a heart attack?
Am I going to die or am I on fire?
It goes on and on with tons of question marks.
If the mind can’t find an explanation…. Oooh boy, it can make anxiety really bad which will bring it to a level where you will want to physically run away.
Panic attack usually happens to those who suffer from chronic stress. As said before, if the mind can’t find a reason… it will start ‘’digging’’ for past experiences until it finds something to grab on. That’s why we often hear people say that panic attacks uncover fears or unsolved experiences that you didn’t let go and must be faced in order to get rid of panicking. Escaping from your fears it just serves you temporarily by exchanging it with the long-term relief.
I suffer from panic attacks, what can I do?
In 2017, I invested in buying a book called ‘’5 second rule’’ which includes all the above information. The writer is Mel Robbins, is an American on-air CNN commentator, television host, author, and motivational speaker. She is known worldwide, she talked in TED X with more than 15 million views on YouTube.
Do you want to hear the juiciest part?
She suffered many years from anxiety, by trying to cure it with medication until she learned about her physiology and transformed it into something beneficial.
For instance, in her book she confess that after 6-7 years of public speaking and she still gets the symptoms of near miss experience. But now she is a badass and she knows exactly how to treat it.
In the beginning she was labelling all these unpleasant emotions as nervousness, which was making the situation even worse. Afterwards she became wiser and she labelled the unpleasant feeling as ‘’ I’m excited’’. And her whole world changed.
Doesn’t make sense ahh???
I have some even more juicy info below soo, por favor proceed.
Excitement and Anxiety feel the same in your Body
That’s right fellas. Physiologically fear and excitement are the same thing. Because they are made by the same hormone, adrenaline, causing the same symptoms. Can you relate? The only difference between them is how your mind label it.
Using this reframing strategy and switching anxiety into excitement is a great alchemy. It’s equally important to point out that Harvard studies showed that is even more effective than trying to calm down. This because trying to calm down while having high heart rate is like saying STOP to a car with speed 140km.
Maybe that’s why Tony Robbins before getting on stage does several ritual moves that boost him energetically (that’s my assumption). To give the message to his brain that he is excited. And when he gets on stage, maan.. he nail it every single time. It’s anxiety turned into excitement. Obviously it does great things!!
Survival mechanism
Do you know why our body release adrenaline in order to protect us? It is a ‘’mechanism’’ we carry within us which keep us alive. It goes back in the years, were humanity lived in caves and jungles. People on daily basis had to deal with life or death occasions.
For instance, food and water supply, to keep themselves warm and safe from wildlife. People before didn’t know if there was a tiger or bear waiting for them while walking in the jungle. So, in these occasions there was always a dose of adrenaline in their blood to keep them alert. It’s survival mode mate.
Nowadays, because our basic needs for survival are easily covered (at least the vast majority) we don’t need to worry about them and unfortunately we tend to take them as granted even if they are not.
However, the survival mechanism still exists in us, and it works as perfect as it used to work before. So now in the new era we are living in, it comes up with worrying about the new car we are gonna buy, or new smartphone, what clothes are we gonna wear etc. With other words worry goes on less important things, such as social recognition, purchasing goods and many other.
Adrenaline or beneficial stress in this case I would say, does not only protect you from threats but also can affect positively your memory, learning and problem solving. If the stress is not released in big amounts, then the brain functions better when is stressed than when is not.
The reason is because we tend to remember way much easier what its life threatening.
On the other side of the coin though, when adrenaline runs in our body for more than few moments, then it becomes really harmful. It does not only harm your memory (we say I was stressed and I forgot everything) and consequently learning but also it can create many diseases in the short and long term. That’s one more proof that we are built for stress that last only few seconds or minutes.
Some symptoms of too much cortisol (second ”wave” after adrenaline when adrenaline it’s been active for too long) can include:
Muscle weakness.
Anxiety, fatigue, depression, and sleep disturbances.
In women, excess facial and body hair and/or irregular periods.
Acne
Weight loss or weight gain
Nonetheless, memory and learning are directly negatively affected when there is stress in the body for a long time. Stress hormone seem to have a particular preference for cells in the hippocampus (part of the brain responsible for long-term memory).
So let me put it in other words. Stress is being released from hippocampus… the place where all the memorizing and learning is happening. They cannot co-exist when stress conquer the whole place.
By understanding your body and it’s needs you gain perspective of a big aspect of your life. Your body is so wise, which provides you the gift of life every moment. It makes sure that all functionalities work smoothly from the simplest to the most complex. This body deserves maximum respect.
When you feel like having a normal panic attack or a panic attack, do you understand that all those unpleasant feelings have a higher purpose, willing to protect you? Or messaging you with something you need to change?
What is unpleasant doesn’t go under the umbrella of ‘’negative’’. Instead we must see beyond that.
Does this help you understand that when something not positive occurs in your life it will have a higher purpose to serve?
Does this give you more clarity in your life now?
If you were not stressed while reading this article, then your hippocampus has already managed to process these information and give them to you on the right time. 🙂
By finishing this article we both earned some self-discovery, self-improvement and awareness.
Thanks for reading it,
Michalis
Life Transitions Coach
CPC, ELI-MP, CTDS
inside out ©
Email: yourinsideoutcoach@gmail.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/inside.out_me/
References
- Robbins, M 2017, The 5 Second Rule: transform your life, work and confidence with everyday courage, United States of America.
- Medina, J 2014, Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School, United States of America.
- Peiffer, V 1991, Positive Thinking: Everything you have always known about positive thinking but were afraid to put into practise, United States of America.
Michalis Efstathiou
Core Energy Coach, Life Coach
Understand your Physiology and change your perception about life! hashtag#life hashtag#physiology hashtag#lifecoaching hashtag#perception hashtag#neurobiology
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