Anxiety Support Group
Anxiety is a physical condition marked by intense and persistent feelings of distress, fear, angst or dread. General anxiety caused by routine day-to-day stresses usually passes quickly and is experienced by almost everyone at one time or another. However, such feelings that linger over time and are very difficult to cope with, and which lack a clear cause, may indicate...
This is an anecdotal description of using the acceptance and paradoxical intention approach to panic.
I hope it may come in useful to you:
A panic attack is fear of completely safe, completely healthy, completely normal sensations of the body. Good advice tells us to that if we did not fear the arrival of the next panic, we would not panic (this is utterly true). In fact this is perfect advice. Additional, if we did not fear a panic attack when we are actually experiencing one, we would not panic about the current status of the body, which even during the most intense, the most strong and the most long lived panic episode, is completely safe, profoundly safe, utterly safe, 100% safe, every single aspect of panic is safe, EVERY SINGLE ASPECT is safe. Every sensation is safe, every thought is safe, every feeling is safe, every nuance is safe.
What do I mean when I say if we did not fear panic we would not panic? Would the body suddenly return to an utterly calm state? Of course not, not immediately, there is still safe adrenaline working its safe chain reaction around the body, and your body will still produce some (in lesser and lesser amounts for the next few hours). You can still feel hot, giddy, wobbly, your muscle can tense and shake, your skin can numb, tingle or feel like it's burning, or get pins and needles or electrical feelings, you may get sensations of flashes of energy peaks, and you can get some blurred bright vision and things may even start to look a bit like a cartoon, but that's ok, these are all completely ok, the body is doing everything right, there are no defects at all,
This scenario of heightened energy and keen senses doesn't have to stop you doing anything at all. Accepting the peak of panic with your eyes and heart and mind open will show you that there is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO FEAR. Not fearing panic is the attitude of "I could not give a hoot if my body does its adrenaline surge ten times today". This is not an easy attitude to adopt if you are currently behaving in a manner where you actively try to avoid adrenaline provoking scenarios.
A viewpoint is this, it's just body turbulence.
Have you ever been on an aeroplane, of even watched films of people on aeroplanes when the ride gets bumpy?
There are 200 people on this flight, the turbulence is identical for everyone, some are eating and drinking, some are chatting and laughing, some are watching movies, and about ten percent are clinging tightly onto the arm-rests under the strange misconception that griping on tightly somehow will make the aeroplane fly more smoothly.
Is the turbulence causing their discomfort or is it their attitude to the turbulence that causes their discomfort?
The existence of the other happy passengers proves that fear of these sensations is an attitude.
Your body is this aeroplane, a perfect aeroplane, an aeroplane that is un-crashable, an aeroplane with no defects, with the best pilots on earth. The aeroplane is not bothered by the turbulence, the pilots are not bothered by the turbulence, only you, and a few others on the same flight have the attitude that something is wrong.
Now to become one of the people who doesn't grip onto the arm-rests an attitude change is required an attitude of "I don't care what my body does, it's all safe", simply saying this is not enough, you have to believe it. How do you change a belief? By seeing new evidence, how do we see new evidence? By observing a demonstration and staying with that demonstration until your fear leaves before you do (notice I didnt say your sensations leave, no I said your fear leaves, and by that I mean your fear is resolved), by observing an adrenaline surge without us recoiling. By just letting it happen, letting it all happen for as long as it takes us to realise we don't have to be scared in any way, 100% acceptance, the answer to not fearing panic only lies in the middle of panic, at the peak of panic, to genuinely be experiencing this adrenaline surge at the very top and to say with all our heart and mind ... "wow!!!! it's utterly and completely safe, it cant touch me, it cant hurt me, it cant do anything to me, it was ME all along 100% me being scared of adrenaline release!!!! WHAT THE HELL WAS I EVER WORRIED ABOUT???!!!!!!!!".
With this, another further realisation, "I CAN DO THIS ANYWHERE!!!! I can have this attitude anywhere, at any time, in any place or time or situation that ever bothered me before"
You will KNOW when you have adopted this attitude because you will GENUINELY want to have another adrenaline release to practice your new skill. You are at the top of the mountain, the top of the world, you are looking around and KNOWING "Wow, I'm ACTUALLY NOT SCARED ANYMORE"
Without you being scared, you will not release adrenaline and your body will slowly calm down. But without fear, you will not be bothered by it at all. This attitude shift can take place quickly or it can take practice, why does it take practice for some and not for others? There is no defect in the person who requires practice; there is just a lack of trust to follow the fear to the end.
To stop being afraid of something takes the following:
Trust: Trust that the protocol you are being given is correct (protocol = advice)
Staying in a situation that you fear until your fear leaves before you do.
I remember reading somewhere that the amygdale in the brain takes as little as a few seconds to 90 minutes to re-adjust its calculations as to whether something is threatening. In this case the calculated threat is currently the badly termed "Panic Attack".
Why has it calculated that it's a threat? Because we have taught it that this is the case, by running away, escaping etc.
Now most people will not stay with what they fear for more than a few seconds, it takes a very-very brave person to say, "I've had enough of all this running, I'm going to accept that my body will do all this stuff, and I'm not going to leave, GODDAMMIT I'M STAYING, NOT ONLY AM I STAYING, I WANT TO EXPERIENCE IT ALL, I WANT IT TO INCREASE, I WANT TO SEE WHAT I'M AFRAID OF, WHAT'S THIS SENSATION? CAN IT GET STRONGER, I WANT TO FEEL WHAT IT'S LIKE IF IT GETS STRONGER". But the good news is that you are already brave, completely brave, you have experienced many panic attacks, how brave is that!!!!!
Regarding asking for more sensations, I was not making a false request I was not sheepishly saying "let this get stronger, because I want it to turn off and I'm aware that this paradox technique can switch off fear"
This can take practice to stop this false requesting.
It takes practice, because we say to ourselves, "I'll just do five minutes". The next day we might do ten minutes, the following day we might only do a few seconds. Practice means that we are dipping our toe in the river to do little tests as to whether it's safe.
My attitude was "I've had enough, I don't care if my body does this high panic for three solid days" ... ok I said that, I really did care a lot, and I still did my running away after 35 minutes (goodness, I was brave ... 35 minutes!). But I then decided to stay with the panic, for as long as it took. I'm jumping in the river and floating along to WHEREVER it takes me.
Where did it take me? A sunny river bank, on a sunny day, with a smile on my face, yes my body was still buzzing and my head still spinning, and my vision all bright, but no fear.
Why did it take me there? because I let the sensations stay, I let them run their course to completion, not when I decided they had completed, when my body decided that they were complete, I didn't react or run away, I stayed until the fear was processed by the amygdale and the sensations were calculated to be "of no threat or consequence". How long did this take with utter acceptance? as long as I was consciously scared.
Being in a high anxiety state for years (was me constantly recoiling from the sensations ... me behaving like adrenaline was dangerous ... that's why its called a behavioural condition, because we have a belief and we behave in accordance with that belief) and knowing that at any time I was a few hours from not being scared anymore, was a bit of a light bulb moment. Did this light bulb moment mean that my body didn't do its thing from time to time? No, of course it did, because I pushed myself further to do things that used to scare me, and these things caused me to remember times in the past when I used to be scared. So my body would do its thing and I would let it all happen. Because what was really going to happen? the emergence of exactly the same physiological sensations that I was no longer fearful of. I knew I could stay with it, stay in the situation, stay with the conversation, stay in bed, stay in work, stay in my chair, stay on the bus, stay in the fast lane of the motorway, stay in the restaurant etc.
Whatever the thought, whatever the situation, whatever the time, whatever the location, whatever the company, whatever the activity, the sensations of adrenaline are the same, effecting the body with the same changes, in the same order adrenaline is limited in strength. You are not.
Was I scared anymore? No.
Now the hardest part of this kind of paradoxical approach is not the approach itself, it takes just a tiny leap of complete faith for it to start working, The hard part is trusting the protocol (trusting that the advice is safe and trusting that in time it will work) In other words if we believe that the technique is not proven or has some unseen risks then this can add to the fear of the condition, thus we add a fear of the technique to the fear of the sensations themselves.
In order to remove the fear of the advice being given it always wise to know that this technique is endorsed by the professionals who really understand panic, by professionals I mean those who are either accredited and/or those who have experienced recovery by these methods and teach others how to do the same:
The technique of paradoxical intention was has been successfully used-by/taught-by:
Dr Viktor Frankl (The originator of Logotherapy)
Dr Hazel Claire Weekes (The Late Great Claire Weekes)
Dr David Burns (The father of Modern CBT and Author of When Panic Attacks)
Dr Harry Barry (Author and General Practitioner)
Dr David Carbonell (Author of the Panic Attacks Workbook)
Jeffrey Hammes (Author of the Panic Switch)
Charles Linden (Creator of the Linden Method)
Joe Barry Mcdonagh (Creator of the Panic Away program)
... and probably a hundred other authors/practitioners who specialise in the safe emotion of anxiety/panic
Hopefully I have spelt the names correctly...
Now each of these people also include a whole myriad of other information and notions to help you understand the safe emotion you are experiencing.
What is important is that these people understand that panic is caused by fear of fear, or more accurately, fear of the sensations in the body when adrenaline is released (thats all fear really is .. a recoil from these sensations).
The advice given by these people is correct and can be summarized by the following statements.
The answer to panic lies at the end of other end panic, it lies not in trying to switch it off of tranquilise it away.
Demand More
Make it worse
Let the sensations engulf you
Its all bullshit
Utter acceptance
Face, Accept, Float, Let Time Pass
Quite frankly how can you ever teach your amygdala that panic is not dangerous if you keep running away and interrupting the process before it's completed?
I hope this has helped anyone who has confusion about the paradoxical approach to panic.
I hope that if you do decide to try it, you have some knowledge and information about where you can get genuinely good advice, some good sources of information and some background into the history of the approach.
Kind regards.
I hope it may come in useful to you:
A panic attack is fear of completely safe, completely healthy, completely normal sensations of the body. Good advice tells us to that if we did not fear the arrival of the next panic, we would not panic (this is utterly true). In fact this is perfect advice. Additional, if we did not fear a panic attack when we are actually experiencing one, we would not panic about the current status of the body, which even during the most intense, the most strong and the most long lived panic episode, is completely safe, profoundly safe, utterly safe, 100% safe, every single aspect of panic is safe, EVERY SINGLE ASPECT is safe. Every sensation is safe, every thought is safe, every feeling is safe, every nuance is safe.
What do I mean when I say if we did not fear panic we would not panic? Would the body suddenly return to an utterly calm state? Of course not, not immediately, there is still safe adrenaline working its safe chain reaction around the body, and your body will still produce some (in lesser and lesser amounts for the next few hours). You can still feel hot, giddy, wobbly, your muscle can tense and shake, your skin can numb, tingle or feel like it's burning, or get pins and needles or electrical feelings, you may get sensations of flashes of energy peaks, and you can get some blurred bright vision and things may even start to look a bit like a cartoon, but that's ok, these are all completely ok, the body is doing everything right, there are no defects at all,
This scenario of heightened energy and keen senses doesn't have to stop you doing anything at all. Accepting the peak of panic with your eyes and heart and mind open will show you that there is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO FEAR. Not fearing panic is the attitude of "I could not give a hoot if my body does its adrenaline surge ten times today". This is not an easy attitude to adopt if you are currently behaving in a manner where you actively try to avoid adrenaline provoking scenarios.
A viewpoint is this, it's just body turbulence.
Have you ever been on an aeroplane, of even watched films of people on aeroplanes when the ride gets bumpy?
There are 200 people on this flight, the turbulence is identical for everyone, some are eating and drinking, some are chatting and laughing, some are watching movies, and about ten percent are clinging tightly onto the arm-rests under the strange misconception that griping on tightly somehow will make the aeroplane fly more smoothly.
Is the turbulence causing their discomfort or is it their attitude to the turbulence that causes their discomfort?
The existence of the other happy passengers proves that fear of these sensations is an attitude.
Your body is this aeroplane, a perfect aeroplane, an aeroplane that is un-crashable, an aeroplane with no defects, with the best pilots on earth. The aeroplane is not bothered by the turbulence, the pilots are not bothered by the turbulence, only you, and a few others on the same flight have the attitude that something is wrong.
Now to become one of the people who doesn't grip onto the arm-rests an attitude change is required an attitude of "I don't care what my body does, it's all safe", simply saying this is not enough, you have to believe it. How do you change a belief? By seeing new evidence, how do we see new evidence? By observing a demonstration and staying with that demonstration until your fear leaves before you do (notice I didnt say your sensations leave, no I said your fear leaves, and by that I mean your fear is resolved), by observing an adrenaline surge without us recoiling. By just letting it happen, letting it all happen for as long as it takes us to realise we don't have to be scared in any way, 100% acceptance, the answer to not fearing panic only lies in the middle of panic, at the peak of panic, to genuinely be experiencing this adrenaline surge at the very top and to say with all our heart and mind ... "wow!!!! it's utterly and completely safe, it cant touch me, it cant hurt me, it cant do anything to me, it was ME all along 100% me being scared of adrenaline release!!!! WHAT THE HELL WAS I EVER WORRIED ABOUT???!!!!!!!!".
With this, another further realisation, "I CAN DO THIS ANYWHERE!!!! I can have this attitude anywhere, at any time, in any place or time or situation that ever bothered me before"
You will KNOW when you have adopted this attitude because you will GENUINELY want to have another adrenaline release to practice your new skill. You are at the top of the mountain, the top of the world, you are looking around and KNOWING "Wow, I'm ACTUALLY NOT SCARED ANYMORE"
Without you being scared, you will not release adrenaline and your body will slowly calm down. But without fear, you will not be bothered by it at all. This attitude shift can take place quickly or it can take practice, why does it take practice for some and not for others? There is no defect in the person who requires practice; there is just a lack of trust to follow the fear to the end.
To stop being afraid of something takes the following:
Trust: Trust that the protocol you are being given is correct (protocol = advice)
Staying in a situation that you fear until your fear leaves before you do.
I remember reading somewhere that the amygdale in the brain takes as little as a few seconds to 90 minutes to re-adjust its calculations as to whether something is threatening. In this case the calculated threat is currently the badly termed "Panic Attack".
Why has it calculated that it's a threat? Because we have taught it that this is the case, by running away, escaping etc.
Now most people will not stay with what they fear for more than a few seconds, it takes a very-very brave person to say, "I've had enough of all this running, I'm going to accept that my body will do all this stuff, and I'm not going to leave, GODDAMMIT I'M STAYING, NOT ONLY AM I STAYING, I WANT TO EXPERIENCE IT ALL, I WANT IT TO INCREASE, I WANT TO SEE WHAT I'M AFRAID OF, WHAT'S THIS SENSATION? CAN IT GET STRONGER, I WANT TO FEEL WHAT IT'S LIKE IF IT GETS STRONGER". But the good news is that you are already brave, completely brave, you have experienced many panic attacks, how brave is that!!!!!
Regarding asking for more sensations, I was not making a false request I was not sheepishly saying "let this get stronger, because I want it to turn off and I'm aware that this paradox technique can switch off fear"
This can take practice to stop this false requesting.
It takes practice, because we say to ourselves, "I'll just do five minutes". The next day we might do ten minutes, the following day we might only do a few seconds. Practice means that we are dipping our toe in the river to do little tests as to whether it's safe.
My attitude was "I've had enough, I don't care if my body does this high panic for three solid days" ... ok I said that, I really did care a lot, and I still did my running away after 35 minutes (goodness, I was brave ... 35 minutes!). But I then decided to stay with the panic, for as long as it took. I'm jumping in the river and floating along to WHEREVER it takes me.
Where did it take me? A sunny river bank, on a sunny day, with a smile on my face, yes my body was still buzzing and my head still spinning, and my vision all bright, but no fear.
Why did it take me there? because I let the sensations stay, I let them run their course to completion, not when I decided they had completed, when my body decided that they were complete, I didn't react or run away, I stayed until the fear was processed by the amygdale and the sensations were calculated to be "of no threat or consequence". How long did this take with utter acceptance? as long as I was consciously scared.
Being in a high anxiety state for years (was me constantly recoiling from the sensations ... me behaving like adrenaline was dangerous ... that's why its called a behavioural condition, because we have a belief and we behave in accordance with that belief) and knowing that at any time I was a few hours from not being scared anymore, was a bit of a light bulb moment. Did this light bulb moment mean that my body didn't do its thing from time to time? No, of course it did, because I pushed myself further to do things that used to scare me, and these things caused me to remember times in the past when I used to be scared. So my body would do its thing and I would let it all happen. Because what was really going to happen? the emergence of exactly the same physiological sensations that I was no longer fearful of. I knew I could stay with it, stay in the situation, stay with the conversation, stay in bed, stay in work, stay in my chair, stay on the bus, stay in the fast lane of the motorway, stay in the restaurant etc.
Whatever the thought, whatever the situation, whatever the time, whatever the location, whatever the company, whatever the activity, the sensations of adrenaline are the same, effecting the body with the same changes, in the same order adrenaline is limited in strength. You are not.
Was I scared anymore? No.
Now the hardest part of this kind of paradoxical approach is not the approach itself, it takes just a tiny leap of complete faith for it to start working, The hard part is trusting the protocol (trusting that the advice is safe and trusting that in time it will work) In other words if we believe that the technique is not proven or has some unseen risks then this can add to the fear of the condition, thus we add a fear of the technique to the fear of the sensations themselves.
In order to remove the fear of the advice being given it always wise to know that this technique is endorsed by the professionals who really understand panic, by professionals I mean those who are either accredited and/or those who have experienced recovery by these methods and teach others how to do the same:
The technique of paradoxical intention was has been successfully used-by/taught-by:
Dr Viktor Frankl (The originator of Logotherapy)
Dr Hazel Claire Weekes (The Late Great Claire Weekes)
Dr David Burns (The father of Modern CBT and Author of When Panic Attacks)
Dr Harry Barry (Author and General Practitioner)
Dr David Carbonell (Author of the Panic Attacks Workbook)
Jeffrey Hammes (Author of the Panic Switch)
Charles Linden (Creator of the Linden Method)
Joe Barry Mcdonagh (Creator of the Panic Away program)
... and probably a hundred other authors/practitioners who specialise in the safe emotion of anxiety/panic
Hopefully I have spelt the names correctly...
Now each of these people also include a whole myriad of other information and notions to help you understand the safe emotion you are experiencing.
What is important is that these people understand that panic is caused by fear of fear, or more accurately, fear of the sensations in the body when adrenaline is released (thats all fear really is .. a recoil from these sensations).
The advice given by these people is correct and can be summarized by the following statements.
The answer to panic lies at the end of other end panic, it lies not in trying to switch it off of tranquilise it away.
Demand More
Make it worse
Let the sensations engulf you
Its all bullshit
Utter acceptance
Face, Accept, Float, Let Time Pass
Quite frankly how can you ever teach your amygdala that panic is not dangerous if you keep running away and interrupting the process before it's completed?
I hope this has helped anyone who has confusion about the paradoxical approach to panic.
I hope that if you do decide to try it, you have some knowledge and information about where you can get genuinely good advice, some good sources of information and some background into the history of the approach.
Kind regards.
I give complete testimony that what you write is truth and will absolutely work for everyone....equal opportunity for everyone that takes a minute...steps back and makes the connection that anxiety will not hurt you.
Let go of the fear of the sensations and just let them happen....ignore them and work off the adrenaline coursing through your veins.
If your mind creates the sensations, your mind has the power to stop them too!
Remember this.....
"If you are depressed....you are living in the past. If you are anxious.....you are living in the future. If you are calm.....you are living in the present!" ~ author unknown to me
Stop predicting the future if you are anxious. Most of what you fear and let snowball out of control will NEVER happen.
Let go of your past if you are depressed....learn from it, but leave it behind you becuz it can't be changed.
Get busy making good memories right here....right now! Take up a hobby......go to the library and read about something new. Do anything that keeps you in the here and now. Let tomorrow take care of itself until you get there!
We are all trying to help you by giving you the tools needed to rid yourself of panic and anxiety. However.....you have to do the work.
This is not an overnight cure....it takes time and practice.
Put as much energy into doing the work to rid yourself of the anxiety as you do in feeding the monster....OK?
Thnx cjdb for your great insight and words of wisdom.
I love how you cover some the aspects of sustained panic, which many of us deal with. Along with the real mental push/pull that comes along with this approach. Many people talk about acceptance... but few really go into what it LOOKS like to do so, like you did here. I love the detail you give.
Thanks again for this.
You said...
"How long did this take? As long as I was consciously scared."
Can you explain that one a bit more? What about those of us whose anxiety's main effect seems to be to take away that part of the brain that can accept and float. Does that make sense? I call it being "underwater." It's like I can't access the acceptance part of the brain when I hit those peak 9-10 out of 10 panic days. How did you handle that. Or did you have to?