For me my recipe would be that you realise what you're doing. You're lying in bed trying to deduce if Joe from marketing found the way you said good night mildly insolent. You're lying in bed wondering if Mary the receptionist is talking to her friends about your second rate secret santa present, and ruining your career prospects.

Well. Here's the thing. Ask them.

What, don't want to? Would make you look ... how would it make you look? Pretty pathetic, right? Not brilliant. Not the kind of person you give a promotion or a pay rise to.

Dead right. So don't ask them.

but don't pretend you can lie in bed and work it out. You can't. You can obsess for a year and not come out with the answer. So obsessing is of no value to you. You are never going to know the answer, because you're not going to ask. And without psychic powers, there is no other way of finding it out.

FULLY understanding that it's of no value to you, won't get a result - not being sucked in in the moment to thinking you can come up with some kind of answer or conclusion, is how you stop it from occurring. Because when it even tries to get in you just smack it away and call it pointless and stupid. Smack it away. Bar the door. Be dogmatic, be aggressive, and be clear in your mind that it gets you nowhere. No. Just no. Nancy was right for once. Just say no.

We lie in bed awake because we want to come to a conclusino that will allow us to make a decision that will improve the situation we have just fouled up (we believe.) So our first question is, have we fouled it up at all?

Without the answer to that, anything else is academic.

So how do we get the answer to that?

We don't without showing our hand as weak, insecure, and cowardly.

Asking would make us look stupid. Instead of thinking we've been stupid, we'd be actually being stupid. Outrageously stupid.

Never do anything based on an anxiety attack. Don't feed the fire. Your life will get worse and worse. And as you learn to control it, you see the people around you at work and socially who do the most dreadful things but barrel on without batting an eyelid. Three days later who hates them? Nobody. Nobody remembers that long. So whatever thing you think you have done, outlast it for three days. If after three days when you've calmed down and you still feel, objectively, that your actions warranted an apology, go ahead and make one now. You'll be sane. you won't be grovelling. You'll maintain your self respect. But never do anything knee-jerk within that three days.

As the weeks, months and years go by, the events will lose their fear for you.

But do look around you. What stresses do you have in life? What screwy people with tantrums and bullshit? How are you managing them? Are they at arm's length or are they close in your life? Because anxiety won't die if its' being fed. So you have to look around for what is feeding it, and deal to that thing.

"...anxiety won't die if its' being fed." Y'know, that's exACT what I tend to forget when in the throes of it. And once I remember that *I* control it, I start (wait for it...) controlling it. Timely reminder, thanks.

Good responses to post. Reminds me of a story I heard about the paralyzed Christopher Reeves telling his wife he was to commit suicide. She responded "give it 6 months". Anxiety that is built up over time can be torn down.

Daymn...that's a haunting story. And liberating. Thanks!

That works. Putting a time on the thought, then put it in a box.

Exxxcellent

Honestly, I've never found a way to overcome feedback loops and obsessive thoughts. And believe me, I have experience the worst of them, more than most people could imagine. Now I find that its a pride thing with how I deal with them, which is strange because I don't believe in self pride (different story). I find that I can observe the situation just slightly from an objective point of view and just accept it as, "oh well, this again". And I feel kinda tough.. you know? And I just let it happen and the observation of all the different aspects of it, from the mental speed of thought like a panic, and they are always dark thoughts, to the physical restlessness and elevated heartrate, strained breathing, the shame sensations in you face and neck and shoulders, all of it. I just look at it happening to me and I feel like I've endured some shit and could endure more. Like... no one knows my threshold and what I've been through. And then after some time is slows down and eventually stops. But this came after a troubled year which I don't like to recall (its like a locked safe in my head) and it made my anxiety worse in some ways, but in this way it kinda made me more able to "take" it. Don't know if that makes sense.

For example before I would absolutely dread just going to a wedding let alone being the best man. And ofcourse even months after the event. Nowadays, I dread the day itself, sweat, bowls, the works, even more than before, but before and after it I'm like... pfff.... that aint nothing! lol.

Awesome. Great perspective, thanks. Yeah, it makes sense: I frequently remind myself that I'm Hardcore and have endured a lot of shit as well. Once I allow myself to remember this, I start to break out of the loop...