I woke up early this morning with a burst of anxiety in my gut. It’s not the first time I’ve felt sudden unexplained bursts of panic. But thankfully, I’ve developed mindful awareness and rather than suppress or ignore it, I quieted my mind, turned to the anxiety and asked it what it was about.
Oh, right… I spent several hours the day before on a text thread with my family, discussing how to respond to the possible threat of coronavirus spread in the U.S.
Funny. I had also gone to bed feeling too edgy to get to sleep, without knowing why. Apparently, when I woke up my mind was still working on the problem.
Then, as I considered the problem, I felt completely overwhelmed, followed by an intense resistance to having to complete any of my tasks for the day. A sort of collapsing in on myself, feeling helpless in the face of even the daily challenges, let alone something really big.
So, why am I telling you personal details about my sleep habits?
Because there’s a pattern here and I want you to see it.
I knew when we were discussing the threat that I was feeling anxious about it. But by the time I had gone to bed, I had no conscious recall of why I felt alert and edgy.
This is not an uncommon response in people with a trauma history. We dissociate away from threatening feelings. Unfortunately, this cuts us off from knowing how to respond appropriately when we suddenly feel anxious.
As I lay there connecting with the source of my fears, I saw this pattern emerge:
First, I experienced what I perceived as a threat to my life and the lives of my important people, followed by fear, followed by feelings of helplessness, and finally – shutting down or collapsing in the face of the fear, because I believed that I couldn’t do anything about it.
Except none of that was entirely accurate. I am an adult now, with resources and problem solving skills. All of these feelings were in fact an old story from my past, that had been triggered by my present circumstances.
By becoming aware of this pattern, I could do something about it.
So, what did I do?
1) I started by breathing deeply through my nose a few times. Short, panting mouth breaths are panic breathing, but deep nose breathing will physically bring you back into your calm parasympathetic (rest and repair) nervous system.
2) I focused on the internal image I have developed of my “safe place.” This is a visual image you practice bringing up in your mind when you need to feel calm. It could be in the mountains, a beautiful lake, the beach at the ocean, or even a fanciful place like a fairy castle.
3) As I experienced the feelings of calm in my body that this image creates for me, I said to myself, “Peace is available to me. I choose peace. I am peace.” I basked in these peaceful, calm feelings for awhile. Tip – peaceful music with this practice is enormously helpful for creating the peaceful feelings you are looking for.
And finally, I stood back from the anxiety and it’s accompanying downward spiral into collapse, and saw it for exactly what it really was – a left over from my past.
Sometimes this is enough to break that connection and return you to the present moment. To help with that, you can say to yourself, “I am here. I am now. I am safe. All is well with me.”
Now, because I’ve brought myself back from the activation of the limbic survival brain and into the problem solving prefrontal cortex, I can recruit all of my adult resources and think through the problem and the solution rationally.
I’ve broken the threat, panic, helplessness, collapse cycle. Consequently, I don’t have to wade through days of anxiety and apathy, not knowing why I feel so awful.
This is the beauty of mindful awareness.
It puts the adult you back in the driver’s seat.
Until next time,
Anne
The Pool Meditation is a powerful tool for developing mindful awareness.
Learn it here: https://www.annemarck.com/
If you need a quick solution for creating feelings of safety and peace go here: https://www.annemarck.com/