How to Stop Panic Attacks — Step-by-Step Guide & Transcript

[00:00] you're going to want to hear about the  story sent in from one of my viewers.   So we're going to go through his story step  by step, and I'm going to show you exactly   what he did to end his panic attacks after  30 years of panic disorder. And by the end  

[00:17] attacks. So here's the problem: most of the advice  you've been given about panic attacks backfires.  

[00:34] So think about it. You're in this intense, panicky  state, and everyone tells you that you just need   to take slow breaths to calm yourself down. Who's  ever teaching people that they should just focus  

[00:46] on their breathing while they're having a panic  attack, I'm pretty sure you've never had a panic   attack in your entire life. And if that actually  worked you wouldn't be here watching this video.   The sneaky thing about panic attacks is that  the more you try to to control your symptoms,  

[01:01] the more you accidentally tell your brain that  those symptoms are dangerous. And it makes your   heartbeat faster and your breathing speed up  and you start to feel dizzier and more panicky.   But this guy figured it out. And I love how he  explains it. So here's what Jon wrote me. He said,  

[01:18] "I have suffered with panic disorder for 30 years,  usually triggered by travel. And I've been told   over and over again that I needed to learn how  to calm myself down. So I learned to meditate,   to use breathing techniques. I spent countless  hours in therapy. I tried hypnotherapy, EMDR, EFT,  

[01:35] etc., but nothing worked completely. I certainly  became a more chilled and mindful person,   and I got better at managing the symptoms.  But I still lived in the fear of the what-ifs,   the super panic attack that my skills couldn't  control." So Jon got all the common advice you'd  

[01:53] expect about stopping a panic attack, which  basically consists of, "Geez, just calm down,   bro. Take a deep breath." And this is like  surprisingly common advice which those of you  

[02:05] watching this video already know is unsurprisingly  unhelpful with panic disorder. But then Jon had   this realization. So he said, "I had read the  advice of running toward and embracing anxiety  

[02:18] in the book Dare by Barry McDonagh, but now I  realize I didn't get it at all. I was trying to   embrace it by being zen-like, by observing  and letting the feelings move through me,   but I was still giving the feelings ultimate  control and treating them as something to  

[02:34] endure. So 2 weeks ago I was due to fly on  a family holiday from the UK to Austria,   and I was beside myself with anxiety. A fellow  panic disorder sufferer even gave me some Valium,  

[02:46] which I was planning to take as a last resort.  But the day before we left I stumbled across   your video, and it finally clicked. Stop trying to  calm yourself. Stop trying to distract yourself.  

[02:58] So I wrote down my panic stories and I gave them  numbers." Okay. So let me explain what Jon is   talking about by first by explaining what panic  stories are. So panic stories are the stories,  

[03:10] the lies that your brain starts telling you when  you start to experience the physical symptoms of   panic. So here's some examples. Um let's say  you're stressing over a deadline at work and   you start to feel nervous in your body. And your  panic story may sound like, "Oh, it would be awful  

[03:26] if my anxiety took over right now." Or if you have  a fear of spiders and you're staring at one right   now and you notice your breathing is becoming  quicker and more shallow. So your story might be,   "What if I pass out?" Maybe you're trying to  get healthy by starting to work out again,  

[03:41] and you notice that your heart is pounding. So  your panic story might be, "I'm having a heart   attack. What if this is a heart attack? What if  I die?" Right? and then another panic story is,   "Oh, I have to make these feelings go away. I  have to force myself to calm down." So these  

[03:56] panic stories typically follow a pattern. There's  there's the trigger - like from these examples,   the work deadline or the spider or the workout  - and then there's the physical symptoms - so   the nervousness, the shallow breathing, the heart  pounding - and then there are the panic stories,  

[04:12] which are your brain trying to convince you that  those sensations, those feelings in your body are   dangerous and that you have to control your  physical response. But trying to control your   panic just makes your brain feel like you're  in more danger, so it increases your anxiety,  

[04:27] and that spiral fuels panic attacks. So the  first skill is learning to recognize these   thoughts as being stories and that they're not  necessarily true. So going back to Jon's story,  

[04:41] we know he gets triggered when he flies on  a plane. When he's on the plane he starts to   experience physical symptoms of anxiety. And in  the past he's tried all kinds of strategies to   calm down, but that fueled the panic attacks. So  this time he tried something different. He said,  

[04:56] "I got on the plane, and as the door closed the  anxiety began to rise." He started thinking,   "Uh-oh, I'm feeling my heart pound. What if I  have a panic attack? That would be catastrophic.   I have to make myself calm down." But instead  of believing that he just labeled it. He said,  

[05:12] "'Ah, this is panic story number two.' And I  looked up. I turned off my headphones. And I   started pumping my legs and tapping my knees,  trying to get myself agitated so that I could  

[05:25] create this fabled super panic attack." But the  more before he tried to feel that panic attack,   it never came. "The anxiety slowly drifted away,  and I went back to watching Netflix." So that's  

[05:37] the second essential skill. Instead of engaging  in a massive struggle with your sensations,   trying to force them to go away, you show your  brain that you're actually safe by just saying,   "This is a curious sensation. I can handle feeling  my heart pound. I can handle feeling dizzy. Bring  

[05:53] it on. Let's see if I can make it more intense.  Let's see if I can make my heart pound harder.   Let's see if I can make myself dizzier." So if  you want to stop panic, you have to be willing   to have it. So you can break the cycle of anxiety  and panic by just trying to make yourself feel  

[06:08] panicky. What you're actually doing is quenching  the cycle of accidentally telling your brain that   those sensations are dangerous. So that's how  Jon did it. He said, "I repeated this exercise  

[06:20] every time I felt my panic rising, and when the  plane landed, my mind was blown. I had just flown   without having a panic attack. how is this even  possible? There were more occasions during the  

[06:32] holiday when anxiety threatened me with a panic  attack, but I dealt with it in the same way." The   more I willed it to happen, the more I tried  to create it, to grasp that panic attack, the   further away it felt. I almost cannot believe it  was so simple to confront. All along it was just a  

[06:51] paper tiger. So thank you so much for this video.  It sounds trite to say it has changed my life,   but it really has. I grieve for the experiences  I have missed and the time I have lost to panic   disorder, but I can now look to the future with  hope. Jon." So just to summarize, here's what Jon  

[07:09] did: one, he learned to question his stories about  panic, that the physical sensations are dangerous   or that feeling panicky is catastrophic. And  then number two, he dropped the struggle to  

[07:22] force himself to calm down, and instead - number  three - he said, "Bring it on" by willing himself to   have panic symptoms. And by doing that he showed  his brain that these symptoms are actually safe.  

[07:34] And doing that stopped the panic attack cycle. This  is so cool, Jon. So thank you so much for sharing   your example. Um if you want to watch the whole  series that Jon was referring to you can just   Google "therapy in a nutshell panic attack playlist,"  or you can click the link in the description. And  

[07:49] that's where I teach the difference between an  anxiety attack and a panic attack, um how to make   space for your sensations, and how to break the  cycle of anxiety and panic. And then I've also   got two extra videos. They're walkthroughs um so that  you can practice the two different approaches to  

[08:03] managing panic attacks. And um if you found this  video helpful and you want to learn more about   how your emotions work or how to deal with your  own anxiety or depression, be sure to check out   my courses How to Process Emotions or Breaking  the Anxiety Cycle. Okay. Hope that's helpful. Take

[08:21] care. [Music]