Recently I have been seeing more cases of panic disorder in my psychiatric practice. Panic attacks have been known to restrict or disrupt up to 2 million Americans each year. For the diagnosis of panic disorder, individuals have a frequency of attacks of once a week for 4 weeks or at least a month of persistent fear of another attack in between attacks. Within 10 minutes, individuals usually develop at least four of the following symptoms: shortness of breath, dizziness, palpitations, trembling, sweating, choking, nausea or abdominal distress, feeling of unreality or of not being themselves, numbness or tingling, flushes or chills, chest pain or discomfort, fear of dying, fear of going crazy or of doing something uncontrolled. Let’s see how panic disorder might help us apply natural principles in our lives.
Whenever anything dramatic happens in life, like a panic attack, something is out of balance. This is an example of the Natural Success principle of Balance. The dramatic episode, whether it results from a money crisis, a health crisis, or an interpersonal crisis, suggests a need for balance. The crisis is nature’s way of showing you that there is an imbalance. The imbalance leads to the crisis and the crisis urges you to resolve the imbalance. So when you have a panic attack, it can be interpreted as a good sign. It is a sign that somehow you are not prepared enough or balanced to avoid the final “trigger” that leads to the panic. If your panic or other crisis is chronic, you are still not addressing the area of your life that needs to be balanced.
How do you figure out what to balance? Well, when it comes to any health disorder, physical or psychological, I consider the source of difficulty as being both psychological and physical. This demonstrates the Natural Success principle of the Whole. The Whole, in this case, is assumed to be that individuals are made of mind and body; spirit is within both mind and body. Uncontrollable anxiety during panic suggests a physical cause. If it could be consciously turned off or dealt with psychologically, then it would appear to be more psychological. Treatment with anti-depressants, a physical intervention, is effective in 85 percent of cases; other medications increase that percentage. Nutrition and exercise are more natural physical alternatives. Studies show that panic victims have physiological measures that suggest a hyperventilation state. Individuals with excessive anxiety have shown poor exercise tolerance and unusually high post-exercise blood lactate levels as compared to normal individuals. Nevertheless, panic induced by infusions of sodium lactate, has been blocked using behavioral treatment without medication and this supports psychological factors to panic. I have seen a pattern in individuals with anxiety, of hiding something. What frightens them is that their secret might be known. It is easier to focus on the anxiety symptoms as a problem than it is to focus on the “real threat”. Totally facing ourselves thus brings psychological balance.
One technique I use with my clients is called “Sweet Three Feet”. When you are in a panic, remember to look three feet around you. If you do not see any grizzly bears or locomotives coming your way, then everything is okay. This is not too far from the popular Ram Dass phrase, “Be here now”. The present, which is naturally before us, is obviously simple, but we let our heads spin us around. This brings up the Natural Success principle of the Truth. People who panic are convinced, for example, that they are going to die. Despite the lack of concrete medical confirmation, they conclude they are destined for death. Proper testing would help allay these fears. Nevertheless, being anxious won’t stop you from dying if you were really headed that way. The Truth makes you feel more relaxed. If we humbled ourselves to the limits of our knowledge, perhaps we could be more at ease — than diseased