Panic Disorder 411
Self-Imposed Stress
Were You Late For Work Again?
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You know that you function best on eight hours of sleep, but
you rarely hit the hay at ten p.m. because there's always another
show to watch on television or another thought to post on social
media. When you finally drag yourself to bed at eleven-thirty,
you're counting sheep for a while trying to fall asleep.
The dreams you remember best are just before the alarm blares,
and you hit the snooze button to try to recapture the interrupted
dream. You doze off for a minute, then the alarm blasts
again.
It's six thirty-five. You spring out of bed. You have a half hour
to get ready for work and a forty-five minute drive. You may be
on time if you're not delayed by heavy traffic. You don't have
time to make coffee, so you swear that you'll buy a programmable
coffeemaker by week's end. You grab an energy drink and slurp it
as you run into the bathroom to get ready for work.
Finally you get in your car door, fasten your seat belt, and
speed out of the garage just clearing the rising garage door. You
make a mental note to find a faster motor for the door.
The freeway is jammed with traffic, which gives you time to think
of a new excuse for being late for work. You pull into the
parking lot at work. It's seven fifty-eight. Phew, you sigh as
you look into the rear- view mirror and brush your hair. You wait
for an elevator for what seems like an eternity and finally
arrive at your desk at three minutes past eight.
Oh no. The boss spotted me, you think, and breathe a sigh of
relief when you see him heading for the conference room instead
of your desk.
After you boot up your computer, the phone rings. You talk on the
phone and try to work on the computer at the same time. You don't
complete either task successfully and have to ask the caller to
repeat himself. You cannot give your full attention to the job at
hand by multitasking.
By ten o'clock, you're starting to fade, crashing from the energy
drink that promised you'd be alert all day long. So you take a
break, drink a cup of coffee and eat a couple donuts.
WHOA! I'm getting stressed out just writing about your morning.
Stress is a killer and the great thief of productivity. Stress is
largely self imposed by our habits and routines as well as our
reaction to it.
So let's start over and roll back the clock to last night. It
will take you some time to get used to a new routine, but this is
what it looks like.
You turn off the television set at 7:30 and listen to some
soothing music as you breathe deeply and rhythmically. You focus
on your breathing and feel relaxed. A warm bath will do wonders
to relax you an hour before bed. You read a chapter in a good
book. You do a gentle Yoga pose. This is your time to center on
your life giving force. The events occurring in the world will
wait until tomorrow.
You don't watch or listen to the news after five. The news is
fraught with anxiety producing events, most of it useless
information. Stay off social media, too. Once you start posting,
it's difficult to stop, like crack cocaine.
If you have children, they will have to be taught to adapt their
lives to your schedule, not the other way around. You set your
alarm to five- thirty and use the music mode for the alarm. You
will awaken more gently to music than the foghorn alarm.
You go to bed at 9:30. When soft music awakens you in the
morning, you lay in bed for a moment and stretch. You're amazed
at the creative thoughts that pass through your mind after a good
night's sleep.
You have a glass of juice, toast, and cereal, then you get ready
for work. You leave the house at six-forty-five, enter the garage
and wait for the garage door to finish its cycle. You drive
slowly down the driveway. Since you've allowed plenty of time to
get to work, you actually enjoy the drive, arriving at the office
at seven forty-five. You have fifteen minutes to prepare for your
day.
When the phone rings, you concentrate on the call. Multitasking
is inefficient, so you complete each task before starting the
next whenever possible. There will be interruptions, but you
don't let them sidetrack you. You've learned how to be flexible.
At breaktime, you drink a cup of tea or a glass of juice and eat
some fruit you brought from home. At the end of the day, you're
amazed by all you've accomplished in the course of the day.
We are, by and large, a stressed out country. Poor diet, lack of
exercise, inadequate sleep, and irregular routines deplete energy
and impair focus. If you don't keep a regular schedule, you wreak
havoc on your 24 hour, Circadian rhythm, the biological clock
that regulates your sleep/wake cycle and energy levels. Think
about how long it takes to adjust to the one hour time change
when we're forced to set our clocks ahead or behind in the spring
and the fall.
At the Winter Olympics in Sochi in 2014, athletes talked a lot
about the degree of their focus in their event. Every athlete has
prepared for years for the Olympics by following a strict routine
of exercise, practice and a balanced lifestyle. As challenging as
it is to discover how far they can push their bodies, it is
equally challenging to develop the kind of focus it takes to
succeed in extremely stressful situations.
Before they begin the event, you can see them breathing deeply,
stretching, preparing for the long course ahead. There is a
discernible difference between athletes who are completely
focused and those who have wavered in their mental preparation. A
skier becomes at one with the slope and his skis, and has reached
his or her goal before even leaving the starting gate. It's
similar to the way you become a part of your car when you're
driving, or a part of a boat when you're navigating through a
storm. The waves, wind, and boat are all a part of you as you
navigate to a safe harbor.
U.S. snowboarder Jamie Anderson is a creature of routine,
balance, and practice. She won the inaugural slopestyle event in
the Sochi Winter Olympics. She prepares for an event using
several techniques.
After her Slopestyle Gold Medal win, Anderson told reporters,
"Last night, I was so nervous, I couldn’t even eat. I was
trying to calm down, put on some meditation music, burned some
sage, and got the candles going. I was trying to do a little bit
of yoga. I was processing so much, I just had to write. I write a
lot. I was writing in my journal, and listening to calm music. It
was all about good vibration. Thankfully I slept really good. I
did some mantras. It worked out for me."
Another tool to use to keep your life in balance is writing,
commonly known as journaling. It helps you to process those
things that are disturbing you and causing stress. It has been
proven that test scores are higher for those individuals who
journal before examinations.
Stress can be a good thing when we channel it toward a goal.
Beneficial stress is called eustress as opposed to distress. It
can provide us with the energy we need to proceed forward. The
secret to success in any endeavor is persistence, practice, and
focus in the light of a sensible routine.
Story by Michael Jackson Smith - 2014
THE ROAD TO FORT WORTH by Michael Jackson Smith: Very little was known about panic disorder when I had my first panic attack. There was no help available to teach me how to assuage the attacks, but I discovered that alcohol would dissolve my fear instantly. My website contains the kind of information that would have been a tremendous help to me in the early days of my illness as I searched for solutions for the panic disorder, agoraphobia, and alcoholism that incapacitated me. My book is the story of my journey into recovery. Read Chapter 8 | Top of Page↑
