Oliver Dodd talks about how meditation can help reduce the risk or onset of a panic or anxiety attack...

1. Meditation and Panic Attacks

2. The causes and origin are truly unknown; it is
twice as common in women as in men, but
panic attacks are the same for everyone.
Some of you might recognize it as those
chills and cold sweats that start to form
during those social situations
Others might associate it with an outright fear
of dying!

3. All-in-all people that suffer from panic attacks
all share the same inevitable feeling of
helplessness that is not only painful to
endure, but outright traumatizing.
Even the mere recollection of a previous
attack can trigger another panic attack.

4. There are many treatments available for the
treatment of panic attacks, but these usually
involve Selective Serotonin Reuptake
Inhibitors (SSRI’s), which is commonly used
in antidepressant medication;
These may include: Prozac, Zoloft, or Paxil,
just as an example.

5. But what about an effective, and non-
chemical alternative that wasn’t synthesized
in a glass tube?
How about cancelling out the mere thought of
an attack without a pill, but by putting your
mind and body at ease.
Meditation can be very beneficial to anyone
who is willing to dedicated their time and
mind to a structured meditation regiment.

6. Meditation doesn’t necessarily mean sitting
down on the floor, cross-legged, middle
finger to thumb, and humming some
mantras...
It is the challenge of achieving pure relaxation
and reaching a plateau in your mind where
nothing can change that relaxation of your
body and mind.

7. One can change a lot in their life by
dedicating a few hours of your day to simply
getting your body and mind in touch.
One must realize that meditation can bring
upon a plethora of positive influences in
their life. Aside from helping one reduce the
likeliness of panic attacks, basic meditation
can:

8. 
Reduce Stress

Benefit your Health

Help you Control your Thoughts

Detachment from the things that irritate
us

Increase Peace of Mind and Happiness

Increase Ones Concentration

Increase Creativity and Spontaneity

9. Studies have shown that meditation, when
done correctly, is a very successful method
to reduce stress. There is really nothing
mystical or illusive about it.
The most apparent cause of anxiety is an over
active and uncontained thought process.
While properly meditating one can slow
down their thought process and reduce
their anxiety.

10. Find a comfortable position, a lot people
choose to sit with good posture in an
upright position.
I would try warming up by first doing a few
minutes of diaphragmatic breathing and
muscle relaxation exercises to relax you
physically.

11. Then you want to close your eyes, which
studies have shown can reduce your brain
activity by up to seventy-five percent;
You want to try and become aware and
identify your own thoughts.

12. Recognize these thoughts and disassociate
yourself from them, the idea here is to have
as few thoughts as possible, but don’t
become anxious if you cannot eliminate
your thoughts altogether.
Let them go every time you find yourself
flowing into thought.

13. One of the things that help us to eliminate our
thought process is to concentrate upon or
repeat a mantra. A mantra is quite simply
just a word or a phrase or a number that you
try to visualize and repeat over and over
again.
The sole purpose in this is to eliminate any
thoughts that might want to creep into your
mind.

14. Many times I would meditate while doing my
breathing exercises. My mantra would be
the numbers that I was using for counting
my breaths.
I would close my eyes and while breathing in I
would visualize and focus upon the
numbers; one, two, three, four, five, six,
seven…

15. And then as I was breathing out I would again
focus upon and visualize the numbers: One,
two, three, four, five, six, seven…
I also will often us a Bible verse or simple the
name “Jesus” while visualizing each
letter’s, size, shape, dimension, colour or
texture.

16. You may have a favourite word or phrase that
you want to use for your mantra. Some
people simply repeat and focus upon the
name of a loved one or a favourite phrase. It
doesn’t matter.
The Idea is to have something to focus upon
to help you to stop thinking.

17. Try to meditate at least once every day for at
least twenty minutes or any time that you
feel stressed or anxious.
Meditating will leave you refreshed and help
to become aware of your thought process.

18. It will also help to bring you out of anxiety and
recondition you to react more calmly in
stressful situations.
Don’t worry if you become so relaxed that you
nod off and fall asleep.

19. If you want to find out an even easier way to
meditate (and this can even be done when
you are walking!), visit
www.yourspiritualsuccess.com/special.html