Hello All,
I'd like to talk a little bit about what is happening in your brain when
you feel anxious. If you can understand what is happening at a 'cerebral'
level, then you might benefit from the relaxation techniques I will cover in
later posts.
The term 'amygdala hijack' was coined by Daniel Coleman in 1996 to
describe what is happening to someone in the midst of an anxiety attack.
Basically, the amygdala is a part of the brain that is tasked to activate our
emotions. It responds to external stimuli and then activates what is called the
'HPA axis' which is expanded to 'hypothalmus-pituitary-adrenal'. I won't go
into depth about the HPA axis, but it is the body’s system designed to get us
'jazzed-up' in case we have to fight or flee from a perceived danger. The
problem with the amygdala is that it gets turned on a split second before our
frontal cortex, which is the part of our brain that is associated with reason and
critical thinking. It is because of this that we get hijacked and stuck
ruminating on the same thing over and over, sometimes feeling that it is
hopeless to try and overcome it. (Obviously, this is a simplification of
the neurological functioning associated with anxiety, but it will suffice for
my purposes in this article.)
The Hijack
Ever notice that sometimes you know that what you're scared of is silly
but you can't seem to will away the feeling that it isn't? Well this is likely
due to the amygdala being activated before the frontal cortex and thus
'hijacking' our rationale and ability to reason out of situationally
inappropriate anxiety. When it is activated, it seems as though nothing can
talk a person out of the emotion they are experiencing. This is why we must
learn to re-train the brain to react less acutely to external stimuli and to
lessen the severity of the anxiety hijack. The brain wants to protect you, and
this is a good thing, but out of place and in high severity it becomes a
problem. So what can you do?
Going Against the Grain
It seems as though doing anything when the amygdala is activated is
impossible. Focus on the word 'seems'. This is because this is untrue. You can
do everything you could without the panic button pushed; it’s just that your
perception is a tad off. So what can you do to turn it off and allow your
rational brain to take over? Well, what you must understand is that the
amygdala responds to stress. If it perceives stress, it activates. The more
stress, the more it activates. While this happens, the frontal cortex is
overridden and you get 'hijacked' and stuck, living in your emotions and
ruminating on the same scary thoughts without ability to reason out of
it. So this is where you go against the grain. The anxious
person often scours the internet to validate their anxiety or tries to find
some way to 'prove' that their fear is untrue or to buy some relief from the
anxiety. By doing this, the person actually perpetuates the pattern and
continues to activate the amygdala and falls further into the trap. Instead of
focusing on the anxiety and being afraid of more anxiety, you have to accept it
and allow it to run its course without tightening the noose. This is one of the
most difficult things for an anxious mind to do because anxiety is such a
strong and painful emotion that the person experiencing it wants to figure out
a way to make it go away. But it is precisely this impulse to 'make it go
away' that actually perpetuates the cycle. You must learn to let go.
The Buddhist Ideal
Going against the grain means to then accept your feelings and fears and
to just allow them to 'be' present. This concept is embedded in what Western
psychologists (or positive psychologists) are now calling 'mindfulness
meditation'. The concept actually originated in Buddhist practice a couple
thousand years ago and is an adaptation from the 'noble eightfold path' and an
amalgam of various other Buddhist philosophies.
The idea with mindfulness is to notice the anxiety but do not react
positively or negatively to it. Just look at your feelings and body sensations
as an onlooker and without any judgement or prejudice. This is a tricky skill
to master, but you can do it and the more you practice, the more your brain
will re-train itself to react less to the amygdala. By not judging or reacting
to your emotions, you will experience less distress and thus diminish the
severity of the 'hijack' on your frontal cortex and less rumination and thus -
less anxiety. This skill can also be applied to the thoughts and your inner
monologue. Often times we say all kinds of things in our inner talk that set
off the 'amygdala hijack'. This is where meditation is superbly successful. By
accessing our inner thoughts momentarily and letting them pass through us
without judging them positively or negatively, we then shut down the hijack and
thus feel less anxiety.
Things to remember and to practice:
·
When you
feel anxious, stop and immediately say to yourself, "this is an amygdala
hijack - I'm reacting to my emotions and I need to shut off this
reaction." But you must do this without fighting it, you do this by accepting the intense emotion and just observing it.
·
Breathe
slowly and deeply inhaling to the counting to 5 or 6, then holding for 3 and
then releasing for 10. This will help calm down the body sensations and to keep
you focused on the present.
·
Do not react to your anxiety. Do not do anything to
try to escape from it. Keep doing what you're doing (so long as you don't have
a full blown panic attack and risk fainting, then find a safe place to sit
down.) This means: no surfing the internet to find a cause for your anxiety or
solution. Doing this will aggravate the issue.
·
While
you're 'riding out' your amygdala hijack, just be compassionate and honest with
yourself and realize that by fighting this awful emotion that you are actually
making it stronger. Just let it be.
·
To
improve on these steps, you should incorporate a daily mindfulness practice and
learn to be 'mindful'. I will be discussing this in future posts and what you
can expect from this and how you know if you're meditating properly.
All the best,
P. Allen B.A. M.A.
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