Don't Sit Still with An Anxiety Attack
You know that feeling of dread? Of panic that starts in your stomach, or as tightness in your chest or throat? The racing pulse, the fight, flight or freeze? The desire to scream, cry or shut down?
However it manifests for you, anxiety sucks. The first time I had a panic attack in high school I thought I was having a heart attack. I didn’t know what was going on, how to stop it or how to prevent it from happening again. During college my anxiety got so bad, I would have terrible attacks every time I sat down to do homework. By that point, I had been practicing yoga for years, so I thought my best course of action was to sit still and breathe and wait for it to pass.
But that wasn’t helping.
What actually helped was acupuncture. I was a true skeptic, but gave it a shot anyway and to my great relief, it helped tremendously.
But what if you don’t have access to acupuncture? I got you. It’s accessible, free and can be tailored to your exact needs.
The secret is movement.
When we feel anxious and that fight or flight response starts creeping in, moving our bodies is the best way to redirect and clear out that nervous energy. Sitting still merely gives anxiety the chance to ruminate inside of us, getting stuck and trapped within the body and mind. And stuck, unprocessed emotions never serve our highest selves.
Think of it as working with your body, not against it. We rechannel the energy by moving the tools we use to fight and flee: our arms and legs.
Add A Booster
When we feel anxious, we feel out of control. But we can maintain control of our breath. Make the below moves even more powerful by adding deep and intentional breaths. Try to let the front of your body be soft (can be challenging when experiencing a panic attack, just do what feels possible) so you can fully inhale into the lungs, diaphragm and belly. Focus on full, open-mouth exhales.
Anxiety-Redirecting Movement Ideas:
01_Stand with feet hip-width apart and simply twist side to side from your navel up, letting your arms be heavy and swing easily with the motion
02_Shake arms and legs while standing
03_Inhale arms lift, exhale release arms down
04_Good, old-fashioned jumping jacks
05_Put on a good song and dance, moving the body in whatever intuitive way it’s calling you to. The weirder the better, honestly. Also, hips store stress, so really tap into your femininity and let them shake.
06_Stand with feet hip-width apart and sink down into a chair pose. Inhale to gather up all of that anxious energy and come to standing, forcefully exhale as you hinge from the hips and sweep the arms behind you. Watch a demo here.
Try whichever move calls to you for a few minutes. And keep in mind - this might work like a charm one day, and might not on another day. That’s ok, you’re not doing anything wrong. We’re not robots, so our bodies respond differently. But now, you have some powerful tactics to expel anxious energy and protect your inner peace.