Posted by alexandra_k on December 25, 2013, at 16:05:34
In reply to Re: Acceptance IT Worked for Neighbor, posted by Phil on December 25, 2013, at 14:26:14
sometimes it can help to distinguish the bodily feeling of anxiety from the cognitive judgement.
the bodily feeling aspect... the racing and thumping heart.. the 'fight or flight' sort of panic response... quite often that can be fairly automatically triggered and there isn't a lot we can do to prevent it (aside from avoiding the things that trigger it).
but the bodily feeling aspect does pass. in 20 or 30 seconds... one can learn to deal with the bodily aspect... and eventually it will be less and it will pass faster.
the cognitive aspect... can have quite an impact on the above bodily aspect. and the cognitive aspect can be brought quite a lot under our control. i think this is where the acceptance goes. when you feel the bodily anxiety... it can be most helpful to accept the feeling - while simultaneously holding in mind the knowledge that the bodily feeling will pass. to kind of... be relaxed about feeling the physiological symptoms of anxiety, if that makes sense.
i like to think of it as being something like a visual illusion... you know the one where you stick an oar (or a popsicle stick or something) into water and it looks bent? you know it isn't bent, but it surely looks bent. it looking bent is kind of like your body increasing the heart rate etc. there is the perception of danger... but just because the oar looks bent (and it surely, surely does look bent) it isn't bent. And surely surely as your body is perceiving danger / a threat (it surely surely is perceiving it / representing the world in that way) there isn't danger / a threat.
I don't know if this helps.
It helped me most for guilt and shame.
poster:alexandra_k
thread:1056938
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20131209/msgs/1056987.html