Joanne Smith explains how to break panic cycles when your body triggers false alarms. Notice the automatic reaction, then reframe it as safe: "it's still safe, my brain just hasn't learned this yet." A pattern interrupt from neurolinguistic programming can replace panic with reassurance.
So if the symptom does happen, this is the second thing that you can do to influence this response. How you respond to that happening is really important, so don't panic and don't get frustrated. Easy said than done, but why would you get frustrated and panicked over something that is a false alarm? Like, once you understand this stuff, It's kind of a lot easier to respond with less fear and less panic, because actually, if that does happen automatically, then notice it, and then you've got the choice to choose on how to respond next. Because you can probably notice a few things here. If you do respond with panic and frustration, you might notice that things flare up more, or this just does reinforce the conditioned response to keep on going and going and going. So you can then go back to reassurance. Ah, it's still safe. This is not a dangerous activity. My brain's just not learned this yet. It's on a journey to learning something different. And it's a pattern interrupt. In neurolinguistic programming, we call it like a pattern interrupt. It's like a sequence of events that happens, and we can intercept it and do something different, in which case the entire pattern changes.
