The survival mechanism and the predictive brain mechanisms are playing a number on you.

Picture this: It's a sunny, perfect day, and an antelope is enjoying a leisurely lunch. The grass is delicious, the weather is warm, and the only annoyance is a swarm of pesky insects whose sole purpose in life seems to be landing on the antelope's eyes. But with a swift flick of its ear, our majestic antelope sends them flying!

So lost in its meal, the antelope loses track of time and accidentally wanders far from its group. Before it knows it, it stumbles upon a pack of lions lounging around, playing with their cubs in the distance.

Fortunately, the antelope spots the lions just in time. Adrenaline floods its system, the survival instinct kicks in, and it bolts for the hills!

Survival Instincts in Action

From a survival instinct perspective, will our antelope ever return to that spot or even near where the lions were?

Definitely not. Its brain has now linked that specific area with danger. Even thinking about wandering in that direction triggers a sense of impending doom for our antelope.

The brain's predictive abilities will keep the antelope away from that area by imagining what might happen if it goes back—based on its past experience. Without this ability to learn from the past, we'd be stuck in a "Groundhog Day" loop, repeating the same mistakes over and over!

Panic Attacks: A Human Version of Survival Instincts

Similarly, during a panic attack, our own survival mechanism is doing its best to steer us away from what it perceives as danger.

When I had my first panic attack, I didn't realize what was happening. I was at a negotiation table with a client when suddenly, the room started spinning. I could barely hear them or focus. My heart was racing, and all I could think about was getting home to "safety" as fast as possible.

That was my first panic attack. The next one was even worse—it landed me in the ER. Why? Because now, I was terrified of that awful feeling of not knowing what was wrong with me during the first panic attack, which only made everything feel more intense.

The fact that the first attack happened at work eventually gave me a clue (after many years and a lot of research) about what was triggering my panic attacks and what their root cause might be. I'll dive deeper into that in another blog.

The Workplace Becomes a "Danger Zone"

Work became dreadful. I felt drained and started to hate going to the place I once loved. Waking up meant hitting the snooze button twenty times and taking extra-long showers just to delay leaving the house. At the time, I didn't connect my panic attacks to the work environment—I couldn't see the correlation. But my brain did. It had tagged the workplace as a danger zone, a source of stress that needed to be avoided at all costs.

The Next Step: Unlinking and Healing

The next step in healing from panic attacks is to start "unlinking" these places that the brain has labeled as dangerous. By doing this, we can begin to release the neural pathways that lead to this habitual reaction, allowing us to move forward on the path to recovery.