Panic Attacks - A Spiritual Catalyst
Since the moon cycled new in Aries 2022, my entire inner system shut down. Panic attacks became a regular occurrence, and more than often, I was convinced I was dying. Having cultivated a connection with my Higher Self, my inner source of power, I understood that I was indeed going through a death cycle, the death of some aspect of personality. This was karmic and necessary for soul and body to evolve. Although I knew this to be true and felt the lightness of Spirit rise from my chest, it didn’t take away the very real, very scary feelings of facing an impending demise.
I was in Tulum, Mexico during these attacks. Alone in a foreign country and determined to outrun my feelings. Yet no matter how fast I ran, I couldn’t escape the responsibility that I knew I must face head on — to feel my feelings, and to disentangle their meaning. See as a child when I felt pain and I didn’t understand the cause, I’d create a story that pain equals not good. Grief, not good; shame, not good; scared, not good; lonely, not good; fear, not good, and on and on and on. As an old and sensitive soul navigating the body of an undeveloped human, I began to believe that all these not good feelings meant that I was not good, and that I was the cause of my feelings. Experiencing life with the volume turned all the way up and unable to comprehend feelings, I internalized all feelings as weaknesses and set out to prove that I was in fact good.
Developing the persona of people pleaser while internally rebelling against conformity left my inner and outer worlds in constant states of stress and tension. The foundation of my nervous system set at a baseline of fight-flight, and the only way to find rest was to create elaborate fantasies in my mind. Imagination became my escape and I learned to live life from my head. This served me well in and out of college and as a marketing analyst for an advertising firm. What fell by the wayside was everything I was neglecting. I gained a tremendous amount of weight and self medicated with wine, cannabis, and sex. Fortunately, Saturn came knocking; and at the age of 27, at the onset of my natal Saturn returning to its position in Sagittarius, I woke up.
That was 7 years ago; and over these past 7 years I have cultivated much in the way of a Spiritual connection. I’ve used the mind to understand what I couldn’t make sense of as a child. I sought to uncover a higher perspective of mine and my family’s karmic unfoldings and to get to the root causation of what has and will unfold for me in this lifetime. I accessed past lives or parallel realities (whatever they may be), to see and gain an understanding for patterns repeating, to help me assess what is useful to carry forward, and what is coming to meet its end.
It is believed in the story of astrology, and through my own personal experimenting, that progress moves through 7 year cycles, and I am coming to the end of mine. Saturn, the planet of karma and the governor of earth-bound time, is activating the end of what was and revealing the beginning of what is to come. The past and future are blending into a cacophony of confusion as I attempt to find meaning in it all; and there in-lies the greatest lesson I am learning to date — life simply is. Life. Simply. Is. Life is only scary because I believe it to be, and what are beliefs but a human desire to give meaning to things.
The two weeks spent in Tulum, I had the realization that I was undergoing some fundamental changes. Old beliefs carried far back in the recesses of the ancestral mind were dying, making way for the New Order of thought to emerge. What I was experiencing as electrified nerve endings, full-body earthquakes, gut wrenching fear and heart-shattering grief was the response of eons of patterns evening out. The work of the past 7 years, yearning with every ounce of my being to understand the whys of things, had awakened harmonic revelations, sending healing reverberating back in time and carried forward through me a long-awaited release.
I’m learning that it is impossible for the dualistic nature of the thinking mind to rationalize spiritual occurrences. They are too paradoxical in nature to comprehend. Having developed a felt-sense of safety living in my head, I began to lose trust in myself completely, falling even deeper into the depths of these anxious onsets. But this, I am coming to find, is all by spiritual design. Life lived in the head is a life only half lived, there is an entire intelligence that lives in the body, and when cared for, awakens the peace and ease of simply being.
The body exists in rhythms. The rhythm of fight-flight is always searching, reaching outside of oneself to have its needs met. The rhythm of homeostasis, a balanced nervous system is that of acceptance and belonging. The world becomes a place of reflection to our inner states, and when the mind and body are connected in harmonic rhythms, such virtues as loving-kindness, compassion, goodwill and grace naturally radiate outward.
Through the experiences of these past few months I am finding trust in the rhythms and cycles of life, carrying forth the firm understanding that every effect has its cause, and nothing is wasted. Each time I reflect upon my past, another layer of understanding is gained. I see through the lens of where I am at today and can breathe a sigh of relief. When I feel scared and wavering in my faith, I know that this too shall pass. It isn’t wrong or I am “not good” for feeling scared or for questioning the nature of my experiences; on the contrary. I am made stronger for it. Every unfolding of the flower of life teaches me about the resiliency of the of the inner spirit, and when cultivated, shines the lamp of knowledge and illuminates the path of wisdom for all brave enough to seek it.
