The first step is understanding what panic really is. A panic attack is not a heart attack, not a sign you’re going crazy, and not something that will make you lose control forever. It is your body’s alarm system firing at the wrong time. Once you start to see the sensations—racing heart, tight chest, dizziness—not as danger but as your body’s survival response, they begin to lose some of their power.

The next step is learning to stay with the discomfort instead of running from it. This may sound frightening at first, but it’s the key to breaking the cycle. Every time you avoid a place or situation, your brain learns, “Yes, that was dangerous, and escaping saved me.” But every time you stay, even just for a little while, your brain learns, “That wasn’t as dangerous as it felt. I can handle this.” Over time, this retrains your nervous system and reduces the frequency and intensity of attacks.

The short version from modern CBT research and clinical guidelines is: the most effective way through a panic surge is to stop fighting it, stay where you are (if it’s safe), and let the sensations rise and fall while you do as little as possible to “fix” them. This isn’t resignation; it’s exposure-with-acceptance, which teaches your brain there’s no danger here. Over repeated experiences, the fear-learning weakens and new “I’m safe” learning takes over. Leading guidelines for panic disorder place cognitive-behavioral therapy with exposure at the top for effectiveness, and newer “inhibitory learning” models explain why allowing feelings (rather than escaping or calming them away) rewires fear more deeply.

When a panic wave hits, think of it as your body’s alarm going off at the wrong time. If you can, pause where you are and notice the sensations with gentle curiosity: “Here’s the racing heart; here comes the heat in my face; my breath feels tight.” Don’t chase perfect breaths, don’t check your pulse, don’t scan for exits, and don’t open your phone to “make it stop.” These are safety behaviors, and although they bring short relief, they convince the brain the situation was dangerous and keep the cycle alive. Staying put and feeling the sensations (even if they spike) is the core of interoceptive exposure—the deliberate practice of letting body feelings be there until your nervous system learns they’re uncomfortable, not catastrophic. Over time, this “do less, allow more” stance builds inhibitory learning: new, stronger memories that compete with the fear memory so the alarm quiets faster on its own.

You don’t have to look calm or breathe “perfectly” for this to work. In fact, exposure aims not for instant comfort but for new learning: “I can have dizziness and not faint; my heart can pound and I’m still safe; I can stay here until it passes.” Therapists often vary the context (different places, times, and body sensations) precisely to deepen this learning, because research shows that mixing it up prevents the brain from needing a special condition to feel safe. This is why many clinicians now coach patients to let anxiety rise, sometimes even provoking the sensations on purpose (spinning for dizziness, brisk stair climbs for heartbeat, holding the breath briefly for air hunger) and then doing nothing to neutralize them.