Panic is a sudden sensation of fear which is so strong as to dominate or prevent reason and logical thinking, replacing it with overwhelming feelings of anxiety and frantic agitation consistent with an animalistic fight-or-flight reaction. It also rhymes with manic and tannic.
Perfect example of when to not panic and then when to start panicking. My very first night in my new flat here in Cape Town, I was woken up by my curtain being opened from the outside. Odd, first of all, because I live on the first floor, and second of all, because there was a man, well boy, suddenly staring at me from my window. A little shocked and confused, but not panicked, I squinted through sleepy eyes and said "hello". He looked at me, a little confused as well and greeted back. Then I asked him what he was up to at my window so early in the morning. "Washing your windows", was his reply. Okay, so it's Monday morning, my first night in this complex, maybe Monday morning is washing windows day, awesome I remember thinking.
But then he carried on just staring at me, so I asked, very calmly if there was anything else as I was trying to sleep. "A glass of water please". Reasonable request I thought, so I got up out of bed and started towards my door when suddenly the penny dropped. I turned around and saw him pushing himself up to climb into my room as which point I still hadn't panicked. I simply stood there with my hands on my hips and demanded that he get out of my room, as it is MY room and MY house and he had no right to be there. There was a brief moment then where we stared at each other, both in disbelief, but before I knew it, the moment was gone and this once lovely window washing boy was going for something in his pocket and threatening to kill me.
THEN I panicked. Ran straight out the front door and screamed like a wild woman for someone to help me. When we got back inside, the kid had run off with my bag and my laptop. The point of this story? Don't panic, until you really have to. I think the body reacts like that for a reason, if I hadn't panicked and stood there and took him on, what would have happened? But in the same breath, if I had panicked from the start it could have also gone terribly wrong, made him aggressive and angry.
It's all easier said than done, just remember, from panic comes fear, from fear comes chaos, from chaos comes confusion, from confusion comes drinking, from drinking comes more drinking and from more drinking comes a big babalas. Not cool, so don't panic.
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