A woman sits in her car outside a glass office tower. She is forty-three, a senior director, and she has a nine o’clock presentation to the board. Her hands are on the wheel. Her heart is going like a bird trapped in a room. She knows, intellectually, that nobody in that building wants to hurt her. Her body has not been told.

If you asked her what she feels, she would say “dread.” If you asked her how old she feels, she might pause. Then, quietly: “About seven.”

That pause is where this article lives.

An old fear in an adult body

Panic is usually described as a false alarm: the body’s threat system firing when there is no real danger. That description is accurate. It is also incomplete. An alarm is wired by someone, at some point, for some reason.

Schema therapy offers a useful way to see that wiring. Early in life, when a core emotional need goes unmet again and again — safety, steady connection, permission to be imperfect — the child builds a working rule about the world. “If I get it wrong, I will be left.” “Something terrible is always about to happen.” “My feelings are too much.” These rules are called schemas. They are not character flaws. They were a child’s best attempt to stay safe.

Schemas do not expire when we grow up. They wait. And when an adult situation rhymes with the original one — being evaluated, being alone, losing control — the old rule wakes up before the adult mind has a chance to weigh in. In schema language, the Vulnerable Child mode takes the wheel. Panic is often what it feels like when that frightened part of us suddenly runs the body.

This does not mean every panic attack has a childhood story behind it. Panic has many contributors, including biology, stress load and learned fear of the sensations themselves. But for many people, the inner-child lens explains something the false-alarm model cannot: why the fear feels so young.

How it shows up at work

You rarely see the child directly. You see what the adult does to keep the child quiet. Some recognisable signs:

• Age regression in the moment. In a tense meeting you feel small, speechless, or suddenly in trouble — out of proportion to what is actually happening.
• Avoidance dressed as strategy. You decline the keynote, send a deputy to the board, or keep “not quite ready” to apply for the bigger role.
• Over-preparation. Forty slides for a ten-minute update. Every question rehearsed. The preparation is not about the audience; it is about never being caught unprotected.
• A harsh inner commentary afterwards. Once the attack passes, a critical voice arrives: “Pathetic. Get it together.” That voice is another mode — the Demanding or Punitive critic — and it tends to make the next attack more likely, not less.

What it costs

The obvious cost is the attack itself: minutes of terror that leave you exhausted for hours. The quieter cost is the shrinking. People with recurrent panic often organise their working life around not panicking. They take fewer risks, speak less, and turn down opportunities they are fully qualified for. Colleagues may read this as low ambition. It is the opposite. It is a great deal of energy spent guarding a door.

There is also a relational cost. A leader who is privately fighting the alarm is less available to the people in front of her. It is hard to listen generously when part of you is scanning for the exit.

What to do: five practices

These are educational practices, not treatment. If you experience panic attacks, please see a qualified clinician for a proper assessment and to discuss treatment options; panic is very treatable, and you do not have to work it out alone.

1. Ask “How old do I feel?” When the wave rises, name the age. It sounds strange. It works because it separates you from the fear: there is a part of you that is frightened, and a part of you that is noticing. The noticing part is the adult.
2. Speak to the child, not at the symptoms. Instead of “Stop it,” try something you would say to a scared seven-year-old: “I know this feels huge. I’m here. We’re going to be all right.” Schema therapists call this building the Healthy Adult. The tone matters more than the words.
3. Give the body a slower rhythm. A longer out-breath than in-breath, feet pressed into the floor, eyes resting on one fixed object. You are not trying to stop the attack; you are showing the nervous system that it is safe enough to settle.
4. Turn down the critic. After an attack, notice the punishing commentary and answer it. “That was hard, and I got through it” is not indulgence. It removes fuel from the next cycle.
5. Find the original rule. With a coach or therapist, get curious about what the frightened part believes. “If I fail, I’ll be alone.” “If I lose control, something terrible happens.” Naming the rule turns a shapeless dread into something you can examine, and eventually update.

If you would like to understand the physical side of an attack first, Eleven Minutes: What Actually Happens in Your Body During a Panic Attack walks through it step by step.

A question to sit with

The next time fear arrives faster than your thinking, what would happen if you asked the frightened part of you what it needs — and then gave it that, the way a kind adult would?

The adult in the car

Back in the parking lot, nothing about the board has changed. What changes is who is driving. The seven-year-old is still there; she always will be. But she no longer has to hold the wheel alone.

Panic is loud. Underneath it, very often, is a small voice asking a simple question: Am I safe? Recovery begins when someone — eventually, you — starts answering.

I explore this lens, alongside CBT, mindfulness, EMDR and somatic approaches, in The Anatomy of Panic. Coaches, therapists and leaders who want to work with panic in a grounded, schema-informed way can meet me at the free open house for The Anatomy of Panic programme on Thursday 29 October at 11:00 AM ET — register at danielaaneva.com/open-houses. For one-to-one support, see For Individuals; for practitioners, For Coaches.