Hope to hear from you again, Aaron, don't be shy ! http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...ilies/grin.gif

If it's useful, meditating with your eyes open / half closed might help with the panic attacks, as lessening the senses might be too much for you at the moment.

I used to suffer from panic attacks, and understand their can be a feeling of losing oneself, which can be scary, but ultimately from a Buddhist perspective (once you have an understanding from the teachings), imo, it's a natural thing that happens in meditation.

I can recommend 'Mindfulness in Plain English' by Bhante Gunaratana, for a good overview of dealing with physical sensations.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mindfulness-.../dp/0861713214

Best wishes, JR http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...lies/hands.gif

Post from i86e2 moved to 'Hello, I'm new to this'

Not sure if I'm coming to the conversation too late, but thought I would share that at first I felt overwhelmed too. I tried looking for books on the subject and found I couldn't understand them. I tried meditating and after the first real peaceful feeling I kept grasping after that and was disappointed when I couldn't reach it and gave up in disgust. Finally I admitted to myself that I needed some help getting started and did a google search for a local Buddhist centre. This might be a good idea for you to do too as I'm sure there would be one somewhere that can help point you in the right direction, maybe even provide some techniques to help with your panic attacks.

As for reading material I found this book really useful, written clearly and without too many unfamiliar jargon. It is Tibetan Buddhism so depending on your preference it may not be for you, but it still explains the basics which is the same across all kinds of Buddhism. Best of all it's free (minus postage, which shouldn't be too high since you're in the US). http://shop.fpmt.org/The-Essence-of-...ee_p_1291.html

Hope it helps! There are numerous other books there, I've read a lot of the free ones and they are all good.