Sometimes I'll notice my heart racing even if I haven't felt particularly anxious about something obvious at that time. I'm kind of attributing this to the overall hellish year 2020 has been - my general anxiety and spikes of panicky feelings have gotten a lot more common. I don't think I'm having a true panic attack - I had one six years ago and luckily haven't had one since, but it was clear to me how much more significant that was than what I'm feeling now. What I feel now is heart racing, jittery and shaky almost like I've just had a bunch of coffee and haven't eaten enough. It's an unpleasant feeling, for sure, and it makes it kind of hard for me to focus on anything.

My question is - when this happened to me this week, I tried to use some relaxation methods to bring my heart rate down, make myself less jittery. But they kind of backfired. I tried to do quiet breathing exercises to slow down my breathing/prevent shallow hyperventilation, etc. But I literally couldn't do them for more than a minute or two because my heart racing was so prominent and it was the only thing I could pay attention to no matter how hard I tried to focus on breathing. Then I tried progressive muscle relaxation - same thing, I just focused entirely on hearing my heart beating so fast. I took my pulse and it was just under 100, and knowing that made it race even faster as I keep thinking "oh no, when is it going to slow down? how long can it go on beating this fast? what can I even do?"

I know I have some work to do in how I'm interpreting the fast heart beat, what I'm telling myself, etc. But I'm looking for ideas on what people find helpful when you start to notice the rapid heart rate starting. I thought sitting and slowing my breath would help but it honestly made it worse because it allowed me to hear/feel my heart beating even more clearly than before. Should I do some kind of exercise when I notice the fast heart rate? Or is that just amping things up even more? Any tips or advice are greatly appreciated!!