I lied in bed thinking about pain. I was thinking about, and practicing, a technique I learned in David Hawkins´ Healing and Recovery for ¨disappearing¨ pain by not resisting it, but instead surrendering to it and even asking for more. At the end of this entry, I´ve posted some quotes about these techniques and the philosophy, but for now, here´s somewhat of the guiding principle: ¨The experience of the body is not occurring in the body; it is occurring in the mind.¨ P.301
Now, when I first read this, I felt defensive in terms of that I felt like he was saying that if I´m in pain, it´s all in my head. I also felt conflicted about embodiment as a healing path vs transcending the body as a spiritual path (but that is a whole other story!) The things is, yes, pain is in our heads! But it´s also in our bodies. My mind interprets my body´s pain signals. It also interprets the context or events that initially caused or contributed to the pain. So the mind can make pain stronger or last longer. But the mind can also help relieve pain and shorten its duration!
As I lied in bed, I was thinkikng about this, and how although I believe in the power of the mind, there still is something going on with the body here. Specifically, I was thinking that although the mind is what interprets pain, the pain response is a bodily mechanism to warn us that there´s some stimulus that needs to be removed, stopped, or avoided. And with that thought came this thought: If the stimulus that initially caused the pain is no longer there, then what purpose does pain serve now? There is no longer any need for it. The message has already been received.
This was an ¨aha!¨ moment for me, big time. And suddenly and noticeably, my body relaxed and softened, and the sensations of pain in my upper body went away. They came back a bit when I got out of bed and sat down to type this! But it was profound to have that realization about the purpose (or lack thereof) of pain, and then experience the effect that realization had on my body and my perception of pain.
Some other parts of my body required some more dialoguing with myself. For example, after my upper body felt better, I noticed an ache in the right side of my lower back. So,I said to my back and the nocioceptors (pain receptors that function in times of injury and inflammation), ¨Ok, so the vertebrae were fused, a bone graft was taken, and there´s that mesh hernia repair, all aroundthat area. But that was years ago! Everything has healed and you´re safe-- no more being cut into. And you even take great care of yourself, getting regular massages, doing yoga, qigong, dancing.¨ No reponse. So drawing on my Upledger CranioSacral and SomatoEmotional Release skills, I asked, ¨What do you need?¨ After a minute or two of just being open to receiving an answer or some sort of guidance, an image appeared of self-massage for some scar tissue and also being more aware of and practicing better posture. And with those images and thoughts, I felt and visualized my spine lengthening and that lower right quadrant of my back relaxing and decompressing.
My glutes and IT band are still a mystery, unless it´s the 4 salsa lessons over the past 3 days catching up with me! Maybe muscle soreness from use is a whole different mechanism than other types of pain. I don´t remember....
The important thing here is that simply holding this thought in mind (the thought that there´s no use for pain once the message is received and the harmful stimulus has been removed) can have profound benefits!
And here are those quotes from Hawkins that have also been helpful with ¨dissovling¨ pain:
The technique that we will get a lot of mileage from is the whole concept of letting go of resistance. P.305
To let go of resistance means to completely be with the event and totally surrender to the sensation. It means to ignore the thoughts that we may be having about it. Instead of thinking about it, we go right into the direct experience of the sensation and totally let go of resisting it. …The way to do this is to say, “More, more, more.” The way to hold this in mind so that this is acceptable is to know that there is only so much pain in any experience. We open the door to it and let it run out rapidly. “I let go of resisting being with it. I ignore the thoughts because the thoughts are not going to be useful. Instead I totally surrender and allow myself to experience it totally. It is as if the doors open, there is a rush, and the pain is totally experienced out rapidly in a very few minutes. P.305-6
[T]he body know how to heal itself the minute we let go of resistance. P.307
Those who have tried Zen meditation know that the first thing taught is the handling of discomfort of the physical body by letting go of resisting the experience, canceling out thoughts about it, and becoming one with it, thereby disappearing it.
In consciousness work, the process is called “disappearing.” By totally letting go of resisting something we disappear it out of our experience. One can see that the experience is prolonged by resistance. As long as we resist a thing and hold it, it continues its existence. Resistance gives it the power over us, and we then become the victim of that. We are at the effect of that which we resist. The minute we let go of our resistance and become one with it, it disappears. This also means letting go of all associated images and their accumulated energy. P.308
If one tries to control the pain or use will power against it and resist it, a negative energy field that calibrates at about 150 occurs within the self. This would be about the same level as the emotions of resentment or grief where we resent the pain and are angry about it. If we move up to letting go of resistance, if we have the courage to use the technique and are unreservedly willing to try it, then we move up to the field of 250 called Neutral. Moving into Neutral means being in a positive, detached energy field where “It’s okay with me, and I’m willing to experience this thing out.” Willingness moves us up to an energy field of 310 where we say yes to life and its experiences, where we agree and align with it, and where life expresses itself as a positive intention.
Instead of resisting life, we go with life and surrender it to God. This is the wisdom of the Tao, which teaches us that the willow tree bends with the wind, but the oak tree, which resists it, breaks. Instead of resisting what has occurred when barking our shin, we just become like the willow tree and go with it; we let go of resisting it. We allow that experience to flow through the self. By doing that, we move out of a negative, painful energy field full of resentment, anger, and fear. P. 309-10
How can this technique be utilized in handling chronic pain, which is different from acute pain? ….WE look to see where the pain is being experienced…When we do that, we begin to notice that the painfulness is being experienced everywhere—all around the body and the energy fields of the body—it is really sort of occurring everywhere. …If we go to the top of the head, just as an exercise that we co, from that point we begin to experience the pain. We notice the pain as being everywhere and then use the same technique that was used in handling the acute pain. We let go of resisting what is being experienced everywhere; it is not going on in any specific place. P.311-12
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