24 Aug What Happens When We Let Pain Die
What do we mean by “pain die”? Is that even a thing? While you may not have heard it in this specific blunt phrasing, saying “pain die” cuts right to the chase, don’t you think? Pete Townsend grants the listener a more poetic interpretation, with this lyric “release yourself from misery” he continues, “there is only one thing that will set you free, it’s my love”. Who is the “you” and who is the “my” in this lyric? CONSIDER THE SELF! That’s right the: me, myself and I. By letting pain die “release ourselves from misery” we experience an opportunity to be reborn. “Life after death”
What must I give more death to today in order to generate more life
Clarissa Pinkola Estes
MOST TIMES PAIN IS TEMPORARY
Most times pain is temporary. It’s an ever evolving path of regeneration. There is an Irish saying that paraphrased sound like “sadness has come upon me, I am not sadness.” Same with pain. By avoiding adding to or prolonging the experience of pain you can start by letting go of all the unhelpful thoughts and feelings, and the ongoing struggle you have with the/your pain. This is not to say giving up, rather you are accepting versus not accepting. With accepting we are saying, “yes, there is pain”
It’s when we are NOT ACCEPTING the unhelpful thoughts and feelings sound like:
- I do not like this pain
- I wish I didn’t have this pain
- May pain is ruining/controlling me
- I have pain everyday
- My pain is always the same/always like this
- Why am I always in pain when I want to be pain free
When we let these unhelpful thoughts and feeling die we allow for new thoughts to enter:
- Even though I have this pain I can accept myself
- Even though I have this pain I completely love myself
- Even though I have this pain I am in control of myself, my life, my day
- Even though I have this pain I and grateful for other things in my mife
- Even though I have this pain I am aware of times I a do not feel like this
- Even though I have this pain I chose to focus on areas that feel good.
WHAT WE FOCUS ON EXPANDS
The two previous blog post about controlling your cortisol response and Hurry Up, Take your Time talked about how what we focus on EXPANDS. Can you relate to a time when you have focused on something painful or negative and you increased your painful and negative experiences? Now think of a time when you focused on your self-care, feeling better, increasing your community connections, helping others…what happened?
What will you give more death today in order to generate more life?
WHEN DO YOU NOTICE YOU ARE EXPERIENCING MORE PAIN?
Without adding the unhelpful thoughts and feelings to pain we can still notice when you may be experiencing more pain. We are reminded of and to paraphrase Eckhart Tolle about why we experience stress and anxiety and similarly to pain, that stress is being HERE and wanting to be THERE.
Stress is caused by narrowly focusing on the future versus experiencing the present moment. This is why is it so hard to calm the body and relax in the body and turn off the brain, because we have wired ourselves to be in the future versions of ourselves versus to “be here now”. Continuing the unhelpful thoughts and feelings around pain is wiring our brain to stay that groove. Think about playing a song over and over again on a record player, by repeating that same song, the groove gets deeper and deeper and deeper, embedding itself. Similarly this happens in our brain. If we stay wired and attached to the unhelpful thoughts and feelings we keep ourselves in the groove.
Need some direction on how to work on rewiring your brain to make a lasting changes toward more useful thoughts and feelings? Body~Mind coaching might be for you. Call/text Tao 732-775-1550 or email us directly at [email protected] to see if working with a ICF Trained Body-Mind Coach is right for you