Mindful Thought Body- Pain

 

 

Today Body pt 4 : how can Mindfulness help with pain.

Hundreds of millions of people all over the world are impacted by pain. Physical pain, chronic pain, mental pain... Living with pain is not only a physical strain it is also an emotional strain as well. Feelings of frustration, anger, depression or even despair can deeply impact the quality of our lives.

The use of highly addictive opioids to treat pain have caused a silent epidemic, every year 300 million pain prescriptions are given out by doctors worldwide, which equals a $24 billion market, 80%of those subscriptions is consumed in the United States, 15% in Canada and Europe, and the rest of the world gets the other 5%. Unfortunately, 40 to 70% of people with chronic pain aren't actually receiving the proper medical treatment for their pain.  The over use of opioid is staggering. Worldwide 187000 people die from opioid overdose every year and that number grows every year by 6%.

Not too long ago, we thought that the brain we’re born with is static—that after a certain age, no change is possible. Fast-forward a decade or two, and we’re beginning to see the opposite: the brain is designed to adapt constantly. Neuro-scientists now know three things: 1) you can train your brain to change, 2) that the change is measurable, and 3) new ways of thinking can change it for the better.

It’s hard to comprehend how this is possible. Practicing mindfulness is nothing like taking a pill, or a quick fix, but just as we learn to play the piano through practice, the same goes for cultivating well-being and happiness. The brain keeps changing over its entire lifespan. And that’s very good news:We can intentionally shape our brain in ways that are beneficial by focusing on wholesome thoughts, for example This leads us to the conclusion that qualities like being kind and being happy should best be regarded as skills.Research on neuro-plasticity and meditation research concludes that even short amounts of practice, like 30 minutes per day, shows measurable changes in the brain on a brain scanner.

A big spoon of scientific information for those of you who like to know more of all the research, a good source with many useful links on this matter: 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3580050/

Pain is a complex experience. The way you experience pain and the intensity is affected by many different factors 

your emotional state (“I am angry that I am feeling this way”), beliefs about pain (“This pain means there’s something seriously wrong with me”), expectations (“These painkillers aren’t going to work”) and environment (“I don’t have anyone to talk to about how I feel”).

Pain is generally recognized to be associated with three major components: 

Physical sensations

Emotional response to the sensations

Social effects of the experience

Mindfulness can help you tune into the difference between these three experiences, making it possible to reduce the suffering without reducing the severity of the pain itself. It can also help you approach your pain with less fear and more acceptance, allowing you to live life fully, even though you have pain.

Many of the studies that explore mindfulness and pain focus on the ways that mindfulness can improve quality of life and mental distress associated with pain, rather than the intensity of the sensations of pain itself.

Mindfulness improve the experience of pain by:

Decreasing the repetitive thinking and reactivity

Increasing a sense of acceptance for unpleasant sensations

Improving emotional flexibility

Reducing rumination and avoiding behaviors

Enhancing self-compassion

Increasing a sense of acceptance for the present moment

Inducing the relaxation response and decreasing stress

The idea of being mindful of pain may seem counter-intuitive. Most people want to forget about their pain— they want to escape it, run away from it, wishing they could ignore it or get rid of it somehow. The problem is—ironically—that by fighting and struggling against it, and even by trying to ignore it, you create within yourself a state of ‘resistance to what is’ and that means stress,higher sensitivity to pain and thus more pain. 

It takes a little practice but it is possible to be in a calm and content emotional state even when in physical pain.This technique is incredibly effective and works wonders in pain reduction (really impressive actually!) and definitely helps cultivate inner peace.

The ability to cope with pain improves which, in turn, improves the quality of life. It also has the wonderful side benefit of reducing much of the mental and emotional strain associated with chronic pain. And most importantly, it does this with no risks or negative side effects— being completely natural, the only side effects are positive ones.

If you suffer ongoing pain I highly recommend you give this a try. What do you have to lose?