Mindfulness doesn't just soothe your mind, it can relieve physical discomfort too.
Living with pain can be a challenge. Whether it’s exercise-induced muscle stiffness or
a chronic condition with limited relief from conventional treatment, pain can bring a host of psychological symptoms along with any physical discomfort. When pain isn’t well managed, you may end up feeling anxious, exhausted, sleep-deprived, angry or even depressed. Of course, any unexplained pain should always be investigated by your health care provider, but mindfulness techniques can go a long way to helping mitigate your experience of physical discomfort.
Traditionally, psychological approaches
to pain management advocated limiting negative thought patterns associated with your condition. But a newer approach has emerged in recent years, encouraging you to view your condition with acceptance and to live as full and productive a life as possible – alongside your pain. And it’s not a grin-and-bear-it
approach. In recent years, a growing body of research shows that mindfulness meditation doesn’t just ease your thoughts and feelings about your condition, it also physically relieves pain by creating structural and functional changes in the brain.
NATURAL PAINKILLER A study published in The Journal of Neuroscience showed that mindfulness reduces pain more effectively than placebos by activating the orbitofrontal cortex and the anterior cingulate cortex of the brain – regions linked with how you control your pain levels. In addition, the thalamas was deactivated, a structure above the brain stem that acts as a gateway to determine which sensory information reaches the higher brain centres. Another study by the University of Colorado Boulder found that brain pathways that contribute to your experience of pain can be self-regulated. And it’s not just meditation that can
ease pain, regular yoga practice can help too. Dr Catherine Bushnell, scientific director at the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NIH), in Maryland, US, has been researching the impact of brain anatomy on pain reduction and she has found that changes in the grey matter in the cerebral cortex are the major players in chronic pain. Her research shows that yoga practitioners have more grey matter than control subjects in regions of the brain associated with pain modulation. If you don’t already have a yoga practice, turn to p78 for some useful yoga postures to try.
EXERCISES TO TRY
The best way to work mindfully with pain is through a regular meditation practice, but the following exercises will help when your levels of discomfort rise.
USE YOUR BREATH
After spending a few moments to
become centred, begin to slowly direct your in-breath to an area of your body that’s in pain. For example, if you have lower back pain, with your mind’s eye, imagine your breath travelling from your nose, through your throat and into your chest, then to your abdomen to rest at your lower back. As you exhale, imagine your breath dissolving and expanding into the area and out beyond your skin surface. Visualise the tension and pain melting away on each exhale. Repeat this pattern on the next and subsequent breaths for five to 10 minutes, then gently let go of the sequence and return to your normal breath for a few moments before opening your eyes. As you become familiar with the exercise, you might like to imagine your breath as a fine white light, travelling through your body and transforming into a soft gold as it reaches the area you’re working with.
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FEEL THE SENSATIONS
In this technique, you focus your
attention on the sensations that make up your discomfort. Is the pain sharp or diffused? Is there heat? Cold? Do you feel any burning? Can you feel any throbbing or tingling? If you separate out the sensations you are experiencing – a technique known as ‘sensory splitting’ – you’re less likely to view pain as a permanent thing, but see it more as a combination of different and constantly changing sensations. Be observant and curious about the sensations you’re feeling, notice them arise, become stronger and begin to recede.
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FOCUS ELSEWHERE
Spend some time giving your
attention to a part of your body that is not in pain. Allow your awareness to rest in that area and tune in to the sensations you feel there. Maybe there is warmth, a sense of strength or fluidity. See if you can relax into the sensations and allow them to be the dominant ones you feel. This exercise is helpful in showing you that pain isn’t the only feeling you can contact in your body. You can explore movement in these areas, maybe enjoying the feeling of stretching your toes and rotating your ankle, feeling the freedom that this brings you.
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DISTRACT YOURSELF
Notice as many other sensory
experiences as you can in this moment. A gentle breeze on your skin as you sit by an open window, the colour of the sunlight as it reflects on your kitchen floor, the sound of birdsong, a passing car or your children playing in another room. When you flood your body and mind with other sensory inputs, your pain may lessen as it becomes just one sensation amid a group of many that you are experiencing in the present moment.
✲Growing research
shows thatmindfulness meditation physically relieves pain
by creating structural andfunctional changes in the brain.
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