People tell me all the time that their doctor tells them “your pain is in your mind”. Chronic pain is in your mind. That doesn’t mean the experience of pain is not real. For year’s doctors thought that pain could be caused only by damage to the structure of the body. They looked for the source of chronic pain in bulging spinal discs, muscle injuries, and infections. However there is a second source of chronic pain, the very real biology of your thoughts, emotions, expectations, and memories. Chronic pain starts with a trauma of some sort, and is sustained by how that initial trauma changes not just the body but the also the mind-body relationship. Knowing this is good news. It means that trying to fix the body with surgeries, pain medications, or physical therapy is not your only hope. By first understanding chronic pain as a mind body experience and then using Ayurveda’s toolbox of healing practices—including breathing exercises, yoga, meditation, Thai Yoga Therapy, and a dosha balancing diet—you can find relief from pain and begin to reclaim your life.
Here are the basic steps of the pain response: sensation, stress, and suffering. The protective pain response begins when the body experiences some physical threat (trauma), such as a cut, a burn, or an inflamed muscle. This threat is detected by specialized nerves and sent through the spinal cord and up to the brain. Where, among other things, the threat signals are transformed into pain sensations. Emotion-processing areas of the brain also get the message, triggering a wide range of reactions, from fear to anger. Combined, your thoughts and emotions about the physical sensations of pain make up the suffering component of the full pain experience.
An emergency stress response triggers a cascade of physiological changes that give you the energy and focus to protect yourself from life-threatening danger. Even after the threat is gone, the pain response is not over. The mind and body are very interested in making sure you know how to protect yourself from this threat in the future. So the nervous system begins the process of learning from this experience. Any kind of injury or illness, even one that is short-lived or appears to be fully healed, can change the way the nervous system processes pain.
Through the repeated experience of pain, the nervous system gets better at detecting threat and producing the protective pain response. So unfortunately, in the case of chronic pain, learning from experience and getting “better” at pain means more pain.
Learning from past experience are the memories of the body and mind that influence how we experience the present moment. Memories of the body and mind keep you stuck, felling the same emotions, thinking the same thoughts, and even experiencing the same pain. Memories of the body and mind do not always lead to suffering—they also lead to positive change. Just as trauma, illness, pain, and stress leave traces on the body and mind, so do positive experiences. What you practice, you become.
Learning is lifelong, and none of the changes you’ve learned have to be permanent. Your mind and body have learned how to “do” chronic pain, and your job is to teach it something new.
Nancy Adams, Certified Thai Yoga Therapist
And Ayurveda consultant
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