If you live with any kind of chronic pain, you know how debilitating and frustrating it can be. The Western medical model would lead you to believe that your physical pain can only have physical causes. When tests can’t point to any clear answers, doctors generally prescribe anti-depressants and opioid painkillers to mask the symptoms.
Sadly, opioids have been shown to be extremely addictive and have led to the deaths of thousands of people. Knowing this, many chronic pain sufferers are looking for more natural treatment strategies. The most promising and non-invasive treatment for chronic pain is mind-body therapy.
How Does Mind-Body Therapy Help Chronic Pain Sufferers?
It’s well documented that there’s a deep connection between our psychological (mind) and physiological (body) well-being. Simply put, the mind and the body are one. What we think often affects how we physically feel and vice versa.
Chronic physical symptoms can cause people to fall into a downward spiral of negative thought patterns reinforcing pain sensitivity. These negative thoughts and emotions are often subconscious and require a regular mindfulness practice to correct. You can’t change what you’re not aware of. Mind-body therapy is so beneficial because it’s able to get to the root of what’s reinforcing chronic pain symptoms: the mind.
Below are four popular mindfulness techniques that all chronic pain sufferers can benefit from:
Four Miraculous Mindfulness Healing Strategies
1. Journaling
As mentioned above, emotions play a huge role in how you perceive physical pain. In some cases, your emotional life could be the main contributing factor to pain symptoms. One of the best ways to get a sense of what’s going on in your subconscious mind is to start journaling every day.
Studies have shown that people who keep a journal have less emotional stress, a stronger immune system, and less physical pain than people who don’t. While there are plenty of apps out there that can help you jot down your thoughts electronically, using old-fashioned pen and paper has proven to be more effective in helping people to process their emotions. Just one page a day can work wonders.
2. Meditation
Much like journaling, breath meditation allows chronic pain sufferers to gain a healthy detachment from their thoughts and feelings. By accepting any thought that comes into the mind with gentle awareness and curiosity, meditation trains people to better recognize negative thought patterns and become less reactive.
Meditation, like mindfulness, isn’t a magic pill that you can take once or twice and have all that ails you cured. To reap the full benefits, you have to practice every day, even if it’s only for five minutes.
People who are in great pain and find it difficult to focus on their breath might consider downloading a guided meditation app. One of the most popular and effective meditation apps specifically for chronic pain sufferers is called Curable. The designers behind Curable all used mind-body techniques to cure themselves of chronic pain conditions like lower back pain and carpal tunnel syndrome. After you type in your symptoms, the Curable app will create a personalized training program you can practice every day wherever you are. Another great app created by pain sufferers that uses similar evidence-based methods is Pathways. It’s great to see more of these effective methods of reducing pain appearing that are accessible to everyone.
3. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
When I started hearing about cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), I did a little research to better understand how this type of therapy could be so effective. What I found it that it’s basically a systematic way to use mindfulness to be happier.
While CBT is more commonly used in therapeutic settings treating depression or anxiety, many people experiencing chronic pain notice great relief by visiting a CBT therapist every week. Ironically, this is because a majority of those with chronic pain also suffer from things like depression or anxiety.
These issues, on top of chronic pain symptoms, can cause a huge strain on a people’s relationships and lives in general. CBT therapists can help chronic pain sufferers identify subconscious negative thought patterns and develop positive coping strategies.
CBT therapy can provide the opportunity to resolve deep emotional traumas that manifest in parts of the body as chronic pain. Chronic pain sufferers who regularly see CBT therapists often report a huge reduction in stress, better relationships, and a greater sense of self-esteem.
4. Deep Breathing Exercises
Most people don’t know how to breathe properly. Due to our fast-paced lifestyles, most of us have adopted a very shallow form of breathing that doesn’t supply our body with enough oxygen. This constant shallow breathing is a major contributor to stress and chronic pain symptoms.
One of the best things you can do to reduce stress quickly is to take a few deep breaths using the following technique: Breathe in deeply through the nose for a count of four, then breathe out for a count of eight, ensuring that you expel all the air in your lungs. Repeat this three or four times. For more specific instructions on breath meditation, you could try an app like Breethe.
Final Tips for Using Mindfulness to Relieve Chronic Pain
All four of these mindfulness strategies have been proven to have a positive impact reducing physical and emotional pain. It’s a great idea to combine many mindfulness exercises each day to experience profound benefits in a short amount of time.
Whatever you choose to do, try to bring your attention to the present moment from a state of loving acceptance. This means that you don’t resist what currently exists. For example, if your back pain is flaring up, don’t wish it to go away or tense up against it (I know how hard this can be).
Instead, accept that it’s there and objectively observe all you can about it. Exactly where do you feel pain? What kind of pain is it? Be curious about it. Ask it for messages that may help you identify its source. I’ve done this myself to alleviate intense back pain as well as other more minor aches and pains. It works. Although it might be hard at first, you will start to see miraculous benefits over time when you practice mindfulness a little bit throughout each day.
