This changed everything for me. If you are in pain, pls read:

This is a brilliant thread. Thank you all for your contributions which have really helped me so much. I knew I was fighting my pain but could not figure out how to stop and to accept it without increased fear and anxiety. I also felt that on times I was running away from it or actually brazening it out but not really acknowledging or accepting it.
I too am finding meditation very beneficial, I really look forward to my morning and evening sessions as they give me a sense of peace and relaxation. However, I do hope this is not another 'distraction' for me as I do meditate to help me feel calmer and therefore suffer less pain. Please can anyone help me here?
I will refer to this thread over and over. I love it. Thank you.
Warmth and compassion to you all.

 

Hi Abbo, I hope you're feeling slightly better this morning. When we experience pain our natural instincts tell us that we are in danger or coming under threat, so our anxiety and fears spiral out of control. I believe the key is not to try and stop the pain, but to observe it and let it pass, much like you would an emotion.

Meditation is useful, but I must place emphasis that your experience shouldn't be target driven i.e to be calmer, to heal, to achieve neuroplasticity. This is probably where most people fail and where it can be just another distraction. Instead, you should enter the practice without any expectations (these are ego driven) and just, observe and allow thoughts to pass without judgement.

Another problem we all tend to get caught up in, is that we chase healing (meditation, eft etc), rather than allowing it. Chasing can create a layer of stress in itself. I believe when we give ourselves and surrender completely, to one modality, we find our truth and healing is possible.

I hope, I helped a little, if not, I welcome an apple pie to be thrown at me

Wishing you wellness and joy, this Sunday Morning.

 

This is really relevant for me, but it's tricky and I'd like to hear more of your thoughts. I feel similarly, the more I don't do, the better. But this includes meditation, journaling, reading Sarno, listening to C. Weekes audiotapes, going to therapy. Engaging with any of those things usually makes me feel worse. I think it's because it keeps my attention hooked on the pain which is so hard to bear. I just get further entrenched. Why isn't this more central to the treatment? Do other people feel like they needed to do more or less to get better? I don't think anything has been so bad for my TMS as 'TMS treatment.'

 

I agree with you Eskimo, I have felt the same and I do believe this is because we have been resisting the pain, ignoring it and just pushing through it. I have found meditation really helpful in calming my mind and thus calming my sensations. However, on reading Mike 2014 post above I am having doubts as to if I am using meditation as a distraction from pain. It is all very confusing on times. I use a guided meditation to start with then carry on on my own. Today on sitting with my sensations (it was just like putting the spotlight on them ) must admit I am experiencing far more discomfort this evening but I do believe that it will be really painful to begin this process but that we have to do as CWeekes said and just face it, accept and relax through it and do not fight it . Also bear in mind what Avid and Ellen says it will gradually lessen and eventually disappear. We must really believe in this and hopefully it will help give us more strength and courage to do what is necessary to heal.

 

Hi Eskimo, just had a thought re meditation. My psychologist suggested I log into 'Headspace' where you can have ten free sessions on mindfulness meditation. Each one consists of a body scan and breathing techniques and wise tips. Please give them a go, you may find them helpful and they only last ten minutes each session not long enough for you to get bored or frustrated.
Believe me Eskimo a lot of us struggle just like you do and I think we have to try everything we can to find something that works for us.
Warm wishes to you

 

Hi Abbo, I hope you're feeling slightly better this morning. When we experience pain our natural instincts tell us that we are in danger or coming under threat, so our anxiety and fears spiral out of control. I believe the key is not to try and stop the pain, but to observe it and let it pass, much like you would an emotion.

Meditation is useful, but I must place emphasis that your experience shouldn't be target driven i.e to be calmer, to heal, to achieve neuroplasticity. This is probably where most people fail and where it can be just another distraction. Instead, you should enter the practice without any expectations (these are ego driven) and just, observe and allow thoughts to pass without judgement.

Another problem we all tend to get caught up in, is that we chase healing (meditation, EFT etc), rather than allowing it. Chasing can create a layer of stress in itself. I believe when we give ourselves and surrender completely, to one modality, we find our truth and healing is possible.

I hope, I helped a little, if not, I welcome an apple pie to be thrown at me

Wishing you wellness and joy, this Sunday Morning.


Mike 2014
Hello Mike, sorry my reply has taken such a long time, I needed to try to figure out what you said in your above post.
. Yes, I could have happily thrown a pie at you!
I thought meditation was to calm the mind. To allow thoughts to come and go without judgement and to find an inner peace within me. If I have got this all wrong I would really appreciate you telling me why you meditate and your opinion of the principles behind it. ( by the way I do start with a guided meditation then carry on by myself).

Warm wishes to you.

 

Abbo,

My post wasn't meant to confuse you, but to only serve to help you.

Sometimes we become so caught up reading differing views it can be a source of stress and anger. I find, at times, it's good to take a breather and a step back, we can try too hard at healing.

I'm not sure if you've ever read this thread, but it explains my points at some length...

http://www.tmswiki.org/forum/threads/how-to-meditate-need-a-tutorial.12482/ (How to meditate - need a tutorial)

Edit - I'd like to highlight point 2. "Mindfulness is about cultivating certain attitudes rather than achieving relaxation or focusing well in one particular meditation."

 

Thank you Mike,

The above thread is exactly what Tara Brach teaches in her meditations. i also listen to 'headspace' which are just ten minute mindfulness/meditations.

Thank you again for pointing this out to me.

 

Healing is all about emotional balance and emotional integration. When we are emotionally in a state of well-being, we are comfortable in our body. The body feels like home and we are anchored there and able to receive the messages the body sends via emotions and sensations with ease and maturity.

The rollar-coastering of emotions where we lurch from fear to panic to anger to what-have-you is indicative of being out of balance and disconnected. Distractions are essentially things that maintain alienation from the body and to this end even activities that appear good can be used addictively to distract us from feeling. Meditation is one example if you are using meditation as a way to hide out in your mind and deny your feelings and your body. Other things include exercise, sex, food, drink as well as the usual suspects for many tms'ers dear old Dr. Google and internet forums. Anywhere you escape is a distraction because you are annexing the mind from the body. Healing does not mean that you will never feel anxious or fearful or rageful but rather that you have nurtured the emotional resilience to feel them aka ACCEPTANCE.

Not acceptance of being in pain but a deeper level of understanding of why you are in pain/anxious. The only way out is through and to this end tools like meditation, mindfulness, journalling and movement help you build the courage and fortitude to endure challenging your self-created demons by creating a better relationship between your mind and your body.

To put this another way meditation can be a distraction if you are using it to control your reactions to your body. This results in a shutdown and an emotional neutrality that is anything but balanced and is more akin to dissociation. Healing is not about control and micro-managing every thought, feeling and action. If you are doing this you are keeping your pain/anxiety alive by proxy. Monte Hueftle discusses this day-to-day and often overlooked element in the December 2013 update on this page:

http://www.runningpain.com/important_tms_updates (The TMS Master Practice Program - The New-Sarno TMS Program - Important TMS Updates)

It does require an email sign-up to receive a download link to an hour long audio where Monte desribes this missing aspect.

If you take the same personality traits that have created your problem into healing (into meditation, exercise etc), you sabotage your efforts.

Let be. Let go. Let healing happen.

 

Nice post Plum! A few good TMS points of many you made, that bear repeating, so I will:

 

Cheers Tom. I'm glad you liked it.

 

I wasn't firing on all cylinders yesterday so forgive me but I forgot to address your question directly. The post I made was a general response but not the full one for you.

Abbo my dear, you've taken to meditation like a swan to water (for you are more graceful than the idiomatic duck), and I can tell in your *voice* that it brings you peace and pleasure. I believe meditation is a healing key for you and not a distraction. I suspect walking was a distraction and a challenging one to boot. I think you ought embrace meditation and run to those healing hills. You don't need to know or do anything else, you simply need to be consistent and I'm confident you'll start to experience more and more good days which will fuel healing until the day comes when you are healed.

Meditation for you sounds like swimming is for me. The inherent pleasure in the discipline makes it easy to maintain and with time you'll naturally incorporate other healing boons. Hopefully things will start falling into place more for you now.

With blessings and love,

Plum x

 

Thank you my dear Plum for those compassionate, comforting words. They give me more hope and encouragement. I do know that since doing meditation (with the guidance of Gupta) both my husband and myself have noticed how much calmer I have become. This is a big plus for me.

I did feel very low these past few days thinking that yet once again I was getting this 'TMS' thing all wrong. I have always been a physical person and that is why when I was encouraged to walk twice a day I really thought and hoped that the exercise would help to release tension from my poor tense body. However, I have been consistently walking two to three miles every day for the past two years and it has not released one tiny bit of tension that I have noticed.

I have joined a class called Extend recently, the exercises are a form of yoga but with chair work included. I do notice how flexible my body is and I am able to easily do all the extensions we are taught. This has always seemed so strange to me that I have this incredible flexibility considering the tension I feel. I also love the company, it is a change to be with a group of ladies and we do share a laugh or two.

Bless you my dear friend for once again giving me hope.

Much love to you xxx

 

"TRACORDIFICATION" is a word that SteveO may have coined in his occupation as a wordsmith, here's a blog he wrote here discussing it and it's role in tension:

http://www.tmswiki.org/forum/threads/dean-ornish.927/ (Steven Ozanich - Dean Ornish)

 

Thank you Tom, I have read and reread the post you recommended above and can see why and how I have TMS. Once more I have been 'enlightened'

 

I wanted to add something to this post.
I highly recommend meditation to all who are not presently doing it.
Meditation essentially trains one to do many of the things spoken about in this thread: to be in the moment, to accept one's situation and to RELAX.
I have such a hard time relaxing during the day that meditation is no longer a luxury for me but a necessity.
You cannot believe what 10 minutes will do to your mind-set and subsequently, your body.

I strongly encourage people to try "Headspace" which is a guided meditation app on IOS and Android (no, I have no affiliation to/with this app).

 

I fully agree with you Avik and Forest. I have found 'headspace' very helpful and also since meditating twice daily (I do have plenty of time!) I feel much, much calmer. Also I practice progressive relaxation.
Another good site to look at is Rick Hanson's wwwwisebrain.org. I highly recommend it.
I just wish I had more control over my thoughts. It is just as if my brain is determined to make me 'worry'. I know if it wasn't for my silly thoughts I would be healed by now!

 

Oh, I just remembered to mention that I am finding breathing techniques really helpful for calming my amygdala particularly alternate nostril breathing and long slow in breath, long slow out breath with no pause in between. Tara Brach does guided meditations and uses the breath in her meditation 'healing breath'. I know that all the above is my way to healing.

 

Abbo-this comment of yours I think is very telling:

"I just wish I had more control over my thoughts".

Its the "control" part.

I am no guru on how one should deal with their thoughts but...I would approach your thoughts the same way we are discussing approaching your pain, in this thread. Further, and ironically, meditation teaches the same thing:
Dont fight. Dont try and control.
Just let them be.
Meditation practitioners will often say "notice the thought but then let it go...dont hold on to it".
We do the same thing with TMS!
Notice the pain, dont judge it, dont analyze and certainly dont try to control it...and let it dissipate (Forest told me this many years ago and it took me quite some time to truly understand how to incorporate relinquishing control).

I will again go back to Dr Weekes as she seemed to figure out all of this a long time ago-
Now granted she says this in relation to anxiety (hence the emphasis on fear below) but I think we are a little anxious when we are overwhelmed with thought (and I quote directly from her book):

(When trying to relax) "Your own thoughts may bring on panic, or it may sweep over you without apparent cause.
Your thoughts are to blame,
recognize that they are only thoughts;
although, coming as they do charged with fear,
they may appear as monsters.
Recognize that they are only thoughts and let them float away.
Release them.
Let them go.
Do not clutch them"

{Hope and Help For your Nerves, pages 313/314, Kindle Edition}

There is a heavy metal band who's lead singer writes incredibly complex yet poetic lyrics.
Here is my favorite quote of his as it essentially sums up my entire life in one sentence whilst simultaneously provides me with all the answers I need.
Maybe its something you can relate to:

"The struggle to free myself of restraints, becomes my very shackles"