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Once again Forest has crystallized the process. Forest, you should create a Peer Review Network for TMS. Good perspective on everything, always great advice (except that time you told me to buy New Coke stock and that Microsoft had no chance of surviving).

It seems like I'm always writing about fine lines with TMS, but the same is true for anything in life. Every single action will immediately begin to generate an opposing "potential", except love/peace. It's a yin yangy thingy--it's all about balance. When it comes to extreme physical activity, I tried to beat the TMS out of me. It worked until a point then healing slowed. The cure for TMS often becomes the cause again...when it becomes the new obsession. If you understand the cause of TMS, why the brain creates the symptom, then you suddenly see how clever the brain is in it's determination to avoid emotional pain.

You can't attack the TMS although you may have short term gains that excite you. The activity does help you understand that you won't get much worse, although the pain may temporarily increase to try to scare you. Physical movement is vital to reducing fear. And fear is the instigator although anger is the emotion that collides in contrast to the fear for balance. (the good doctor called anger "the social reaction to fear to try to overcome its source.")

To simplify:
1) You should become physical, doing what you want again, without worries
2) But don't do what I did, attack it with extreme aggression. This undermines your goal which is to forget about what the body is doing altogether.
3) So you do whatever you want to, but never with the purpose of eliminating pain. This plays right into your brain's hands, as it were. Your brain wants you to challenge it, to focus on defeating pain--never do this. What it has done, if you fall for this, is once again allow you to avoid the emotional cause. Be careful of your brain it's smarter than you think.

Fear is the bully behind TMS,. If you punch the bully in the nose it will stop harassing you. But the problem is that this bully is inside you, it's not an outside entity. You can't fight yourself and find peace with yourself at the same time. When the divided mind has become one, or nearer one, the conflict fades and TMS no longer has a purpose, or needs to send a message of discontent. Suffering ends.

There are 3 ways to handle an enemy, kill it, yield totally, or take the weapon from it. Never fight it, never let it control you, and so I always recommend taking its purpose from it. It's there for a reason, remove the reason.

Don't treat TMS like an invader, this is the reason it's there in the first place, for you to fear. It's not the symptom that your brain wants, it wants you to have something to fear. You hide behind your fear of your symptom, not the sensation of the symptom, but the fear of the sensation. We bury emotional conflict behind fear.

I used a two part healing solution 1) got physical, 2 ) began to soothe myself with new life, direction, and purpose. With purpose, fear fades into light. TMS exists because we're not on the the path we want to be on, it's a motivator with a big stick.

Things are busy, lots going on, PR shtufff, few emails with Dr. Sarno, articles, etc.. Look out for a new article by Dr. Sarno in Consumer Reports Health. He's hanging tough, still a little engaged, and he's still the man.

Happiness to all, who choose it.

Steve