Day 21 The Importance of visualizations and affirmations

If you want to get to the subconscious mind then you have to speak to it. In a sense you have to keep bombarding it with information. Anyone with TMS already knows how to do that with negative thoughts and catastrophic ideas. So if it works for that why cant it work to unlearn these things and teach ourselves new things? It can. Neurolinguistic Programming is just one way people use Visualization and Affirmations to do this around phobias or fear etc. You know that guy Tony Robbins, well he got famous for going around helping people to change their mindsets around money. If you dig deep enough you will see that this is true. Unconsciously linked to our pain is fear.

When we go through the TMS recovery with ups and downs, if we do the work honestly, we will eventually become more steady. What is happening with me is this along with something else which i believe is due to trying to unlearn the fear. What is happening is fear, in the form of pain, is trying to find its way back in. I think of fear and pain related to fear as seeping water looking for cracks to settle into. As water freezes it expands and it can create larger cracks. In TMS this is fear piling onto itself, then doubt, then more fear, then maybe a real injury and so on. Pretty soon we're back in pain.

What am I doing about it? Well for starters I not being aggressive about recovery at this stage. I did that before and it didn't really work. I am catching the fear mostly, reaffirming what I now know and ignoring the fear and pain. I let it hang around as long as it wants and I know it will lose interest and leave. This has been going on for a few days now. It may last longer. Some days it takes only minutes other days it last several hours. But it's all the same thing.

Journalling: I used to hate this part. I was lazy about it. Why it's important. It lets you get out your thoughts in real time and as you write more will flow. As it flows, things unconsciously attached to the thoughts (other thoughts and beliefs) will come to mind. You can then see what you need to do next, which is unlearn these beliefs or replace them with new ones.

Beliefs and affirmations. Going back to the reference of NLP, the notion is much like CBT, identify the negative belief. For example I get back pain when I go fishing. What is the negative belief? Though not obvious at first but what I came to learn was, that i wanted my father's approval so I put so much pressure on myself to become a great fisherman so I could be noticed by him. I did this for a long time since childhood, that now when I go fishing the fear kicks up my back tension and Now I have created an association. Fishing=fear or Fishing=pressure=fear=back pain. So what do i do? In the world of therapy this is known as coupling. This happens in trauma also. I need to uncouple and unlearn the associations and create new ones. This can be done while fishing (though don't expect you will be out of pain right away) secondly by imagining ourselves being pain free while doing the activity. Peter Levine calls this renegotiation. You might think how is visualization going to help. Well since it has been shown that the amygdala can respond to imagined or perceived threats, which in turn kick up fight or flight or freeze, that should be our cue to realize that even thoughts and imagined scenarios can be used to perpetuate TMS. SO they can be used to dismantle the fear and pain also. Lastly, I think if we say to ourselves either out-loud or internally what we want or something which is restorative- i.e. I am loved or I am deserving or I do belong here (though not associated with the pain) you're getting to the root belief associated with the trigger.

The point: When people talk about conditioning, this is what they mean. Retraining our brain, changing our beliefs and solidifying something beneficial. Give it a try for a few months and see what happens. I do these practices and visualizations in the am and before bed as well as any free time I have.