Does this phrase ‘Intend the Pain to Stop’ sound crazy? When you feel pain, either physical or emotional, you can make an intention for the pain to stop.
MY STORY OF STOPPING PAIN
Here is my story of stopping pain. Yesterday I got into the bathtub to take a soak – the water temperature was deliciously warm, I had poured Epson salt in the water, and I was looking forward to a nice long soak in the tub to ease my tired muscles. As soon as I stretched out in the tub, I got this awful cramp in my chest on the right side below the breast bone. I had never before had a cramp in that area of my body. So immediately I went into catastrophizing, “oh my God, I am going to have a heart attack in the tub” and “ I won’t be able to get out of the tub on my own.” Remembering my breathing practices, I took a deep breath and stopped that train of thought. After the shock of feeling this pain and sliding down the negative spiral, I put my hand on the place that was in pain and said to my body, “stop the pain”. Repeatedly I kept saying to myself, ‘stop the pain, stop the pain’. And in a few seconds, the pain stopped.
REALLY?
At this point some of will smirk and say – ‘dummy, the pain was going to stop anyway so what you did didn’t affect the pain’. Maybe yes and maybe no. Perhaps if I had not intended for the pain to stop it would have lasted longer. The point is that in the moment I was experiencing pain, I decided not to focus on the pain and how frightened I was, but to actually intend with my entire being that this pain go away. And it went away within a few seconds.
THOUGHTS AND FEELINGS MATTER
This minor episode is a reminder of how powerful our thoughts and feelings are in regulating how our bodies function. When we feel pain, we have an opportunity to intend that it stop so that we can return to our normal healthy state.
Now what is the moral of this story? The moral of this story is that you can intend for the pain to stop. I was able to summon my entire focus because I practice intentions for healing and because I do breathing and meditation practices. These practices have trained me to focus my attention and awareness on demand, and to do it for sustained periods of time. And that is a skills set.
YOUR CHALLENGE
The next time that you feel pain, observe how you respond to it. Note if you focus on how awful it is and how much discomfort you feel. Do you create a story about what the pain means? Do you create an automatic bad ending to the story of that pain? Notice what your thoughts and feelings are around pain. Then you can decide if you want to change your habits around pain.
ATTEND A LIVE HEALING PRACTICE WITH PAULA
If you do want to change your habits around pain, you can do so by learning new skills.
If you want to develop new habits when you experience pain, then attend the Practice with Paula on Healing.
This month I am committing to helping 100 people have an experience that helps them to heal. I plan to fulfill this commitment by offering a practice to help people create their individual healing intention. Some come prepared with your healing intention, and if you need help in creating one, read this blog. Once you create your healing intention you will then focus on it during the practice.
This practice will be a live-online healing practice via Zoom.
Click HERE to register for this free practice on July 10th 4-4:30 pm EST.
After the session you will have an opportunity to ask questions.
The recording of the session will only be available to participants who show up for the live practice. Sign up for Early Bird Notifications for other events by clicking HERE.