Somatic Meditation For Chronic Pain

In this video do you deal with stress, tension and

pain

? I'm going to guide you through a guided

somatic

meditation

for

chronic

pain

. Hello, beautiful humans. I'm Tsuki Baxter, founder of Whole Body Revolution, where I help you rewire yourself for greater happiness and health. And success, if you're new here, make sure to click the subscribe button and hit the bell to get notified every time I post a new video so you never miss all the links to anything I mentioned in this video that you can find linked. In the description box below, let's get into it, so if you have been dealing with pain, whether mild or severe, for a long time, you may have noticed that the pain will expand until it takes up your entire consciousness;

It's basically the only thing he can focus on. In this guided

meditation

what we are doing is really expanding your capacity for sensory awareness. We want to open it up a little so that you can become aware of more experiences than just the experience of pain and this has a very calming effect on your nervous system. system that will then decrease the sensitization of your nerves and decrease your pain, so I want to go ahead and start with the question that I use at the beginning of every session and what has your attention right now and if you have been in pain for a time, what's drawing your attention is probably something that's quite uncomfortable, it's probably pain and that's okay, so just bring your awareness to your body and check, I want you to notice what you notice, notice what arises for you and, like I said, if it's that feeling of pain, if it's something uncomfortable, that's normal and that's completely okay, so what we're going to do is start to expand our ability to notice the things around us, so what I would love to invite you What to do is open your eyes, if you've had them closed, and just start allowing your eyes to move around the room and just notice what catches your attention, see if maybe there are some colors that are really attractive, maybe some shapes that really catch your attention, maybe there's a texture that's really appealing and allows your vision to connect with them and really linger in the places they draw you to, as long as your vision wants to be there, just let yourself absorb, let yourself explore. and absorb the colors and shapes. and the textures around you, there may be something like a painting that has a really beautiful color or a flower that has a bright pop of color.

If you are outside, there may be trees that catch your attention or even wildlife that is very attractive. You can notice maybe the angularity of a chair that is in your room or whatever, it is not important, what does not matter just allows your vision to be drawn and if you are inside I invite you if you have access to a window. really let your gaze expand outside the window and look beyond the confines of the room you are in, simply noticing if there are things outside the space you are in that immediately catch your attention and if you are outside, notice if There are colors and textures that are quite far away that are in your distance that draw your eye and allow you to land on them as much as things that are much closer to you, so explore that by looking at things that are close and then, let your your gaze wanders to things that are further away, and as you do that, you might notice what's going on with that sensory experience in your body, so maybe just check out what you have your attention on now in your body and it may be the same.

It may be that same sensation that caught your attention at the beginning and that's totally fine or it may have moved a little bit and what I want you to be aware of is what's really important when it comes to pain is that I've noticed a trend in people who are dealing with pain to go deeper into their pain story, there's nothing wrong with that, but for this practice we really want to stay in the sensory information, so what it seems like a lot of times is I'll ask someone what a note and they'll notice some pain and then they'll say I know it's because I need to stretch more or I know it's because I sit in front of a computer all day or I know it's because of that accident I had where I fell I got off the horse five years ago or I hurt my back or you know, whatever they've identified as the source or the problem or the diagnosis of the root of their problem and there's nothing wrong with that, but I kind of want to stay out of that story for now, much like how you would do it in traditional meditation.

If a thought arose, if a thought came into your consciousness, you would simply notice it and let it pass without needing to connect with it. need to act on it without needing to engage or get entangled with it in any way, so this is a way that you can work with the pain without getting entangled in a cycle of pain, by simply noticing that it is there and then reconnecting with it. your surroundings and as you have taken in the sights, start to notice the sounds around you, start to notice what you hear in your surroundings, perhaps if you are inside you may notice the hum of a refrigerator for example, or a fan on , maybe there is an air conditioning unit or a heater on or there may be other people in your environment maybe someone in another room has a TV on or is listening to music or something like that start to pay attention to sounds that you may not know He didn't realize they were happening until I mentioned that if you're outside, of course, there could be birds, there could be wildlife, it could be traffic noise again, this isn't about good or bad sounds, we're starting to pay attention to what is happening around us right now and As you do this, you may start to again feel some changes happening inside your body and if you don't, that's okay, there is no judgment here, we are just observing that experience, paying attention to those. sounds, noticing what you are noticing, maybe there is a clock. ticking maybe there is wind in the trees rain falling all kinds of things may be happening and then return to your body again keeping your eyes open if possible notice what has your attention on your physical body again notice what sensation you may be aware of it be exactly the same as what you were initially aware of at the beginning of this meditation or it may have changed it may be something completely different it may be that the sensation has changed or that you feel drawn to another area of ​​your body if you find that at any time your pain is intensifying, return to that practice of visually connecting with your environment by listening to the sounds around you and now I would like to invite you to put your attention on your breathing.

Breathing is a primary pattern. One of the first things you do in life is that you are basically born and breathe, so when you work with breathing you are working with something that is underneath all the layers of neural habits that we have developed throughout our lives. Breathing is also very connected to your autonomic nervous system, so this is the part of your nervous system responsible for the processes in your body that are under your conscious control and are also related to the way your body stores and processes stress, so stress and pain is like that, they are so connected that as we work with the breath, we undo that connection a little bit, calm things down and allow your brain to get new information that can lessen that pain, so it is not necessary.

To do anything with your breath, simply become aware of what is happening, so where in your body do you feel your breath? Is it low on your belly or high on your chest? Maybe it's very wide or very, very narrow, maybe it's just in your throat it could be right here, is it more in the front or the back of your body? You have the ability to breathe both in your back and in front, so just notice where your breath is, where it's going. naturally in your body and even just that will start to change your breathing, often you will just have a sense of how that happens naturally, without you interfering, without you trying to change it, without you knowing that you breathe a certain way, you don't have to Do it. practice any type of yogic breathing or meditative breathing, we are just noticing almost like a scientist observing when you have a very good idea of ​​how your breath moves in your body.

I would like to invite you to find a place in your body. that feels comfortable it feels like a really good place it feels like things are going well there and if you've been suffering for a long time this can be a challenge so if you're having trouble finding a place in your body that's comfortable just try to find a place that is neutral try to find a place that is apart from that pain pattern, a place where you may not feel particularly good but you also don't feel particularly bad and if it is okay to do so, go ahead and let your awareness stay in that place, much like how you let your vision land around your space wherever you are, see if you can let your attention stay in this place in your body that is comfortable or neutral and just observe what happens. .

With that again, if at any point you start to feel your pain intensify, reconnect with your surroundings through your vision and through sound, listening and then noticing as you do this, you may discover that perhaps there is a breathing that is a little. deeper, maybe your breathing is changing a little bit spontaneously, maybe there's just a breath there that changes a little bit, you may start to notice that as you allow yourself to stay in your body in this landing place, in this place of comfort and this place of neutrality where things start to change on their own, so coming back to that sensory experience in your body, just notice what is drawing your attention now, what are you aware of?

Overall, you've found this place of comfort and neutrality, coming back to something like that. the totality of your experience is the same thing that caught your attention in the beginning or it is a little different maybe it is the same but it has changed maybe you feel that and something else maybe you can have an expanded consciousness in the place where you are holding attention and awareness of pain and discomfort and also something else, maybe a couple of other things too, maybe you can be present with more physical experience than just that experience of discomfort that often occupies our entire consciousness, especially when it has been

chronic

. pain for such a long period of time and now I would like to invite you if you want to go ahead and play with some movement, so keeping your eyes open I want you to let your gaze travel around the room until you find one of those things where you like to land and let your head just shake gently not too slowly and nod your head while keeping your eyes on the thing that catches your attention so we're playing with our eyes landing and then your head is You'll move while your vision stays on something and again you can notice that a breath is coming or maybe there's a deeper breath and then allow your gaze to shift to something else and we're going to do that again so let your gaze land and then you're just going to do slow movements , now it's important that these are slow knots, yes and no, okay, and then we're going to play with the opposite, so I want you to let your head, if it's okay, turn just a little bit. a little bit to the left and then slide your eyes to the right so your head moves to the left and your eyes move a little to the right, we're just going to stay here for a few seconds okay and then let's go ahead and let your head turns to the right and your eyes will move to the left, so a lot of our movements are related to our visual cortex because that's how we navigate, we see the world and that's connected to how we move, when we start to break our habitual visual and movement patterns, that's another way of giving our brain new sensory input that can start to interrupt those pain pathways in the body, go ahead and get back in the middle and again, I'm just going to take one more.

Time to ask what catches your attention now, what you are noticing and noticing. I'm not saying what you're feeling, which is essentially what I'm asking, but I'm asking what you're noticing because what we notice isn't always a feeling. and sometimes we can get a little tripped up by that word, so what is it that catches your attention? A very broad question and there is no wrong answer to that, you may notice maybe a little lightness or a little calm or you may notice a tingling or warmth. or you can notice several things, there are many answers to this question and again, like I said, there is no right or wrong way to do this, the more you practice this type of practice, I don't like to call it exercise. both because it's really not so much about doing as it is about noticing and the more you practice this awareness, the more you will develop the ability to notice things that are outside of that experience of pain.

The thing about pain is that when you feel pain it is a sign of stress in itself, soThere's usually some reason why the pain occurs and that's complex and I talk about it a lot so I'm not going to go into it too much here, but for some reason the pain starts to occur. and then that is stress in itself and your brain goes into a state of stress, your nervous system goes into a state of stress. When I say brain, I mean not just what's up here, but your entire nervous system that's throughout your body, so when you're in a slightly stressful state, the painful stimulus actually seems more threatening. for your brain, so it's like we're in a little bit of pain, so now we're a little bit stressed, that makes the pain more intense, so now we're up here, so now we're more stressed and we keep taking a step forward. and more and more, so when we can interrupt that and send some sensory data to your brain, it's called non-nociceptive information, which means it's non-threatening, what happens is it creates a feeling of safety, it downregulates that sign of stress. in your body so that the pain can decrease, the sensitivity to pain decreases, so you don't receive as strong a signal to your brain.

This takes time so often people feel quite a bit of relief at first but then the pain can come back and if that happens it's just that you need to continue developing these nociceptive pathways and that can take some time to make them more common in her body. I hope you found this

somatic

meditation helpful for your chronic illness. If you did, I would really appreciate it if you hit the like button and definitely remember to subscribe. If you hit the bell, you'll get a notification every time I post a new video and I think thank you so much for watching, I hope.

I'll see you next time