I'm in a lot of physical pain right now, how can I make use of this situation to gro?

[TrippyMindSubstance]

I've been suffering from chronic headaches and neck pain for a while now. It seems to be stress and fatigue related and it's seriously impacting my quality of life. 

Any tips for practices I can do while in this state, or productive ways for me to experience/view this pain?

[kag101]

have you gone to a doctor?

[Flowerfaeiry]

Are you taking care of your body? Sounds like it's telling you something. Maybe you need more rest and to take breaks. 

[TrippyMindSubstance]

Just an update:

I usually find ted talks pretty boring, but I just found this one about chronic pain and actually found it very helpful if anyone else suffers from similar things

 

[TrippyMindSubstance]

7 minutes ago, kag101 said:

have you gone to a doctor?

I have and they did lots of bloodwork, some stuff with my liver was a little messed up so they're keeping an eye on it but they didn't do much to help. I will have to try booking a physio appointment next and see if that can help.

 

1 minute ago, Flowerfaeiry said:

Are you taking care of your body? Sounds like it's telling you something. Maybe you need more rest and to take breaks. 

I think this is a big part of the problem, there is definitely a correlation between both mental and physical stress and my pain, however there are lots of stressors that I can't really avoid. I think I could improve on planning my day better and managing my energy more effectively though.

[kag101]

18 minutes ago, TrippyMindSubstance said:

I have and they did lots of bloodwork, some stuff with my liver was a little messed up so they're keeping an eye on it but they didn't do much to help. I will have to try booking a physio appointment next and see if that can help.

i see.

i'm sorry to hear you're having to endure so much pain that's affecting your quality of life.

did you go to a rheumatologist? they are the ones who can help the most.

 

if i were you, i'd try as much as i can to find a way to alleviate this pain in the conventional way. like going to different doctors, doing  physiotherapy for at least 3 months, going to a psychiatric session which could help see if maybe you're dealing with, for instance, generalized anxiety disorder, which can create many physical symptoms. 

 

and then if you exhausted all your options, then it's time to accept it and try to live with it. a very renowned vipassana teacher, Goenka, claim that meditation retreats helped him tremendously. so you might try that out. psychotherapy can also help a lot to find ways to cope with this pain, and maybe uncover emotional wounds.

 

ps: be careful about spiritual people who promise miraculous results. 

ps 2: thanks for recommending this ted talk. sounds interesting. i'll check it out!

 

best of luck!!! ☘️

Edited July 28, 2021 by kag101

[BipolarGrowth]

This is the perfect opportunity to investigate the three characteristics in Buddhism. You can create the suffering sensations as a meditation object and view their impermanence, non self nature, and the dissatisfaction of experience. At least that’s what I’d do. You’ll probably notice as your insight increases your suffering will likely fade. 

[Preety_India]

Have you tried drinking lots of water ?

 

[Seeker531]

I often suffer from a tension created headache. I've learnt that one can learn to make peace with it each time as a practice and it won't disturb you anymore for some time. Another way is to see that I created this cobstant feeling, which isn't constant in reality, it is more like seeing, thinking, feeling. That on which you keep the focus you stabilize as one continuous object, but it turned out that this stabilizing caused the pain which grows less and less when you turn your focus away. Yet another way is to actively feel ibto the pain and don't turn away or try to change anything, become one with it that helped me dealing with immense pain when I was in hospital a while ago. Well, I guess you can learn a lot from it. ?

[TrippyMindSubstance]

5 hours ago, Preety_India said:

Have you tried drinking lots of water ?

I have, but there doesn't seem to be much of a correlation between the amount of water I drink and the frequency/intensity of pain.

@kag101 Thanks for the advice, I'm guessing I won't be able to get an appointment with a rheumatologist unless I try a bunch of other stuff first, so next on that list is probably physio, maybe a psychologist to help me relax more effectively as well.

 

@BipolarGrowth @Seeker531 I will experiment more with both turning the pain into a meditation object and also doing the exact opposite to see if taking my focus away from it can be effective.

Thanks guys.

 

[Mu_]

@TrippyMindSubstance Have you ever gotten a massage?  It may simply be just muscle tension in the nk and head area.  I'd try that first.  Find a place with a lot of good reviews.

[snowyowl]

Bad posture might be a cause. If you're on your phone a lot with your head tilted forward it can give you neck strain. Or if you use a desktop setup, your chair, screen, keyboard and mouse need to be positioned well to avoid muscle strain. Also you need regular breaks for your eyes. Here's one reference (from the UK):

https://www.hse.gov.uk/msd/dse/

Lastly, regular eye tests are a good idea.

Edited July 28, 2021 by snowyowl

[impulse9]

Could be your lymph system. You may want to try to eat lots of hot peppers and take cold showers. Those two cured my chronic shoulder pain that I've had for over a decade. Look into Wim Hof method. (Just a suggestion - I am not a doctor)

[Pacific Sage]

On 7/28/2021 at 9:39 AM, kag101 said:

 

and then if you exhausted all your options, then it's time to accept it and try to live with it. a very renowned vipassana teacher, Goenka, claim that meditation retreats helped him tremendously. so you might try that out. 

+1

Vipassana method by Goenka is awesome for dealing with Pain

 

[Nahm]

On 7/27/2021 at 10:54 PM, TrippyMindSubstance said:

Any tips for practices I can do while in this state, or productive ways for me to experience/view this pain?

Don’t hold the belief you are in a state and then try to practice as compensation, just notice you are not in a state. When you think or say that, attempt to point to it for clarity. Like if you were “in a house”, you could point to the house you are in. Do that with “a state”, to liberate yourself of this suffering.  Believing you are is not without emotional consequence, because then you attempt to change “your state”, which “you are in”, without addressing the thought or perspective by which you’re creating the discordant emotions. Essentially, this is monkey mind (a self referential thought narrative) and a spiritual bypassing of that you are doing so.  In not addressing this, that whisper of discord gets louder. In letting this lens or framing  go, the pain, headaches, stress & fatigue will fade away naturally such that you won’t even remember them really. 

Every time you focus upon the arising thought “I’m in a state”, source is ‘saying’ no I am not. This emotional & physiological tug of war ends in listening to source. 

Analogously, imagine someone walking around telling everyone “I’m in a box”… and everyone telling them, no you are not. Imagine them refuting this, and insisting they are in a box. What could you possibly do to help them with this suffering which they insist upon? They’d have to acknowledge they are not actually in a box. 

[TrippyMindSubstance]

Thanks guys, and @Nahm I will try that out