Sunday, December 22, 2019

Blending Pain and Pleasure

My awareness has always revolved around my body because I am a dancer. I express myself through my movements.  My spine moves, my arms and legs extend, my core is strong, and I dance my way through life. My emotional surges, physical twists and turns, and mental realizations stem from my sensory perception, which organizes and processes the information around me.

If I feel pain, I scan my body and try to pinpoint its origin. Where is it? How did it manifest? What was the constitution of my emotional and mental state at the time of injury? Sometimes, it's easy to determine — for instance, an acute ankle sprain from a misstep on an uneven surface. The trauma takes place, pain ensues, and in a moment, I realize that my spatial awareness was not in sync with my movement.  My ankle could not support the full weight of my body, I was off-balance; therefore, I collapsed in pain. 

Other times, it is not as obvious. The trauma is more subtle, sustained, and chronic. It becomes a continuous lingering event below the surface of my awareness. Over time, it bubbles up to remind me that I am out of balance. An example of this is "chronic back pain." When my body is continuously hunched and contracted over a laptop, or the wheel of a car most hours of the day, the back muscles become overstretched. The intelligence of those muscles triggers my brain to give the spine some relief, so it sends messages to the torso to erect itself by contracting the back and extending the chest and abdominals.

However, if finishing a blog or arriving at that next appointment is vital enough to my monetary sustenance, my body overrides those messages. It will allow me to stay hunched over and contracted as long as necessary to complete the task. After a while, the accumulated pain and the weakening of the back muscles become so intense, the body's survival mechanisms kick in and force me to address the pain. That’s when I realize I have to STOP, pull out my cylinder, and begin rolling my back, or, get a massage, and discipline myself to incorporate more back extensions into my workouts.

If you are not aware of an imbalance in your body, mind, or emotions, a default mechanism will force your awareness of the problem. You may fall and injure yourself, become ill because of a compromised immune system, or become paralyzed with pain.

I'm grateful for my body awareness and its intelligence. Although I often get caught up in the race of getting things done, I know my body will alert me to recalibrate and adjust my physical and emotional state of mind so I can better navigate my world. If I can blend the moments of my experiences, both the pain and pleasure and bring them into my present awareness, then I can learn how to self regulate and heal my body.

A nudge from the highest vibration of myself will tell me whether or not I am on the right track. As I age, each moment from the past merges with my present, making me stop and take notice of who I am and where I am going.  It is a mind-altering experience to heal your pain and open yourself up to positive vibrations. Although I will never fully eradicate pain from my life, I can develop more awareness of myself and my surroundings so I can carefully walk the path to health and wellness.

If you have pain in your body, try some of the exercises I share on my youtube channel and see if they help. 

Or come visit me at:

No comments:

Post a Comment