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Transformational Spring Reading – Hold Me Tight

I have been thinking about belonging, and the various points in my life when I felt I more or less belonged.  At this particular phase where I live a rather secluded life due both to personal choice and the more recent COVID-19 pandemic, all of my attention is going toward taking care of my most basic needs, I set up my daily schedule so I can get all of that important self-care stuff in like I never have before.  My house is set up so it can be as efficient as possible.  If I didn’t make a concerted effort to do it, I assure you, it wouldn’t get done. 

The quality of my life, of my future, depends on how well I meet my basic needs.  This was also true when I was an infant.  Like all infants, I had many needs and obviously a good many of them were met because I survived, right?  I am here writing this blog post.  But as I am getting more clear on my unmet infant needs now, my home was set up primarily to meet everyone else’s needs because either they were providing the income necessary to put a roof over our heads or because they were attending to one urgent emergency after another, juggling financial hardship and probably postpartum depression, leaving me not feeling particularly safe or cherished.  The home was not set up to make sure that my unique needs were well met. 

I have more clarity about this today because of a book I’m reading called Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love, by Dr. Sue Johnson (a little hint as to what I was needing and not getting).  The book’s basic premise can be summed up with an acronym, A.R.E., which stands for Accessible, Responsive, and Emotionally Engaged. The level of belonging I felt in my family of origin was directly proportionate to the degree to which I felt that my caretakers were accessible, responsive to my needs, and able to emotionally engage with me. 

The quality of my relationships and my adult life have been a reflection of the absence of the accessibility, responsiveness and emotional engagement that nobody but me was even aware of.  Through this lens, I can finally see what it was that caused me to create relationships where I did not feel connected or safe.  And now that I am in the process of parenting myself well, I am experiencing what it feels like to be safe and connected, if only to myself.  And it is with great joy and anticipation that I can say that I feel as though a whole new world awaits me.  As a result of the ongoing dedication I have to caring for myself well, and books and other resources such as this, I am broadening my vocabulary, my capacity to experience new things interpersonally and educating myself about what is possible when we feel truly attuned to, and are accessible to our tender selves, responsive to our own needs, and committed to staying emotionally engaged with ourselves – uncomfortable emotions, vulnerable needs and all. 

I see a very different life opening up for me, where the dialogue involves a whole lot of listening to and paying attention to what delights me (even if that sounds silly or selfish), and at the same time offering myself an environment that provides safety, along with the structure and tangible practicalities that are necessary to meet the more typically recognized needs like adequate rest, good enough hygiene, sufficient exercise, hydration, routines that ensure that my spiritual needs are met, human connection and remedial care that my body requires after a lifetime of neglect.  A lifetime of not being sure that I was the kind of person who could get attuned to, responded to, and emotionally engaged with – at least with a parent or a primary partner.   Holding it all together on the outside is a very different thing from feeling that sense of safety and true belonging on the inside that is a result of strong bonds and healthy intimate relationships, whether it is the mother-infant dyad or the couple who knows how to stay calm and listen and offer assurance when his or her partner is experiencing intense emotions or an automatic reflex that harks back to an earlier traumatic moment.

Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love, by Dr. Sue Johnson is a godsend.  It is just the material I needed to catapult my healing work forward.  I recommend it highly to anyone who wants to experience more depth, connection and oxytocin in intimate relationship.

“…once distressed partners learn to hold each other tight, they continue reaching out to each other, trying to create these transforming and satisfying moments again and again. I believe that A.R.E. interactions turn on this neurochemical love potion honed by millions of years of evolution. Oxytocin seems to be nature’s way of promoting attachment.”

– Dr. Sue Johnson in Hold Me Tight

Prayer?

Over time it has become increasingly evident that prayer is the single most powerful tool in my toolbox.  For me, there are three aspects to prayer: Gratitude, Asking, and Humility. 

You might not think of the first, initially.  So let’s look at GRATITUDE.  I see gratitude as letting the powers – whatever they are – know that I have noticed and received the abundant gifts all around me.  I accept!  I delight in them; I take them in.  I receive them; they are for me.  I feel loved and grateful.  I notice all manner of things, large and small, obvious and subtle; straightforward and quirky.  These gifts are here, whether I notice them or not.  I attribute them to a benevolent force more powerful than me.  I let my thank yous flow free and abundant.

The second aspect of prayer is ASKING for what I want more of.  Something that is not as easy as it sounds for many of us.  Reaching for what our hearts desired was often shamed out of us as children, and it was not in our repertoire to believe that we were worthy of asking God for what we wanted.  Therefore, we unlearned to naturally reach for what we wanted or put importance on developing a regular or clear sense of what we liked or preferred.  Rather we learned to hope that if we were good enough (not greedy or selfish), God would reward us with all He thought we needed and that was the correct and proper way of it.  Nor were we encouraged to know ourselves to understand what made us uniquely ourselves, and what made our unique hearts sing (beyond merely getting by).  This is what we saw our parents doing too.  I sometimes attribute this trait to my Puritan ancestors.  Make no mistake, it is not normal or healthy; it is a form of intergenerational trauma.  But I digress.

I now understand that for so many years my body was too bound up in defenses and unprocessed emotions to ask for what I wanted.  And there was the issue of the missing skill set.  That is what I am working on now.  And I am making beautiful strides.  This crucial step in growing one’s self up emotionally involves studying oneself and noticing when they like something.  A smile creeps over your face.  You feel lighter.  You sense that your heart has been flung open.  Or there might be a subtle putting down of defenses, a relaxing.  A nod.  And then taking that one step further, taking the risk to admit, I want more of that, please.  Can you help me?  For me, that is the third aspect of prayer: HUMILITY.  

As I dedicate these days to studying myself, caring for myself and slowing way down in the heart of this COVID-19 quarantine, I think of The Serenity Prayer, which tells us to ask for the serenity to accept the things we cannot change, the courage to change the things we can, and the wisdom to know the difference.  This is such an important prayer to be praying at this time.  Being confused about what we do and don’t have control of is something that might also have followed us from emotionally impoverished childhoods.   It was developmentally appropriate at age seven to believe we had control of things we absolutely did not.  Many of us learned that we should try to control things we had no business controlling – other people’s moods, feelings, opinions of us.  And without proper role models or any other way to recognize these errors, we entered into adulthood with the toxic combination of unexamined shame and unrealistic expectations of ourselves and others: I am responsible for the bad things that are happening.  I am responsible for your bad mood, etc.  I should be doing something to fix this.  And if I try harder to be what you need me to be, then I might be able to get what I so desperately need.

Wisdom often comes with maturity which comes not just from getting older, but from resolving trauma and releasing hurt from the past.  It is what helps us know whether we should accept a thing or fight to change it.  And whether it is ours to change.

My wish for you is that you learn to cultivate a prayer practice beginning with gratitude.  Pray.  Ask for what you want, even if you’re not sure what to ask for.  Even when you can’t see how your heart’s desires could possibly be granted.  Spend time thinking about what you would rather have.  What you want more of, what would truly delight you.  Go ahead.  Make it detailed, and imagine what it feels, looks, tastes, smells and sounds like when you actually have what you have asked for.  Write those things down because they matter.

You are an infinite being of light; one cell in the organism of humanity.  And that organism needs you and me to be fully who we are, to choose for ourselves what we want.  To reach for what makes us shine, what delights us, to bud and blossom into all of who we are, which necessitates kicking into self-care mode, fearless self-attunement.  I do this now in order to coax out what I had deemed as my shadow before, but which is actually my Great Self. 

Spirit, please let this time be the container I need to study, to know and to nurture my Great Self.  Help me to appreciate and cherish Her.  Help me to value Her above all else.  Guide me so that I can be the person I came here to be, to contribute what the world needs most from me and can only get from me.  Guide me so that I can find my way to my tribe, to feel that I belong.  To share physical warmth, harmony and deep connection in a supportive family environment, to be part of a whole – a thing of great functional beauty.  This family community is the one that gets to usher in a new version of modern life.  A more sustainable one, connected to heart and filled with physical and emotional warmth, balance and beauty.    Thank you, and so it is.  Amen.

Thank you, Spirit, for putting me in a family of visionaries and healers.  Three of the healers and visionaries who are inspiring me during this pandemic, who never cease to amaze me with the way they use their gifts and talents to make the world a better place, and serve as role models for me, also happen to be sisters. If you don’t already know them, allow me to introduce them to you:

Tracy Barnett inspires me endlessly in her tireless ability to see the bigger picture, to be an advocate for the planet, and for people who are on the front lines making strides toward not just environmental and economic sustainability but regenerative living. She has helped me to add flesh to the bones of my vision of what that kind of life might look and feel like, and that is such a priceless gift. She supports so many in telling their stories that would otherwise go untold. With her magnificent heart and her journalistic spirit, she shows us the world, and introduces us to change makers and wisdom holders. I hope you will check out her recent Patreon and learn more about Tracy at Esperanza Project.

I have had the great pleasure to witness the blossoming of Tami Brunk, Shamanic Astrologer, as she literally blossoms these past couple months. Quarantine for her prompted the call for a free Earth Sky Woman Summit, a gathering of enlightened women who shed their light and share gifts to help those of us who want to maximize this time of transition, or a portal into a profoundly changed post-pandemic world. That summit can be viewed here. Tami recently kicked off a brand new podcast which you can check out here. Tami’s knowledge of astrology and her ability to zero in on what is most important right now never fails to knock my socks off.

Trina Brunk continues to inspire me by doing her own sacred and beautiful work, to share on her own Patreon, and to offer SoulPath Sessions, Hypnotherapy, and EFT Support Groups. Not to mention inspiring music, kirtan, poetry and artwork. SoulPath is my favorite of her offerings, which powerfully and consistently help me connect with my spiritual supports, remove blocks to love that I didn’t even know were there, and blast through self-defeating patterns that have flown beneath the radar for so long. She is a wonder, and I don’t know what I would do without her.

I have immeasurable gratitude for these three during this time of great transformation and change. If you need inspiration on your journey of learning to better care for yourself and/or create a better future for yourself and the planet, I encourage you to check out their free offerings or dive deeper and get individualized attention you need to break out into a deeper, richer, more connected reality for yourself and those in your circle.

This is Personal: Humanitarian Pilgrimage to the Border

I’m heading to the border. Please read if you’d like to know the details, and how you can help.

These are not ordinary times. 

Many of you already know me.  I am an adventurous spirit with an itch to travel, a license to practice as a counselor and consultant with quite a bit of experience working with people who are struggling from one kind of trauma or another. 

I am currently on a mission of the heart.  Though I am from the Midwest USA I live in Guadalajara among kindhearted and welcoming Mexicans.  Every time I tune in to the news and world events I am compelled to do something out of the ordinary.  In October I went on a fact-finding mission to see how I might plug in there, and had a phenomenal response. So, in January I’m heading back. This time I’ll fly to Tucson, and then travel by bus to Hermosillo MX. I will be volunteering with Healing Days, an event in Tucson that happens every three months. And in Hermosillo I have been invited to do a talk about trauma and self care. I am continuing to build relationships with activists and healers at the border, with hopes of contributing to the effort, offering healing and reinforcement to the folks who are on the front lines, tirelessly providing care to refugees and others who are affected by the situation there.  

In my experience, those who serve others are often less dedicated to making sure their own needs are well met.  And since the bulk of the work I do now is with people in helping professions (clinicians, administrators, healers of various sorts), I plan to team up with an organization or two at the border where I can do some volunteer work with clinicians and/or people in service on the front lines who are in need of some personal support.

For me, these past few years have been about getting myself positioned to contribute more to issues I am passionate about.  These trips to the border are only the beginning. I will keep you posted here. 

Below I include the latest version of my winter 2020 tour.  It will change as the days go by and things firm up.

  • Jan 23 – Arrive in Tucson
  • Jan 24-25 – Individual Sessions, Meetings with Friends
  • January 25 – Complex PTSD and Early Relational Trauma talk at Public Library
  • Jan 26 – Volunteer with Healing Days
  • Jan 27 – Leave for Hermosillo
  • Jan 28 – Red Tent Presentation – Anger and Using your emotions to achieve your heart’s desires
  • Jan 29 – Centro Zalzican – Complex PTSD and Early Relational Trauma
  • Jan 30-31 – Individual Sessions in Hermosillo
  • Feb 1 – Return to Guadalajara

I can easily craft talks about trauma in very basic terms, and the importance of trauma-informed care.  I also can teach techniques for helping people who have just experienced a traumatic event to calm their nervous system down so they can think and attend to next steps. This can be learned by anybody for self use or helping others.

Summing it up, I am interested in providing appropriate, high-quality therapies, knowledge and techniques to people who might not otherwise get it.   The kind of therapy I do is research-based, of the highest quality available for trauma.  A lot can be done in a session or two, and even more if follow-up sessions are arranged via video.  I will see English speaking service providers who are suffering physical symptoms that are likely due to secondary trauma and stress, or helpers who have diagnoses of PTSD/Trauma.  I would also be open to seeing non English speakers if I can have appropriate interpretive support.  Adequate support would necessarily be someone with a mental health background/pastoral experience.

If you have read this far, thank you.  If you feel so moved, please send me some words of encouragement, pass the word to people you know in Tucson and others who are concerned about the humanitarian crisis at the border.  I trust I will find just the right setting in which to plug in, but your well wishes and support mean a lot to me.  The border is calling me, and there are still so many important people there I wish to meet.

I will be providing as much pro bono work as I can.  But there may also be people who would like to schedule paid sessions with me.  That income will help subsidize my volunteer work, so if you know of anyone who might be interested, please pass the word.  You don’t even have to be local.  I offer EMDR Therapy via Internet, and I can receive payments via PayPal!  Or if you feel like you would like to make a monetary contribution, it could help me expand my reach and the amount of trauma work I am able to do.  I promise I would spend it wisely, always with the intention of maximizing my positive impact in the region and making a difference.  My expenses will include the following:

  • Bus fare and Air fare.
  • Meals while I’m on the road.
  • Missed work while I am traveling.
  • Car Rental/Uber
  • Incidentals – small gifts and compensation for hosts, etc.

Toni Rahman is a trauma-informed practitioner, certified in EMDR, and an EMDRIA Approved Consultant, who can provide consultation toward EMDR certification.  She is also trained in Advanced CranioSacral Therapy and SomatoEmotional Release and Hypnosis.

Affirmations to Address Blocks to Sweetness and Abundance

And the kicker, which is a combination of my conditioning and what my body instinctively knows: This really is a matter of life or death. I die either way. If I’m not attuned to or if I demand what I want/need. The ultimate double bind.

(As infants) “our most intimate sense of self is created in our minute-to-minute exchanges with our caregivers.”
“Early attachment patterns create the inner maps that chart our relationships throughout life, not only in terms of what we expect from others, but also in terms of how much comfort and pleasure we can experience in their presence.”

Bessel van der Kolk in The Body Keeps the Score

I get to reach out for what I want.
I am more of who I came here to be when I reach for what I want.
I get connection that feels sweet to me.
I get to have friends who give of themselves, who have skills, who do their emotional work.
Doing without is not a virtue.
Doing without is a way of shutting down and blocking the flow of good.
Identifying with doing without is another form of anger, resentment and unfelt pain.
God and I are on the same team.
God tells me what I want and need by giving me emotional responses, which I can attune to, and learn from.
I can be involved in this process.
It isn’t some mysterious process that happens behind the scenes.
If I stay in denial about my emotions and needs, I am telling myself that I am not worthy of my own care and attention.
There is no reward for applying austerity measures in response to scarcity.
I am totally worthy of the sweet stuff.
Doing without is not what gets me what I should have had in the first place.
Doing without is not what gets me what is already available and free for the taking: the really sweet stuff of life.
The really sweet stuff of life is free.
I am the one who gets to say what I like and what is sweet to me, in each moment.
There is no should when it comes to my desires.
I am completely worthy of pursuing my heart’s desires.
Spirit is right behind me, encouraging me to reach for and satisfy exactly that.
My heart’s desires are gifts, and I can attune to them, clarify them, and explore them.
I am encouraged to act on my desires.
I can be deeply satisfied even when I am reaching for other things I don’t yet have.
Me being deeply satisfied hurts nobody!
I can get what I want and need.
I release the pain, frustration, anger, resentment, and terror of not being well-attuned to in infancy and childhood.
I can let that go now.

These affirmations sprung out of my head after working with a client who shares my blocks around moving from scarcity to abundance.

The fear and pain and resentment that is trapped in a human body from infancy and childhood can be expressed in words.  Once the words are stated, a part of oneself can feel seen, heard and validated.  Once the feelings are acknowledged, they can actually be released.

Here are the emotions (not truths) expressed in words:

• If I do without (the sweet stuff – these profoundly necessary things: connection, being attuned to well, expression of my desires) I will be rewarded.
• The real reward comes if I am self-disciplined and accept doing without (without complaining or being upset).
• I will be rewarded with what I “really” need (what God thinks I need).
• If I accept the lie and tell myself I’m not worthy – for some reason – of the sweet stuff in life, then I will subconsciously believe that doing without what I really want will get me what I should have; that I will be rewarded and that I will then be worthy.
• Sacrificing gets me the good stuff, that I may or may not like or understand, but God knows better than me, so I’ll trust and accept that.
• If I accept the other lie that what I really want is not a trustworthy or reliable gauge of what I should have, I’ll eventually get what I should have.
• I can’t trust my desires, for sure. That will bring me unhappiness.
• Acknowledging my desires and outwardly reaching for what I want is selfish and bad and will only result in unhappiness.
• I will be punished if I act on my desires.
• There will be serious negative consequences if my wants and needs are deeply satisfied. It will probably really hurt someone I love.
• It is impossible for my wants and needs to be satisfied, so it’s an infernal waste of time to pursue that or focus on them.
• This really is a matter of life or death. I die either way.
• If I’m not attuned to or if I ask directly for what I want/need.

IDT Workbook – Now Available!

My new workbook is now available on Amazon! I’m so excited. You can get it here.

This course in a workbook will be your guide as you learn to recognize and eliminate internal/self-abuse and become a better, more loving parent to yourself.  It offers a practical, effective, research-supported framework including exercises to reduce the intensity and duration of emotional flashbacks, a symptom of Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD) and unresolved early stress and trauma.

This course is designed to equip you with tools to use when you:

  • Often find yourself stuck in internal conflicts about what you want and where you are going.
  • Are sometimes so harsh and unrelenting with yourself that you cannot relax and enjoy what you have.
  • Find yourself getting triggered often or staying triggered for long periods of time.

Tap into your deepest potential by learning to focus your attention.  Dare to invest the time and commitment that is necessary to replace old, worn-out strategies to avoid feeling vulnerable and replace them with authenticity, integration and health.  Reconnect with your body’s social engagement system by safely directing your compassionate attention inward. 

Get ready.  You are about to learn how to calm your nervous system and experience what it feels like to be held in the safety and stability of the parents you never had.

Get your copy here.

Attached – A Book Review

Attached.  The New Science of Adult Attachment and How it Can Help You Find – and Keep – Love.  By Amir Levine, MD, and Rachel S.F. Heller, MA

I found reading Attached to be a tasty experience.  So tasty in fact, that I read it again before putting it down.  It was very much like eating a cookie.  I raced through, devouring each crumb, excited to have found a book on attachment so easy to read; that the authors so clearly had researched and taken due diligence to present.  I learned a great deal while reading it, not just enjoying each nibble, the richness of its texture and balance by myself, but I also shared and reflected with other people – therapist friends and relatives who were reading it alongside me.  How exciting to see such a phenomenon as attachment come so fully onto the public stage in such a palatable form as this!  And by the time I had read it twice, I felt myself changed somehow. 

Since I am a psychotherapist, I found that Attached gave me heart, and a good many angles through which to enter the topic of relationships and help my clients move toward deeper intimacy and satisfaction in theirs.  Equipped with these tools and this knowledge it is easier to emerge from past failures with a sense of hopefulness and courage to try again.

I have always been intensely interested in relationships.  Long before I became a social worker or a psychotherapist I was devouring literature on intimacy and connection.  And as a person who has failed at relationships enough times to write ten books, I am especially grateful for Levine and Heller’s book.  I believe that it provided exactly the right ingredients and precisely the right texture and crunch.  I no longer identify as one of those poor, insecurely attached blokes who are not relationship material.

After finishing Attached for the second time and taking a separate, two-week webinar on attachment with my sister, and beginning to follow another phenomenal relationship, intimacy and dating expert, Ken Page, I can now say, with some certainty, that I am not as dysfunctional or broken as I previously thought.  In fact, I might even go so far as to say that I have a predominantly secure attachment style.  And yes, I was missing the cues that could have saved me so much time and heartache, had I come across this book decades ago.

What I’d like readers to know is that if they’ve failed at relationships, it may not be because they are jerks or incapable of empathy or are somehow broken.  It’s because they are still acquiring the basic skills to recognize a healthy, life-affirming relationship and what it actually feels like to be in one.

The thing I find missing in virtually all of the popular approaches on dating and intimacy is the concept of the emotional flashback, which should not be confused with attachment style, though does contribute to many of the behaviors this book talks about.

As you learn and grow and partake of the popular literature, make sure that you don’t over-identify as an avoidant or ambivalent or disorganized person.  What happens to me, and it may happen to you too, is that the prospect of new love, and the hope of connecting deeply is so moving and so tantalizing that I can lose my balance if I am not adequately caring for myself and tending to my important needs.  Intimacy serves as a portal into our deepest wounds, for better or worse, and as we become more mature connoisseurs of sweets, we gain important tools and discernment about which desserts leave us with a belly ache and which ones actually leave us feeling stronger, more ourselves and deeply, truly satisfied.

Ode to the Mother

I am willing to remember what it feels like.

Wow.  So many of us are traveling the same path, though not realizing how others are quietly doing their own work that is so very similar to ours, right alongside us.

It was so lovely to see Trina Brunk drawing on her Paneurhythmy roots in her recent post, and this exquisite piece of music with her resonant, moving rendering.  I was listening to it this morning, wrapping my mind around the idea that for the past several decades I have been learning how to put words to how it feels to NOT feel/have this. 

I listened thinking first of the universal feeling of unbounded, uncontaminated mother love – when it does happen – and then I made the Earth Day connection.  (How ironic! Because it was the Earth connection I know – not the infant connection with my biological mother). 

Today it strikes me that increasingly, I have seen the importance of feeling what THIS does feel like, even though it is not strongly in my immediate memory.  And anger and resentment and fear have been blocks to reaching consistently for it (stemming from old feelings of unworthiness?).  Below is an affirmation set I wrote for a friend a week or so ago.  It was inspired somewhat by Trina’s Closer Than You Think system of clearing old trauma, but also by Theta Healing, The Work, and EFT:

  • I now release any feelings of unworthiness from all lifetimes past, present and future.
  • I am willing to release feelings of unworthiness.
  • I can allow myself the time I need to remember what it feels like to be completely worthy.
  • I allow myself to remember what it feels like to be completely worthy.
  • I am completely worthy.

What a glorious musical piece; what a glorious expression of YOU, Trina.  To support us all in feeling loved and worthy of this huge unconditional love.


Pain

It is normal to have little sensitive points in our body. These points tell us about how the body is functioning. They are sore or sensitive not to tell us how we have failed. They are not there as a form of punishment. Making the pain along these points stop hurting is not our objective.  It’s not that we can be healthier if they don’t hurt.  I think sore points are our body’s way of saying This needs attention. There is a story here, and it wants to be told. And “this” is not just a point on your leg.  “This” is a point on a map – the map which is possibly on a meridian line that runs through the gall bladder and up into the jaw, and that that point of pain is like a little push pin.  It’s like a little light blinking, saying: HERE.  THIS IS HOW YOU CAN CARE FOR YOURSELF, BY NOTING THIS, BY BEING CURIOUS ABOUT THIS, BY SLOWING DOWN, ASKING FOR HELP AND APPLYING THE INFORMATION YOU RECEIVE.

Pain Really

Pain is when I’m simultaneously reaching for something and smacking myself back for reaching for it.

I’d like to open up a conversation about talking about pain, talking about our pain with other people.  Gosh, where to start?  All kinds of feelings of shame and embarrassment come up for me whenever I am telling people these days about the most exciting and the most fascinating project that I’ve been working on, which is correcting my bite, so that my body functions like it was intended to function, and I am not chronically defended or clenched and body parts are not cut off from my awareness.  And with some people I can approach the subject more easily.  But with other people, they have this reflexive response to the mere mention of pain (you included, maybe).  They think it is their responsibility to do something about it, when all I really want is to see if this is anything similar to what they experience.  I mention that I’ve had pain and chronic clenching, and for me that is progress – cause for celebration, actually.  But they reflexively wince, and apologize for my experience, which they are not in any way responsible for.  I am learning about the pain from my childhood and how to put words on it and share my ideas with other people because my numbness is parting (subsiding).  I am having moments of feedback from my body which is what I want, which is possibly what you want, too.  So what I’m talking about when I say “pain” is not anything approaching suffering.  Suffering is akin to victimhood…it’s got an element of powerlessness to it that makes it inescapable, possibly helpless.  So for you right now, suffering might be the ongoing barrage of information about how you are not living up to some expectation that you or some other person put on you, or a chronic resistance to the changes that are going on in your world, or a non-acceptance of something that life has offered you (emotions included).  Or it is you unknowingly fighting against yourself.  So you just suffer (tolerate, and cope in whatever way you can) it.  

I am thinking and talking about the pain in my neck or discovering from some therapist or another that this is happening in my body because of something I reflexively did to cope with my emotions as a child, and the last thing I want is to be that person who is obsessing about their pain, wallowing in discomfort – the person who talks about themselves incessantly.  But I am longing to share my ideas with other people because this is such a vast topic and I really don’t think I’m the only person doing this, and I think it is incumbent upon us all to take responsibility for bringing our unconscious pain to awareness so we can properly care for ourselves and move past the pain and suffering; to move into the fully-lived embodied present.  And we cannot do that alone.

Retreat from Pain

 

What is pain anyway, but information.  It’s upsetting to me when I tell my dentist that my tooth doesn’t feel right.  The tooth feels like it is being pushed out, I tell her.  I feel frustration when even talking about what’s happening with my tooth because it doesn’t “hurt.”  It is holding frustration.  It feels like it is being pushed out by my body.  When the dentist tries to pin me down for a better explanation, and she goes about tapping it to determine whether it “hurts” or not, I’m just like, “It doesn’t hurt, but if you don’t stop that I AM GOING TO SMACK YOU.”  That’s NOT physical pain. It’s a flavor of sensation (frustration? despair?).  Nuance.  It is information wanting to be acknowledged, to be put into words.  Heard.  

For me, pain, right now, is information.  It is necessary, it is desirable.  I want to know about my body. 

I notice that when I cop to having sensations I don’t have shame.  But when I cop to being in pain or having been in pain for a long time or having chronically tensed muscles (against some numbed-out historical stressor), I’m slipping over into another territory, which people interpret as “suffering” and the moment people do that, I want to just retreat into my solitude because I don’t want to be that person.

Being Vulnerable Has Been Dangerous

So maybe that is why we have healers.  Because good healers are naturally curious about the kinds of sensations we are getting because that’s what they work with.  That is their medium.  And when we talk to other people about our journey with pain (physical or emotional); our experience, and we are reaching for understanding; we are reaching for more information to help us emerge and know ourselves and overcome suffering, it’s scary maybe because being vulnerable has been dangerous for us in the past.