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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
 Posted - Dec 04 2005 : 07:00:41 AM
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How To Kill Pain
was the original title of this, but I remembered that it can also be used to sit still in meditation. Some types of meditation work much better if you sit perfectly still, but we are bothered by various body distractions like itching or discomfort. This same technique can be used to get rid of those things without moving at all.
this is something I was taught years ago by an alternative therapist.
It is extremely powerful and works for me in almost all cases.
i haven't been able to get it to work much for other people, because they can't concentrate, or don't believe it can work, or don't want to. I talked my ex-girlfriend through it, but as soon as the pain moved, she got scared and never wanted to try it again. She said she felt it was something we weren't supposed to do.
So I'm giving it to you guys here because I think meditation
will have strengthened your concentration and ability
to "go inside" and be aware, which is all that is necessary.
First I will try to abate a couple of fears I had about killing pain.
1) As you start to do this, the pain often moves and/or
changes. This is normal, and means you are doing it right. Just keep going.
2) The most common question is "What if i kill pain that was there for an important reason, like a broken bone? The answer is don't worry.
If there is a physical reason for it, the pain will go away, then come back later to remind you. I broke a bone once, and had to
do this twice a day to keep the pain away. I didn't go to the doctor for four months, so let that be a lesson to you! if it keeps returning; go to the doctor.
You will find that killing pain is what we are naturally
meant to do, and just didn't know it. The reason people don't know this is because they try to ignore pain. The body
creates pain to make us aware of something. This is the whole key to stopping it. if you become fully aware of the pain, it has accomplished its purpose and goes away.
The technique:
Prepare as if to meditate, in a quiet, comfortable environment, with eyes closed. You can do this anywhere once you get good at it, but start out this way.
I will use an example of a cut knee, but the technique is the same for any kind of pain, anywhere in the body.
You may need someone to talk you through it the first couple times if you can't remember all this.
Close your eyes and imagine your eyelids are like a movie screen. Imagine you are very small, inside your
head, looking at the screen. Being small, you can travel around in your body and look at things. Begin
to slowly move to the point of pain, imagining you see things within your body. So in the case of the
cut knee, I would slowly travel down the neck, seeing the throat, then seeing the lungs in my chest.
Still sinking down, I would see organs in my abdomen, intestines, groin, then move into the leg with
the pain. I would move down and see the muscles and bone in my upper leg. Remember everything is much bigger than me. I am not the big
body; I am a small point of awareness. I move down behind the knee in pain. I orient myself so the pain is directly in front
of me. So if your pain is on the back of your body, you would imagine turning around to look directly at it. In this case I am behind the cut knee imagining looking at the cut from the inside. Don't worry if you don't have a good imagination; this will work anyway. The pain helps us be aware.
Now that you are tiny and looking directly at the pain, you have to ask yourself questions about the pain; all of them relating to physical attributes that you normally receive with your senses. There are no "correct" answers. You're going to get weird, nonsensical answers, but it doesn't matter.
The power is in the asking of questions, and being fully aware of what you sense.
1) VISUAL:
What does it look like? how big is it? What shape is it? What color is it? Don't worry that things like the color change as you look at it. You're just trying to be fully aware of the color. Is it fuzzy or clear?
It will probably start to change or move because visual is our strongest sense, so that means it is working. But keep your full attention on it as you're only 1/5th done. If it moves, follow it.
2) TOUCH: What texture does it seem to have? is it soft or hard? is it prickly, or sharp, or smooth, or what?
Is it a pulsating, or shooting pain, or what? is it solid, or liquid or gas? What does it feel like if you touch it?
3) SOUND: What does it sound like? is it booming, a grating sound, scraping, screaming, is it a repetitive pattern? imagine what it sounds like.
4) SMELL: What does it smell like? As you look at it, you should be able to get a smell from it.
5) TASTE: What does it taste like? Is it bitter, salty, sweet, metallic, or what?
That's it. Go back to #1 'visual' again. Keep going through all five senses so that you can be fully aware of every sensual aspect of the pain. Once you are fully aware it will go away, or change. Usually with mine, it changes, shrinks, moves, then disappears. All within less than a minute.
If you want to practice, you can create pain. pinch yourself or stick something sharp in your arm and try it. Please don't draw blood; I don't want to be responsible for that!! It's easier if the pain is naturally occuring though so your attention is fully on getting rid of it and not on creating it.
Please reply with your experiences, or modifications, or other handy techniques! But don't change the instructions until you can make it work. It's really not very hard, especially for meditators. The only
time I can't make it work is when I'm distracted and can't take time to concentrate.
Etherfish |
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2005 : 12:18:32 PM
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Everything you described is a fine thing to do, but a lot of it is unnecessary to the purpose of handling pain. Any subtle focused attention at the center of the point of pain will accomplish the same, if you have good powers of concentration. Subtle (to the point of invisible) body movements around (and at) the pain point increase the effect greatly, fwiw. Subtle focused attention in infinitessimal movement is key. Playing with direction of movement/rotation unlocks a lot of power.
Use of the five senses are just one method for cultivating focus, but any other means of cultivating focus will work equally well (suggestion: add in mantra), and once you've developed the ability to focus, you can drop all that and just immerse attention instantly.
Though it's not necessary for pain deflection, what your therapist stumbled into with the senses is far more profound than anything s/he likely imagined. See my postings in this thread for more info: http://www.aypsite.org/forum/topic....TOPIC_ID=500 |
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Ute
39 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2005 : 3:42:02 PM
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Jim and his Karma wrote:
Any subtle focused attention at the center of the point of pain will accomplish the same, if you have good powers of concentration. Subtle (to the point of invisible) body movements around (and at) the pain point increase the effect greatly, fwiw. Subtle focused attention in infinitessimal movement is key. Playing with direction of movement/rotation unlocks a lot of power.
Jim,
You took the words right out of my mouth! I intuitively found exactly the same method including those micro-moves you describe and have used it for years.
I think Etherfish’s process is a structured attempt to guide people there, especially those who are not so used to focus attention. Zooming in on the pain directly works for me. Instead of fighting pain, I just dissolve into it. It gets quite interesting because it shows me pathways and connections of places that are activated around the pain. Sometimes the origin is elsewhere. Surrendering into them dissolves the pain and draws me into a very deep and quiet space of stillness. It doesn't necessarily fix what's going on, but it allows me to be with it or go to sleep.
Blessings,
Ute
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rabar
USA
64 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2005 : 4:25:18 PM
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Just read through http://www.aypsite.org/forum/topic....TOPIC_ID=500
and was very pleased to see that others are enthused by the Inner Smile
exercise also. For pain control, I would add the preliminary to the
Inner Smile: think of someone or something or somewhere you love, smile
a big smile, and then start sending that smile to various part of the
body. You can do it in five minutes, or take the scenic route. I enjoy
both. A good book on human anatomy with graphics also helps with visualization,
I find. I use "The Human Body: An Illustrated Guide to Its Structure, Function
and Disorders," Editor Charle Clayman. Amazon has 30 available at one-third
price - $12.50 delivered. ($30 list). |
Edited by - rabar on Dec 04 2005 4:30:49 PM |
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Anthem
1608 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2005 : 5:19:02 PM
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Hi guys,
Great topic Ether, I think it is important to note in this thread that attention is not just useful to stop pain but also has a healing affect as well. Like Ute points out the pain disolves and a lot of the time, it doesn't come back suggesting the source of the pain is released as well.
It all becomes a choice doesn't it? To let pain, emotional duress, any form of stress or discomfort touch us.
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2005 : 6:36:04 PM
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Hey,
I just rush attention to the spot also, but the method was necessary to get started.
Nobody I know can kill pain, so I thought somebody might use the info. It makes me feel validated as I've been trying to pass this on for years with no success, and here are other people who can already do it!
Glad I started this as it looks like it opened up a little portal of interesting stuff for me to
check out while keeping "I Am" as a central practice.
The kind of meditation I was talking about where you have to sit still is Patanjali's instruction to keep the mind on a single point. You are supposed to be able to see the essence behind it, then all kinds of siddhi are possible by concentrating on different things. I have heard that reality is given to us like a movie. The essence of God, the "Iam (om) sound" of creation of all things is vibrated something like 30 times a second, like the frames of a movie. In other words supposedly if you can fix your mind on a single point for a while, you will see that reality is not as "solid" as we think, but is a vibration of God energy.
My therapist probably wasn't 'stumbling' too much onto these concepts. She was an incredible, unlicensed therapist who only charged me $15 an hour but told me she wasn't going to do it anymore. She said I was "OK".
She said you could throw her out on the street with nothing and she knew how to fill her life with abundance. A few weeks later she said she was leaving the state and said a millionaire had set her up for life in a beautiful mountainous environment. I lost contact.
Etherfish |
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Ute
39 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2005 : 9:20:57 PM
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Anthem11 wrote: It all becomes a choice doesn't it? To let pain, emotional duress, any form of stress or discomfort touch us.
Anthem,
I have been thinking about that also. It seems to me that we can’t always avoid pain, but we can avoid much suffering. I see suffering as a personal reaction to pain, dependent on how much we identify with ego.
Take care,
Ute
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Anthem
1608 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2005 : 9:34:26 PM
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quote:
I have heard that reality is given to us like a movie. The essence of God, the "Iam (om) sound" of creation of all things is vibrated something like 30 times a second, like the frames of a movie.
I had a similar experience once during the tail end of my AYP session. I noticed or became aware that life is just an infinite series of "nows" or "now moments" and that we choose to bring all kinds of things into these moments with us like fear or expectation or any variety of baggage which distract us or take part of our attention away. Those "things" aren't really in the "here and now" with us but we hold on to them and then think they are.
Public speaking could make a good example. We speak every day, never a problem. Put someone in front of a thousand people and all of a sudden, for a variety of reasons, fear joins into the process. Fear isn't there intrinsically, we feel it because of our choice of perceptions and then it stays with us or sticks to us during our act of speaking.
quote:
My therapist probably wasn't 'stumbling' too much onto these concepts. She was an incredible, unlicensed therapist who only charged me $15 an hour but told me she wasn't going to do it anymore. She said I was "OK". She said you could throw her out on the street with nothing and she knew how to fill her life with abundance. A few weeks later she said she was leaving the state and said a millionaire had set her up for life in a beautiful mountainous environment. I lost contact.
Sounds like that therapist could be one of those "enlightened" we have been looking for in Frank's thread!
A
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Anthem
1608 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2005 : 9:57:52 PM
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Hi Ute,
Looks like we posted at nearly the same time, so I am just responding to yours now.
quote:
It seems to me that we can’t always avoid pain, but we can avoid much suffering. I see suffering as a personal reaction to pain, dependent on how much we identify with ego.
I am not sure I understand your reference about identifying with ego, but agree with your statement. To me, pain is our reaction to experiencing anything we don't want or anything we want to avoid and pleasure is the opposite. We are happy when we get what we want and unhappy when we don't. We are happy when we avoid not getting something (painful) and unhappy when we don't get what we want (pleasurable). To me, all action is born from trying to fulfill the pain/ pleasure equation. Even all of us here with our AYP practices are trying to gain a more pleasurable existence and are therefore inspired to action.
Anthem
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2005 : 10:07:22 PM
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"My therapist probably wasn't 'stumbling' too much onto these concepts"
I wasn't dissing your therapist. But if you'll read thru that thread I linked to (I suspect you didn't, which is cool, but what I'm talking about has zero to do with the pain thing), I believe that the reversal of the senses (in a different way from what she was saying, though she's pointing there) is the true pratyahara, and if that's ever been noticed by yoga authorities, they haven't said so publicly to my knowledge. I, too stumbled on this....from a related comment by Mantak Chia, which caught my eye, along with Swami Rama's advice to not start intoning mantra at the beginning of meditation, but to LISTEN for mantra deeply in the interior core of your body. The two together inspired pratyahara practice that has been a spiritual gold mine for me.
Chia didn't take this particular concept to the end, and neither did Rama. But I was lucky enough to stumble on both, and am grateful for their teachings, just as you (and we) are grateful your therapist found her piece of the puzzle!
Really, it's all stumbling. Aside from some rather stodgy, secret, and inflexible lineages of practice, the spiritual path is poorly demarcated. Cheers to Yogani for seeing this problem and offering a new roadmap that works superbly for our culture and time (and I'm certain he'd fess up to having devised it via lots of stumbling!). Cheers to all of us for leaving our own bread crumb trails....including this great thread you've created in order to generously share this info (for others to stumble upon)! |
Edited by - Jim and His Karma on Dec 04 2005 11:53:43 PM |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - Dec 05 2005 : 10:48:35 PM
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"Any subtle focused attention at the center of the point of pain will accomplish the same, if you have good powers of concentration. Subtle (to the point of invisible) body movements around (and at) the pain point increase the effect greatly,"
does this get rid of all pain quickly, and for a prolonged period? "increase the effect" sounds like maybe not?
What does subtle mean? without trying maybe? Does it matter how the infinitessimal movement is done? by rotation, do you mean like rotation of a joint, or the energy?
Sounds interesting; I just don't understand.
Thanks,
Etherfish |
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Ute
39 Posts |
Posted - Dec 06 2005 : 10:00:55 PM
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Anthem wrote: I am not sure I understand your reference about identifying with ego, but agree with your statement. To me, pain is our reaction to experiencing anything we don't want or anything we want to avoid and pleasure is the opposite. We are happy when we get what we want and unhappy when we don't. We are happy when we avoid not getting something (painful) and unhappy when we don't get what we want (pleasurable). To me, all action is born from trying to fulfill the pain/ pleasure equation. Even all of us here with our AYP practices are trying to gain a more pleasurable existence and are therefore inspired to action.
Anthem,
By ego I mean that part of myself that relates to who I am in this earthly existence, basically Ute. This identity is essential in managing my life, but I see it as a manifestation of the greater spirit, rather than an end in itself. Sometimes we speak of identifying with the smaller self or the Higher Self. When I think that Ute is all there is to me, I start taking things very personally and I’m more apt to suffer. I differentiate pain from suffering. I might experience physical pain and that is something to be dealt with. When I take it personal and ask, ”why me” or have some similar reaction, it becomes suffering.
Many spiritual practices try to get us beyond the yoyo effect of likes and dislikes. Patanjali addresses it in the Yoga Sutras as part of the Kleshas (obstacles). I’m not very versed in Buddhist literature, but I think it’s part of the suffering to be overcome. Krishna teaches about it in the Bhagavad Gita. When we learn to access Inner Stillness in our AYP practice, we are also less likely to get jerked around by the myriad of ups and downs in everyday life.
I hope this helps
Ute
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Ute
39 Posts |
Posted - Dec 06 2005 : 10:14:39 PM
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Etherfish wrote:
What does subtle mean? without trying maybe? Does it matter how the infinitessimal movement is done? by rotation, do you mean like rotation of a joint, or the energy?
Sounds interesting; I just don't understand
Etherfish,
I don’t know if I experience it exactly like Jim, but for me it is intuitive, spontaneous micro-movement. It’s more about letting it happen than making it happen.
I hope this helps,
Ute
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - Dec 07 2005 : 01:55:50 AM
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| Micromovement is exactly it. also, it can heal as well as block pain. |
Edited by - Jim and His Karma on Dec 07 2005 03:02:40 AM |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - Dec 07 2005 : 07:26:32 AM
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In my first post I wrote exactly what steps one can follow to stop ALL of the pain so it will stay completely gone. People have hinted that there are much easier ways to do it, but you're not telling how to do it (other than inner smile).
It sounds like you're saying just kinda ('subtle') put your attention on the pain, and some microscopic movement happens by intuition and the pain goes away. Just 'let it happen'.
So what I'm getting from that is there are really no steps or action that i can take today to implement this; that it is something that just 'happens' maybe in some later development that I haven't reached? Is that correct?
I mean, if I just let the pain happen, it doesn't seem to go away.
I might not care as much, but it's still pain.
Etherfish |
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - Dec 07 2005 : 1:19:39 PM
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Imner smile itself won't remove pain or heal acute problems (though the things you learn from it, after a long while, can). It's not inner smile I'm recommending here...it's tangential.
Didn't mean to be obtuse, Etherfish, I'm genuinely trying to offer helpful info. I don't have it reduced to a clear, analytical step-by-step process, but I think I've brain-dumped where I'm coming from. If I'm doing a poor job, I apologize...I'm having the busiest month of my life. In January I'll have more time to settle down and post more methodically.
Meanwhile, again, your way works fine. I guess you think I"m sneering at it or something. I'm not, at all! If I've done a poor job of describing how to remove some of the excess, hopefully that can wait a while till I'm able to express it more clearly. Meanwhile, lots of good stuff in this thread for all to chew on.
J&K |
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Ute
39 Posts |
Posted - Dec 07 2005 : 9:42:30 PM
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Etherfish,
I meant to validate your experience, not diminish it. My intention was to say, ”hey, I know this healing space, too and this is how I get there”. I believe your approach is a structured procedure to get there. It is absolutely valid. It’s one of those things where there are several approaches, some better explainable than others.
Blessings,
Ute |
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Anthem
1608 Posts |
Posted - Dec 08 2005 : 12:54:21 AM
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Thanks for clarifying Ute.
A
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mystiq
India
62 Posts |
Posted - Dec 19 2005 : 04:28:05 AM
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Lots of very interesting and informative stuff.If this thread continues can be the stuff of which doctorates are made.I used to do a practise of placing attention on the breath along with the repetetion of soham hamsa.So inbreath ham outbreath, ham inbreath and sa out breath.When a pain occurs i immediately focus on the breath with the repetetion of this mantra and the focus shifts from the pain. Never tried it for intense pains like broken bones. I also use this when I have to use strange toilets while travelling and get constipated lol.It helps. I cant wait to use etherfishes method the next time pain comes around.
mystiq |
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Kyman
530 Posts |
Posted - Dec 25 2005 : 8:50:41 PM
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Recently in my life I became aware of the energy of the body and how that can be used to decrease or eliminate the sensation of pain. Partially in sitting meditation, but most thoroughly and dramatically while having a migraine. Though I could have bad migraine, I can lay down in concentration and feel no pain at all.
It is so weird, as a child I experienced something so profound but it was fleeting. A momentary glimpse, a clarity of the state of our being. I was maybe 9 or 10 years old, laying in the nurses office with a migraine that had completely incapacitated. It wasn't like an ache you are aware you have, but more like a recent injury that has you beside yourself because it is humming with pain. I remember laying there for a while, thinking, how is this hurting me. Where is it that it is touching me and hurting me. I swear, for a few seconds the pain was there bit it did not hurt me.
Later in life I realized why that was so. In that small moment I became more conscious of the sensation, and temporarliy abided in its mystery. My curiosity allowed me to observe it within the truth that I did not know what it was. I wasn't labeling it at that point. It was just an unconditioned sensation, neither good or bad. |
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - Dec 26 2005 : 01:36:12 AM
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" I wasn't labeling it at that point. It was just an unconditioned sensation, neither good or bad."
Kyman, that's actually very close to a major goal of spiritual practice right there. If you can view everything without labeling or filtering it through conditioning, preference/aversion, etc., that would be just fantastic. Exist at the level of pure unfiltered "raw" experience. That's what we're shooting for. Detach from grasping and labeling and prefering or scorning.
The result shouldn't be stoic, cold, blase, aloof, or non-caring. That's a common misstep taken by seekers who misunderstand the concept of "detachment". There's love to it. It's juicy, not dry. It's about indiscriminate embrace of the whole of existence, rather than spurning individual parts. A migraine's as "good" as a hot fudge sundae (sorry, Meg). It is what it is. "What it is!" is one of the great American mantras!
For inspiration on all this, have a look at this spiritual classic, the hsin hsin ming: http://www.allspirit.co.uk/hsinhsinming.html
Here's a Christmas thought. If a present was given to you with enormous love and consideration, you wouldn't pick it apart, choosing what to love and what to hate. You'd just embrace the feeling contained in the gesture.
The world is given to us in a gesture of humungous love and consideration. Every aspect of it is far denser with richness, feeling, and gut-wrenching beauty and expressiveness than the most stirring painting or symphony. And it must work exactly as it does (migraines and sundaes are all facets of the same love). We open ourselves to this gift only in dribs and drabs. Throw open your doors for just a moment and savor it all...not for what it is, but for the love behind it. |
Edited by - Jim and His Karma on Dec 26 2005 01:52:11 AM |
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Frank-in-SanDiego
USA
363 Posts |
Posted - Dec 27 2005 : 8:37:10 PM
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Hari Om
~~~~~~~
quote:
Originally posted by Jim and His Karma
Everything you described is a fine thing to do, but a lot of it is unnecessary
TYLENOL 
Frank In San Diego
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - Jan 07 2006 : 4:36:54 PM
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maybe Tylenol works better for other people than me, but for me
it doesn't kill the pain of a broken bone or a massive cut with huge blood loss, or even a migraine headache. maybe I have a greater tolerance for drugs than you.
Etherfish
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How to Kill Pain or Sit Still in Meditation
