Recent content by If 6 was 9

Thanks for thinking of me, Plum, so nice of you! They’re some useful words. The difference with me is I never went through church. Brought up pretty much an atheist. I like to joke that I’m a god fearing atheist but maybe it’s no joke. I agree, the awe you feel with nature is something special...

Thanks SpinCycle, that’s exactly what I needed to hear! I was starting to think that atheism/agnosticism was holding me back in my recovery. As it happens I had an “episode” on the weekend of my back flaring up after working all day in the garden. During the work I was getting twinges of pain...

Thanks Plum, you’re still just as eloquent, I see. Really lovely words. BTW I really wanted to correct the typo in “agnosticism” in the subject line of this thread but it wouldn’t let me! I’m sure it must mean something (probably that I’m a perfectionist)

Thanks MiffyBunny, it’s sort of what I was hoping to hear. I can see how spirituality or belief in a deity could help, and I almost wish I did have that faith. It’s just that Steve O said in his book that he noticed that atheists had more trouble perhaps for that very reason (not having...

Hi Jane.Fearless, that sounds really tough, I can imagine how frustrating, annoying and probably scary that may seem right now. I have to admit I hadn’t heard of that condition before and went and read an online research paper to find out more. One of the ideas they posed in the research paper...

Hi, I've been away from this for a while....I go through stages of becoming disillusioned with TMS, not to mention angry with it (maybe that's for another topic) but strangely enough I can never completely reject it. Having said all that, I'm still suffering from pain - lower back, where it...

Ah yes, if only I'd read past page 1! I take your point that the two ideas basically describe the same thing. I do a lot of swimming (as I recall you do or did, Plum) and I devote 100m of backstroke to each of Dr Sarno's 12 Daily Reminders, where I repeat each one to myself in a sort of...

Alan says here that pain can be triggered by accident because the brain can't distinguish too well between real life threats and mere anxiety caused by uncomfortable social situations. In which case the pain would be an expression of the brain's sense of danger. This seems to be a departure...

Thanks MindBodyPT. I've been using the 12 daily reminders as meditative truths, I might have to change the wording of that one (No.2). Maybe it could be worded "The direct reason for the pain is a change in the autonomic nervous system servicing the affected area." Not as simple as it was...

Hi all, apologies if this has already been asked but one of the late Dr Sarno's theories about pain was that it could be explained by mild deprivation of oxygen to the part of the body afflicted by pain. I have no trouble accepting this but how would you explain the pain experienced by...

Hi Zane, did you read Dr Sarno's book Healing Back Pain? In it he provides a list of 12 daily reminders. They're ostensibly for the back, but they can be altered to refer to any type of chronic pain. I found meditating on them for 90 seconds each really helped (made a total of 18 minutes, not...

Hi Puddin, I would say that if you're feeling depressed by the journaling topics then you've probably picked some good ones. Remember the goal is to uncover the buried emotions, if you're feeling depressed then you're obviously responding to them. In other words you're feeling, which is what you...

Hi all, Just a follow up to my gloomy last message when I got to the end of the SEP. The thrust of that post was that I'd finished the course in worse pain than when I started. That was true, and in the days that followed I got even worse than that and developed sciatica, which I've never had...