Is using your phone repression?

[StrappingStanley]

I find myself using my phone to avoid situations quite a lot. With this have anything to do with trying to repress emotions?

Is this a behavior people with TMS should avoid at all costs?

Final question for today is, I used to get bad pain sitting up straight and that has been OK lately, but the really bad pain still always 100% of the time comes back when I sit down and lean forward, So every time I need to use the bathroom. Could this still be a conditioned thing? It only happens when I sit and lean forward, I have never had relief from doing that. I can lie on my back and squeeze my knees to my chest and get no pain so… hard to say. When I sit down and lean forward and feel the pain coming, what should I do?

 

[Baseball65]

So every time I need to use the bathroom. Could this still be a conditioned thing

Yep.

When I sit down and lean forward and feel the pain coming, what should I do

That's brings back memories. Long before I found Sarno, I could work for 12,15, 17 hours at hard labor without a twinge, but when I mildly leaned forward to wash dishes or fold laundry my shoulder KILLED me!!


The very fact that you have noticed this very peculiarly simple action as a pain causer is proof positive that is is conditioned...it only takes one or two ID's for a conditioned response to click...mercifully, it only takes a couple of focused 'Sarno' therapies to erase it and it is VERY erasable.

Two things. One is 'talk to yourself/talk to your brain' "OK....we're NOT doing this...you don't make any sense at all and I am gonna do it no matter how bad you try and scare me, so F You TMS, but I am gonna do this and you are gonna go away"...or your version of that.

Also, to decondition something , before you expose yourself to whatever that thing is....Have a painful topic ready to think about...either financial or a personal relationship that you are aware is a problem. Any Rage inducer will work, though the more painful, the better!

Before you do said activity, begin to think about your rage inducer..even though it is conscious, you are sending a message to the unconscious, overnight delivery that, 'I know what you're doing and we're not playing anymore'. This is literally like taking a CD and scratching it with a nail...eventually it will get so scratched it can't play anymore. If it sounds crazy, it is...but it works and we ARE that simple.

The Phone thing? The fact that you're aware of it means it isn't 'repressed' or 'unconscious' so it probably at best is just aggravating the situation, but not a true 'cause'...

I spend hours upon hours on my phone looking at guitar's I am never gonna buy...It is clearly an avoidance strategy, but I don't think it is causing and pain..maybe exacerbating it, maybe a personality defect, but if we had to get rid of all of those to get better, we'd never recover (LOL)

 

[StrappingStanley]

That thinking of something and having it ready before doing the action is genius, thank you man. Thanks for always helping me.

 

[Baseball65]

That thinking of something and having it ready before doing the action is genius, thank you man. Thanks for always helping me.

That is probably THEE most important strategy in the Sarno arsenal.
Usually by the time I have a little something (tms) I have ignored it for a minute and it's printed itself in there.

To get rid of it, I usually remove all distractions and really focus hard on that 'recurring source of irritation'...Radio's, podcasts, Me chatting up my co-workers..I stop all of that and get MAD at the 'source'...I go inside and give it my FULL attention. I also maintain an attitude of 'disdain' for the pain like it is an annoying whining younger sibling.
There is many times where Sarno reminds us in 'Mindbody Prescription' to think of this as a contest of You vs You ....It hasn't failed me yet in over 25 years, but sometimes I wait too long to do it....it's amazing how we just hope it's gonna 'go away'. That's why Sarno is still the simple gospel truth of recovery