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Why would I waste my time helping someone who can't even be bothered to do the bare minimum of reading (or listening to) a book ?
No, indeed, you wouldn't. As I appreciate you will be aware - so I write this for others coming across this thread and this posting - Dr Sarno wrote the following in 'The Divided Mind':

"Following the initial evaluation, the psychologist decides whether treatment within our program is appropriate. If it is found not to be appropriate, the psychologist may refer the patient to either psychiatric treatment or supportive psychotherapy, or both."

Imo some people with TMS who won't read a Sarno book (or read a Sarno book but don't take Sarno's advice and act on it) are probably either in need of "psychiatric treatment" or/and they need time to hit rock bottom in suffering their pain and other symptoms in order to overcome their brain's strong resistance to them doing anything effective to stop it TMSing symptoms. In Alan Gordon's book 'The Way Out' he tells of how his mother gave him a mind/body book to read that had helped a friend's son recover but he just threw it across the room and didn't read it for a year. Unfortunately, for some people, hitting rock bottom can take all too many years and "psychiatric treatment or supportive psychotherapy, or both" may be beyond a lot of people's financial means so they're liable to remain stuck.
 
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I think we do have to keep in mind that some people aren't readers.
Very true. A friend of mine wouldn't read a Sarno book so I suggested they read 'Dr. John Sarno's Top 10 Healing Discoveries' by Steven Ozanich, which summarises Dr Sarno's discoveries; they got on with this and are implementing the advice therein.
 
I really want people to get better. I wouldn't hang out on this forum after all of these years If I didn't, but virtually every time I read a question on here the first 'answer' I think is "Go and read the F--ng Book"

"But I read the book"
Yeah...like a Novel. Go and make it YOUR story. And all of those 'suggestions' that Sarno makes? If you're pain is that bad, make them absolute commands like YHWH is passing the 10 words to you...live it, do it, do it more...until it's invisible and automatic and your first thought. When I do get the occasional tickle, I don't think "Oh no! What have I done?"...my very first pavlovian conditioned thought is 'Oh crap...what's going on that I am not seeing... I better get out a pen and GO READ THE BOOK. Not 10 books. This is not a buffet. Go and Read SARNO.

Go and read it again...over and over until virtually every conditioned response is de-conditioned and you have an inside track on the fundamental rage makers that trigger your TMS...I have been doing this 25 years and I haven't changed on the inside one iota. I am just not that dynamic. When I read someones life story (who is still in pain) I see someone who thinks that 'talking about it' will make it better.. it won't. 'Journaling' about your 'feelings' is not going to stop your pain UNLESS it's aim and focus is on finding and exposing Unconscious RAGE.
This is between you and you and God. That's it. You might ask a simple question, but If you're writing a book about your very special , detailed symptoms, you never got it...you had the 'beginners luck' that a lot of TMS sufferers have with their first experience...just knowing there is nothing really wrong is powerful enough to make a lot of people's symptoms TEMPORARILY go away

I am amazed at all of the feel-good hippy crap that has showed up on here that has NOTHING to do with what Sarno taught.

"But his idea's would have evolved and all of this is so much nicer... he was mean. He was like my Dad. I don't like crabby old Italian Catholic men...I want an App to do this for me.....Oh..I read it back in 2010 but this is different because.....I am doing 'somatic tracking' and I am OK being in low grade pain all of the time..but THIS is really bad....I have been meditating and going to therapy... Namaste

I have always been eternally grateful to the emergency room doctor who stuck his face in mine and said 'There is nothing wrong with you...I deal with Bullet injuries and broken bones...your 'Pain Doctor' is probably really sympathetic and says lots of warm and fuzzy feelgood things, writes you a scrip and punts...Guys go into chronic pain so they can make their 3PM tee time... I am a REAL doctor.'

That A-hole was actually the first person to tell me the truth. All of the Warm and Fuzzy hippy crap that got me 'in touch' with my feelings left me in AGONY. Focusing on the pain and becoming 'OK' with it, left me in AGONY... I want an outcome...I came here to GET OUT OF PAIN.

If you're new and wonder how to get better, GO AND READ THE BOOK. If you're relapsing and in pain GO AND READ THE BOOK. If you have a question or just need to vent? PM one of us recovered people. But remember...the A-hole who tells you the truth is way more useful than the nice person who tells you the warm and fuzzies.

namaste.....whatever that means
 
This. Is. Awesome. ( and true). I have been re -listening to his audio book for the 4-5th x and FINALLY getting thru my thick head. So sick and tired of the bs. THIS !!!!!! Thx!!!!!
 
I really want people to get better. I wouldn't hang out on this forum after all of these years If I didn't, but virtually every time I read a question on here the first 'answer' I think is "Go and read the F--ng Book"

"But I read the book"
Yeah...like a Novel. Go and make it YOUR story. And all of those 'suggestions' that Sarno makes? If you're pain is that bad, make them absolute commands like YHWH is passing the 10 words to you...live it, do it, do it more...until it's invisible and automatic and your first thought. When I do get the occasional tickle, I don't think "Oh no! What have I done?"...my very first pavlovian conditioned thought is 'Oh crap...what's going on that I am not seeing... I better get out a pen and GO READ THE BOOK. Not 10 books. This is not a buffet. Go and Read SARNO.

Go and read it again...over and over until virtually every conditioned response is de-conditioned and you have an inside track on the fundamental rage makers that trigger your TMS...I have been doing this 25 years and I haven't changed on the inside one iota. I am just not that dynamic. When I read someones life story (who is still in pain) I see someone who thinks that 'talking about it' will make it better.. it won't. 'Journaling' about your 'feelings' is not going to stop your pain UNLESS it's aim and focus is on finding and exposing Unconscious RAGE.
This is between you and you and God. That's it. You might ask a simple question, but If you're writing a book about your very special , detailed symptoms, you never got it...you had the 'beginners luck' that a lot of TMS sufferers have with their first experience...just knowing there is nothing really wrong is powerful enough to make a lot of people's symptoms TEMPORARILY go away

I am amazed at all of the feel-good hippy crap that has showed up on here that has NOTHING to do with what Sarno taught.

"But his idea's would have evolved and all of this is so much nicer... he was mean. He was like my Dad. I don't like crabby old Italian Catholic men...I want an App to do this for me.....Oh..I read it back in 2010 but this is different because.....I am doing 'somatic tracking' and I am OK being in low grade pain all of the time..but THIS is really bad....I have been meditating and going to therapy... Namaste

I have always been eternally grateful to the emergency room doctor who stuck his face in mine and said 'There is nothing wrong with you...I deal with Bullet injuries and broken bones...your 'Pain Doctor' is probably really sympathetic and says lots of warm and fuzzy feelgood things, writes you a scrip and punts...Guys go into chronic pain so they can make their 3PM tee time... I am a REAL doctor.'

That A-hole was actually the first person to tell me the truth. All of the Warm and Fuzzy hippy crap that got me 'in touch' with my feelings left me in AGONY. Focusing on the pain and becoming 'OK' with it, left me in AGONY... I want an outcome...I came here to GET OUT OF PAIN.

If you're new and wonder how to get better, GO AND READ THE BOOK. If you're relapsing and in pain GO AND READ THE BOOK. If you have a question or just need to vent? PM one of us recovered people. But remember...the A-hole who tells you the truth is way more useful than the nice person who tells you the warm and fuzzies.

namaste.....whatever that means
 
Omg I need to read how to post on HERE. GeeZUS. THIS I have read 3 x. This post ALONE has helped me over the hump. I feel like the chick in Hancock…the one who was his counterpart who was dead on the table, then started to come back to life? I have been exactly that person at the buffet! Listened to Sarno again ( have the audiobook and can’t really say how many x I listened to it). I FINALLY HEARD IT.
 
Omg I need to read how to post on HERE. GeeZUS. THIS I have read 3 x. This post ALONE has helped me over the hump. I feel like the chick in Hancock…the one who was his counterpart who was dead on the table, then started to come back to life? I have been exactly that person at the buffet! Listened to Sarno again ( have the audiobook and can’t really say how many x I listened to it). I FINALLY HEARD IT.
Lol You sound just like @Baseball65; you must be his 'twin'! ;);)
 
Omg I need to read how to post on HERE.
So if you are looking at someone's post and hit Reply it will quote the entire thing. You just need to make sure your cursor is at the very end of all that text, outside of the last closing bracket after the last [/QUOTE] Then you can start typing your response.

Alternatively you can highlight a short part of someone's post as I did just now. When you do that, a black balloon appears right under the highlighted text, which says Reply. When you click on that, just that selection gets quoted, and the same rule applies - make sure your cursor is after the final closing bracket before you start typing. You can keep inserting bits of quotes by carefully placing your cursor on a blank line where you want the new snippet to appear.
 
I would like to make a point about reading comprehension. Reading alone is not a panacea. Unless people comprehend, digest and take every Sarno's word to heart (and to brain!), their pain would not go away. It is that last inch of the way that many people cannot cross.

There are so many different ways TMS shows up in people's lives. Then, there are the multitude of ways that people interact with the world and learn stuff that's important. It's so hard for some folks to cross that last inch or two.

Some will make the connection they need in some other powerful way that then makes the Sarno book pages come alive. Need to get through deeply, and it's different for all of us how that can happen.
In fact, none of us knew how it might work before it actually clicked for us. So, let's be patient with each other and embrace difference.
 
I am so freaking bullheaded it takes being smacked upside and down the other to get thru to me. Seriously , I gotta touch a hot stove a couple times. While it’s been great for my job ( to be relentlessly stubborn)…not so much “unlearning” my pain isn’t something broken. Getting there!!!! I like raging in my car. If I’m in traffic I just pretend I’m on my phone. Folks don’t know I’m verbally writing an anger letter to someone ;)
 
I realize this post started a while ago but just stumbled onto it. With that said - and I suspect this may cause strong opinions - can anyone tell me if the practice of JournalSpeak by Nicole Sachs is that different than what Sarno wrote about? Since she was a protege of his and he helped to cure her of her TMS symptoms, I'm thinking they are pretty similar? Or am I missing something that is critically different between the two? I have done Journal Speak and feel like I have gotten to some pretty deep suppressed feelings but maybe I'm still not getting deep enough which is why I ask. Thanks for any thoughts!
 
can anyone tell me if the practice of JournalSpeak by Nicole Sachs is that different than what Sarno wrote about?
It all comes under the heading of "therapeutic writing" and every mental health practitioner who advocates for the value of writing describes it a little differently. There is no inherent difference in the concept which has been well-known for many decades, probably centuries, really. Dr Hanscom refers to it as "expressive writing". Nicole packaged therapeutic writing into a formal timed practice along with meditation, which works really well for those who like clear guidance.

Whereas I just call it "writing shit down" and I practice it quite randomly and as needed. I already had experience with therapeutic writing as a concept well before I knew about TMS - for instance, I introduced the idea of the "unsent letter" to a teen foster kid who had a ton of rage against her mother. It would be another ten years before I found Sarno and the SEP and applied the techniques to my TMS.
 
It all comes under the heading of "therapeutic writing" and every mental health practitioner who advocates for the value of writing describes it a little differently. There is no inherent difference in the concept which has been well-known for many decades, probably centuries, really. Dr Hanscom refers to it as "expressive writing". Nicole packaged therapeutic writing into a formal timed practice along with meditation, which works really well for those who like clear guidance.

Whereas I just call it "writing shit down" and I practice it quite randomly and as needed. I already had experience with therapeutic writing as a concept well before I knew about TMS - for instance, I introduced the idea of the "unsent letter" to a teen foster kid who had a ton of rage against her mother. It would be another ten years before I found Sarno and the SEP and applied the techniques to my TMS.
Thank you! I feel like I'm getting hung up on semantics as they do all seem like forms of expressive writing (I have read others as well). I'll keep writing/raging away!
 
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