Why Somatic Tracking might not be working for you. (The science and theory behind why active visualisation works better for some.)

[BloodMoon]

I wanted to make a post about Somatic Tracking because I see people getting very frustrated and disillusioned when it doesn’t work for them. We often hear about the effectiveness of Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT). But when we try to sit with our pain with "neutral curiosity" and nothing changes—or it gets worse—it’s easy to feel like we’re failing.

If Somatic Tracking is backfiring or doing nothing for you, I don't believe you're doing it wrong. The clinical theory behind it might actually be missing what your specific nervous system needs right now. Looking at the neuroscience of pain management, it makes perfect sense why pure tracking fails for some—and why active, metaphorical visualisation can be a highly effective alternative.

I actually wanted to share a personal win with this. I had been trying standard tracking, but it wasn't helping me. So, I decided to try something different. I started spending a little time each day visualising oiling my clicking jaw joint, picturing it becoming completely lubricated, smooth, and moving without friction. Amazingly, my jaw is now clicking much less.

With a little help from AI to help me put this together, here is the actual science and theory behind why active visualisation like this can work so well:

1. Neuroimaging shows "neutrality" can cause threat hyper-focus
Somatic Tracking asks you to look at a painful sensation objectively. However, functional MRI (fMRI) studies show that chronic pain significantly alters the brain's body-self neuromatrix. If an area is chronically tight or painful, your amygdala and anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) are already flashing with danger signals. Forcing yourself to pay close attention to that spot under the guise of "neutrality" can accidentally result in hyper-vigilance. Instead of calming the brain, you are shining a massive spotlight on the alarm system, which can cause the brain to dial up the tension and pain volume.

2. Active visualisation activates the Gate Control Theory
Pure Somatic Tracking is passive—you just watch and allow. But many of us have nervous systems stuck in a severe fight-or-flight state. Sitting still and just "observing" a fire feels terrifying. Your nervous system might actually require a sense of agency and action.

This is where active, metaphor-based guided imagery shines. When you visualise a highly specific, comforting physical action—like oiling stiff joints, softening rigid tissues, or physically "scraping" and disposing of the tension and pain—you trigger the classic Gate Control Theory of Pain.

By flooding your brain with detailed, non-threatening sensory inputs (picturing the smooth glide of oil, or the weight of pain being thrown away), you are sending descending signals from the brain down to the nervous system. This heavy cognitive engagement effectively "closes the neural gate", blocking the upward transmission of distress signals.

3. Turning off the "Bracing" Reflex
When a joint is clicking or painful, the surrounding muscles instinctively tighten up to protect it. This is called muscle bracing, and it actually increases friction and makes clicking worse. By deeply focusing on a soothing metaphor like "lubricating the joint", you physically trigger the parasympathetic nervous system. Your brain stops sending the alarm signals that cause those (e.g. jaw) muscles to lock up. As the muscles relax, blood flow increases, the joint decompression allows for smoother tracking, and your body naturally releases endorphins (our internal painkillers).

The Bottom Line
If purely observing your pain makes you anxious or does nothing for you, don't force it. If imagining yourself lubricating your tissues or disposing of the heavy tension gives you relief, that is a completely valid, neurophysiologically sound way to retrain your brain. The best tool is the one that actually brings your nervous system peace.

 

[Zaylou]

This is a great post, thank you for sharing. I'm thankful somatic tracking works for me, but I've also found visualization helps. I also have issues with my TMJ joint. I like your idea of visualizing oiling it. I'm going to try that tonight. I like to visualize, in a non creepy way, unhooking my jaw bone from my face and setting it on a shelf to rest overnight. That allows all of the muscles, tendons, ligaments, whatever is compressed between the joint, to release and relax overnight. I'm going to add visualizing oiling the jaw while I'm at it!

 

[Ellen]

Great idea! I'm really enjoying these informative posts you make.

I'm going to try this. I've been feeling very stiff lately and haven't determined if it's TMS or just normal aging. I was just telling a friend how I feel like I need a good oiling. So now I will visualize that happening.

I regularly read quotes from A Course in Miracles, and the one today is: "All thought creates form at some level." Synchronicity?

 

[BloodMoon]

I've been feeling very stiff lately and haven't determined if it's TMS or just normal aging.

A big component of my TMS was stiffness — my hips and buttocks in particular were like the Tin Man’s from The Wizard of Oz. I still experience some residual stiffness (in my muscles, and my left shoulder joint). I did some visualisation last night where I imagined them being massaged, and almost immediately got some tingling sensations that literally gave me goosebumps, so I’m going to keep that up on a regular basis. Just thought I’d mention it, what with you saying about feeling stiff of late.

I like to visualize, in a non creepy way, unhooking my jaw bone from my face and setting it on a shelf to rest overnight. That allows all of the muscles, tendons, ligaments, whatever is compressed between the joint, to release and relax overnight.

I like it! II never thought of visualising the removal of a body part before! Started doing that last night too with my jaw... and tonight I’m going to visualise taking my left arm off like one of those mannequins they put in shop windows, to give my shoulder joint a rest.

 

[Duggit]

I have never done somatic tracking. Alan Gordon came up with that concept after I found other ways to successfully deal with when I have TMS. Nonetheless I will comment on why I think self-help somatic tracking can be ineffective.

I have watched videos of Alan Gordon doing somatic tracking with patients, and I have read his chapter on somatic tracking in his The Way Out book. He asks his patients a series of questions about their pain sensations. After every patient response, he tells the patient there is nothing physically work with him or her. In his book, he illustrates that with a patient he called Janet. After every answer by Janet about her pain, he would give essentially the same response. Here are three examples of his responses to Janet:

1. "Me: As you explore this tight, pulsing feeling in your back, remember that there is noting to fear here. Neuroplastic pain is actually a safe sensation. It's just your brain overreacting to neutral, safe signals from your body."
2. "Me: Remember, whatever happens to the sensation is okay. Because its safe. Your brain may misinterest them as pain sometimes, but they are safe."
3."Me: You're just watching and feeling with lightness and curiosity. This reinforces to your brain that the sensation is safe."

I my opinion, it is one thing for an expert in neuroplastic pain (aka TMS) to repeatedly tell you there is nothing physically wrong and quite another thing to do self-help somatic tracking, i.e., for you to tell yourself there is nothing physically wrong. Are you going believe yourself as readily and convincingly as you would believe an expert who is telling you the same thing?

 

[BloodMoon]

I my opinion, it is one thing for an expert in neuroplastic pain (aka TMS) to repeatedly tell you there is nothing physically wrong and quite another thing to do self-help somatic tracking, i.e., for you to tell yourself there is nothing physically wrong. Are you going believe yourself as readily and convincingly as you would believe an expert who is telling you the same thing?

Yep, my brain doesn't always want to believe me, that's for sure! I remember reading somewhere that, as part of his own recovery process, Alan Gordon carried around a stress-relief "toy" shaped like a brain and pretended it was his brain, talking to it and saying things like, "poor little brain," to soothe it, but I don't remember from when I read his book The Way Out whether he used somatic tracking on himself before he ever taught it to others. If he did, I guess his brain must have been at least somewhat receptive to his own self-talk — or at least that he believed it might be.

A catch with somatic tracking is contained in two small words that I remember Alan Gordon repeating in his book: outcome independence, which is, IMO, a big ask and a real hurdle to get over... You're not supposed to be watching the pain in the hope that it will go away; the moment you're secretly hoping it drops, you've told your brain that the pain still matters, and the "alarm" stays on. Instead, I gather that you're supposed to be doing it with the intention of reducing your fear of the symptoms.

Something I discovered long before I knew about Alan Gordon, and which seems akin to somatic tracking, was the work of the Buddhist monk Shinzen Young. He recorded a set of guided meditations for chronic pain relief where you don't tell yourself that there's nothing physically wrong; instead, you simply pay attention to the areas of pain in various ways — observing the nature of the pain, its intensity, whether it fluctuates or not, its exact location, shifting your attention to areas where there's no pain and then back again to the areas of discomfort, and so on. With some of his meditations, you do talk to yourself, e.g. to describe the sensations, intensity, etc., but you don't try to convince your brain of anything. I guess it's based partly on the Buddhist idea that resistance to "what is" can itself be part of the problem.

I used Young's meditations when I was bedridden with excruciating pain in my thigh. I couldn't sleep because of the pain when I was mentally resisting it, whereas when I observed it and "faced it head-on", I got some sleep. Perhaps I should have continued practising the meditations, as they might have helped reduce my resistance and fear of the symptoms even further. In my experience, at least, facing them head-on can certainly reduce at least some of the fear.

These are Shinzen Young's meditations, just in case anyone might be interested in them: Amazon.co.uk. (Some people don't like his voice because they say it's whiney, but I didn't mind it at all.)

 

[Ellen]

I guess it's based partly on the Buddhist idea that resistance to "what is" can itself be part of the problem.

I agree with this. I used mindfulness meditation to deal with pain long before Gordon started calling it Somatic Tracking. It works by eliminating the judgement the brain makes that these sensations are "wrong". They just are.

But I believe there is a cognitive reframing practice that @Duggit discusses above. Yes, it is very effective to have a kind medical professionalism tell you there is nothing to fear. (I think Sarno with his white coat was especially effective at this, as is Schubiner.) But I also think we can do this for ourselves by bringing in the rational logic of our higher brain to override the fearful primitive brain. Keeping an evidence list and referencing it in our self talk when in pain can also be effective.

 

[BloodMoon]

But I also think we can do this for ourselves by bringing in the rational logic of our higher brain to override the fearful primitive brain. Keeping an evidence list and referencing it in our self talk when in pain can also be effective.

To reference an evidence list while somatic tracking is a great idea.
I was also thinking about my experimentation with what my brain will respond to, which I mentioned in another thread a little while back. I found that when new symptoms have appeared, if I say something along the lines of, "Don't be ridiculous!" to my brain, I get a positive response and those symptoms don't stay around very long. Whereas, if I talk to it in any other way, there's no such effect.
So, at least from my experience, I think it can really pay to experiment with what we say and how we say it, which I guess can equally apply to how we talk to our brains during somatic tracking too.

 

[feduccini]

I think PRT and its tools are very good for the first phase of the work, when you need to lose some of the panic and have some control back. But then as the work evolves you get to a point where you need to pay attention to the whole scope of your life, with pain slowly moving away from the main stage. And it worries me the fact that somatic tracking is based on paying attention to symptoms, so I still use it but not too much.