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Recent Posts

Create a Safe Haven – Family

Pain = Frustration. In the presence of unrelenting pain this frustration can be intense. Anger is a survival reaction and it ...

Let’s Wake Up

Overview Our conscious brain interprets our internal bodily sensations. Since we are geared to survive, most of our time is ...

The Gift of Pain – Thanksgiving 2013

Pain, The Gift That Nobody Wants is a book written by an orthopedic hand surgeon, Paul Brand. Through his work ...

“I Want to Believe”

Florence, Italy My wife lived in Florence, Italy from 1983 to 1990. She is fluent in Italian and some of ...

Understand RUTs (Repetitive Unwanted Thoughts) and Solve Them

I am excited about my recent insights that have emerged from writing my new book on RUTs. It will be ...

Connect to Your Dark Side and Heal – Joy will Emerge

Overview Your survival reactions are meant to be deeply unpleasant, since they are protective danger signals. You have absolutely no ...

“Ride It Out!” Thriving After a Back-Breaking Horse Fall

Rachel is a therapist, specializing in trauma. She reached out to me a couple of years ago to learn more ...

“She Just Let Go”

My migraine headaches began on the Fourth of July when I was five years old. By age fifty, I had ...

Anger and Workers’ Comp Webinar

Our medical and political system has failed. Employers have abused workers as long as there have been employers and workers ...

Degenerative Disc Disease Isn’t a Disease

Surgeries being performed for axial neck, thoracic, and low back pain on normally aging spines was a major reason I ...

Physical versus Emotional Pain

The Swerve, by Steven Greenblatt is a historical account of a papal scribe’s discovery in the 1400’s of a poem, The ...

“The Journey of 1000 Moons”

“The Journey of 1000 Moons” by Ernesto Sanchez If you count the moon cycles you will experience in your lifetime, by ...

Stage 1 - Lay the Foundation

Select a step from the dropdown menu below to view the posts in that step. The steps are:

Step 1 - Learn About Your Pain
Step 2 - Expressive Writing
Step 3 - Active Meditation
Step 4 - Sleep
Step 5 - Don't Share Your Pain

Back Pain vs. Mouth Pain

I am a busy spine surgeon, yet I spend most of my time talking my patients out of surgery. When ...

Video: Memorizing the Circuits: Phantom Pain

Our brain has neurological circuits that can become memorized. In this video I discuss phantom pain, which is more the ...

Video: Your Brain Becomes Sensitized

I discuss how the brain becomes more sensitive to pain with repetition. I also introduce the first 3 “E’s” of ...

Video: Is Your Pain Structural or Not?

I look at the source of the pain and it’s receptors in reference to back pain and one’s spine. I ...

A Bunch of Balloons

Much, if not most, of what the DOC project presents about creating a central nervous shift is 180 degrees different ...

Video: Introduction of David Hanscom

In this introductory clip, I lay out my novel approach to chronic pain. In addition to sharing some of my ...

David Burn’s Letter

In the beginning of the DOC Project, the only resource that I had for my patients to deal with the ...

The Terrifying Triad

When a basic human need such as air, food, or water is not met, we experience a deep feeling of ...

Write and Don’t Stop!

There are over 2200 research papers that document that expressive writing in some form is effective for improving both ...

Your Demons are Robots

It is critical to understand how deeply negative anxiety-producing thoughts are etched into your nervous system. A 1987 Harvard experiment (1) ...

Normal Arms Amputated

It’s important for you to understand how powerfully and quickly pain circuits are embedded into the nervous system. It’s accomplished ...

Decreasing Anxiety with Control

Anxiety is the basis for most of our behavior and ability to stay alive. We have many cues around us ...

Sleep Disorders

Only five percent of patients have an adequate evaluation of their sleep issues by any physician. (1) This is unfortunate, ...

Writing at Bedtime

When you are under stress, your brain is on a Formula One racetrack. Being in chronic pain is one of ...

Sleep Meds

Nothing can really happen in the context of the DOC Project until you are regularly getting a full night’s sleep ...

Sleep Hygiene

Sleep hygiene is a term that’s used to describe a group of strategies that will improve your ability to get ...

Stage 2 - Forgive and Play

Select a step from the dropdown menu below to view the posts in that step. The steps are:

Step 1 - Understand the Impact of Anger on Your Life
Step 2 - Acknowledge Your Disguises
Step 3 - Admit Your Victimhood
Step 4 - Choose Not to Remain a Victim
Step 5 - Forgive
Step 6 - Play

Video 15/19: Anger Fueled Anxiety-“The Highway to Hell”

I discuss how anger is the turbocharger that keeps anxiety both covered up and fired up. Until you turn off ...

Enjoy Your Day-Today

“Happy” We all want to become better, happier people, and we work pretty hard at it. The marketing world keeps ...

Video 3/19: Completely Trapped

I talk about the frustration and the feeling of being trapped by chronic pain and how using the DOC Project ...

Video 2/19: Your Hand Over the Stove

Consider a situation where you are forced to hold your hand next to the hot burner of a stove. What ...

“I Understand Your Anger. Get Over It.”

I was relaxing this weekend and cleaning up stacks of papers that have been piling up over the last six ...

“Call Things by Their Right Names”

The culture of medicine is immersed in high standards, ideals, and perfections. Society demands perfection from physicians. It is manifested ...

A Tale of Two Golf Holes

I love golf. I love the social aspect of it. I love to hit a great golf shot. There is ...

My Victimhood

I was raised in an abusive household and living that life seemed normal because it was all that I knew. I ...

Advantages of Victimhood–No one Believes You

Without an obvious source of pain, patients eventually feel that no one believes that they have pain. It is an ...

Anger = Loss of Control

Anxiety is the feeling generated by your body in response to a threat. When a situation causes a feeling of ...

Anger and the Continental Divide

Playing the victim role is a universal part of the human experience. The word ‘victim’ does not sound very pleasing ...

Breaking Stress into Its Parts

I would like to define some terms. Stress is a vague term. I think that one of the most important ...

Anger/Victim with Worker’s Comp

There is a “genealogy” of frustration/anger. It is: Circumstance Blame Victim Frustration/Anger There are two types of “victimhood”: Perceived ...

Suppressing

We frequently deal with negative thoughts by suppressing them. We don’t want to feel negative, so we don’t. We think ...

Anger and Anxiety–Highway to Hell

There is an intense relationship between anxiety and anger. Understanding this interaction is perhaps one of the most important concepts ...

Stage 3 - Move Forward

Select a step from the dropdown menu below to view the posts in that step. The steps are:

Step 1 - Commit to a Daily Practice
Step 2 - Create a Safe Haven - Family
Step 3 - Get Organized
Step 4 - Connect with the Life You Want
Step 5 - Create Your Vision

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Stage 4 Posts - Expand Your Consciousness

Select a step from the dropdown menu below to view the posts in that step. The steps are:

Step 1 - Pass Through the "Ring of Fire"
Step 2 - Step Into Your New Life
Step 3 - "Failing" Well
Step 4 - Look Up - Your Spiritual Journey
Step 5 - Giving Back is Healing

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Stage 5 - Decision-making

Select a step from the dropdown menu below to view the posts in that step. The steps are:

Step 1 - General Principles - The Grid
Step 2 - The Source of Your Pain
Step 3 - The Impact of Stress on Your Pain and Decision-making
Step 4 - Understanding the Magnitude of the Surgery
Step 5 - Making the Final Surgical Decision
Step 6 - Stories of Surgical Despair

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Stage 6 Posts - Procedures

Select a step from the dropdown menu below to view the posts in that step. The steps are:

Step 1 - General Considerations: Magnitude vs. Benefit
Step 2 - Decompressions
Step 3 - Lumbar Fusions
Step 4 - Deformity Surgery
Step 5 - Other Spine Surgeries
Step 6 - Stories of Surgical Despair

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Important Posts

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Stories of Hope

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Expressive Arts Gallery

No posts found.

Other Posts

Repetitive Unpleasant Thoughts

Click a Show Section button below to view the posts in that section.

Section 1 - Overview of RUTs

Overview of RUTs

RUTs - Defining the Problem

“The Curse of Consciousness” – Trapped by Your Thoughts

Objectives: Unpleasant thoughts are impossible to avoid and can significantly impact your quality of life. They are a “neurological trick” created by your unconscious brain. They are not subject to rational interventions. The root cause of the problem is the ...

Quit Fighting Darkness and Turn on the Light

Objectives We are trained that if we can solve enough of our problems, we’ll have an “enjoyable life.” Life’s challenges never stop, and we may slowly sink into darkness, “The Abyss.” We become desperate trying to escape; especially from our ...

Am I Operating on Your Pain or Anxiety?

My surgical decision-making dramatically changed over the last five years of my practice. In spite of watching so many successes of people healing from chronic pain without surgery, I still had a surgical mindset and was always looking for a ...

My Descent Into The Abyss

Objectives There are many different physical and mental symptoms that are possible when you are in sustained flight or fight physiology. At my lowest point, I was experiencing 17 of them. No one could tell me what was happening despite ...

Section 2 - Solving RUTs

Solving RUTs

Separating Your Identity from Your Physiology

The Gift of Anxiety – Your Bodyguard or Prison Guard?

Objectives: Since the body’s response to threats affects every cell in your body, it feels like part of who you are. We spend a lot of time attempting to avoid this intentionally unpleasant sensation when it is necessary for life ...

Four Aspects of Solving RUTs

Objectives Mental and physical pain are processed in similar regions of the brain. Our inability to escape from RUTs relentlessly drives flight or fight physiology, and people may become ill. There is a healing sequence for solving them: separation of ...

The Popcorn Machine – Healing RUTS

Objectives Repetitive Unpleasant Thoughts (RUTs) are solvable with a multi-pronged self-directed approach. Consider the four aspects in the metaphor of a popcorn machine. They are 1) the kernels 2) the cooking pot 3) the storage compartment 4) the power source ...

Write and Don’t Stop!

There are over 2200 research papers that document that expressive writing in some form is effective for improving both your mental and physical health. I have been adamant for a long time that you should write down just negative ...

Unhooking from the Train

Your body under chronic stress There are multiple physical and mental manifestations of a chronically fired up nervous system. With engagement of the principles that calm it down, the improvements in my patients’ quality of life are consistent and frequently ...

The Three Column Technique

After you have become comfortable with writing down and immediately destroying your thoughts, the next phase involves the “three-column technique that Dr. David Burns outlines in his book, Feeling Good. It provides an excellent format in which to apply the principles ...

Active Meditation

A basic tenet of many Eastern philosophies is that worrying about the future and thinking about the past causes internal unrest. There is anxiety around the future and many regrets and frustrations about the past. By staying only in the ...

Anger Academy

Objectives Processing anger is more doable if it is broken down into its components. Anger is a powerful, necessary, and hard wired survival reflex. You cannot tame it with the conscious brain. It is an acquired skill that requires ongoing ...

Directly Calming the Threat Response

Your capacity to enjoy your life, feel safe and content is dependent on your body’s neurochemical profile. When you are stressed you don’t feel good. There are methods to regulate your body’s stress reaction and inflammatory response. The gift of ...

“5–3–2” – Processing Anger in Three Steps

Objectives Anxiety is an unpleasant sensation generated by your body’s physiological response to real or perceived danger. It compels you to take action to resolve the threat and live another day. If you cannot escape or solve the threat, your ...

RUTs – Can’t Take Your Hand Off the Stove? Turn Down the Heat

Holding your hand over a hot burner triggers an immediate threat response (anxiety) and prompts action to address that threat. This sequence is part of the protective pain response known as the nociceptive pain system. Numerous danger cues activate this ...

Quit Fighting Darkness and Turn on the Light

Section 3 - The Evolution of RUTs

The Evolution of RUTs

The Need for Mental Control – The “Ironic Effect”

Your Demons are Robots

It is critical to understand how deeply negative anxiety-producing thoughts are etched into your nervous system. A 1987 Harvard experiment (1) documented that when you suppress unpleasant thoughts, they become more powerful. Unfortunately, they documented a trampoline effect in that they ...

Your “Authentic Self”

The only “authentic self” that exists is the one who is present today – right this very second. Your actions and reactions reflect your entire lifetime of programming. Much of our programming is less than ideal but it is what ...

Your Personal Brain Scanner

Every second of your life depends on your brain scanning your surroundings for trouble. This unconscious process guides your behavior so as to avoid danger and maximize your chances of survival. You will become conscious of this ongoing interaction with ...

Threat versus Safety Physiology

Lesson Objectives Consider ongoing environmental input separately from your body’s responses. Understand the essence of illness/ disease is sustained exposure to real or perceived threats. It creates an adverse chemical profile that increases metabolism (your rate of fuel consumption) and ...

Common Links to Chronic Disease – RUTs are Relentless

Objectives: Understanding the nature of chronic disease and the principles behind the solutions, allows you to fully engage in your care. Characteristics that keep us alive are what also create disease states. Chronic pain is a neurological diagnosis that has ...

We have no protection from mental pain

Objectives: Pain from any body part is a protective danger signal that guides our behavior and physical responses to avoid danger and remain safe. This system is called the nociceptive system, which guides behaviors to not exceed the limits of ...

Section 4 - Consequences of RUTs

Consequences of RUTs

Clinical Manifestations / illnesses/ Diseases

Extreme Mental Pain – OCD

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is an extreme form of anxiety. A relentless assault of unwelcome intrusive thoughts characterizes it. I suffered from OCD for several decades, well before I knew what OCD meant. It is becoming increasingly apparent that many ...

School or Prison – What’s the Difference?

Bullying bothers me–a lot. When I was in middle school and high school, I was very fortunate in that I was not a target of bullying. However, I have watched dozens of friends and family come under attack from bullies ...

Threat Physiology Can’t be Controlled with Behavioral Approaches

Objectives Many people are focused on controlling anger and anxiety with behavioural approaches. These powerful reactions are not controllable and suppressing them increases threat physiology. We all need to be heard, supported, and taught methods to regulate and lower these ...

School or Prison – What’s the Difference?

Threat Physiology Can’t be Controlled with Behavioral Approaches

Section 5 - Healing Principles

Healing Principles

Addressing RUTs

The “C”quence of Healing Chronic Illness

Objectives Connecting to every aspect of your life is difficult but is essential for allowing your body to heal. “Being” with your past may be challenging, but it is necessary in order to learn and grow. It is the opposite ...

Your “Authentic Self”

Navigating Life is Similar to Playing Major League Baseball

Feeling safe is the essence of enjoying life, healing, and thriving Healing chronic illness happens by moving towards health not by “fixing” yourself. An analogy can be made to becoming a professional baseball player. The goal is to be “safe” ...

Become a Genius at Solving Pain

I always wanted to play golf at a level where I could consistently shoot in the 70’s. I began to play when I was 14 but I never took lessons and didn’t practice much. Then in college I subscribed to ...

Repetition and Healing

Objectives Learning any new material or skill is an active process than can only be acquired through repetition. There are few people with a photographic memory and even they need repetition to embed a skill. Living your life in the ...

“She Just Let Go”

My migraine headaches began on the Fourth of July when I was five years old. By age fifty, I had over fifteen physical and mental symptoms from being in a state of sustained threat physiology. They became extreme and intolerable ...

A Bunch of Balloons

Much, if not most, of what the DOC project presents about creating a central nervous shift is 180 degrees different than how most of us are taught to deal with our conscious mind. One of the most important paradoxes to ...

Let's Wake Up

Let’s Wake Up

Overview Our conscious brain interprets our internal bodily sensations. Since we are geared to survive, most of our time is spent in survival physiology. In this state, blood flow shifts away from our highest thinking brain, and we react more ... Read More

Overview of RUTs

RUTs - Defining the Problem

Solving RUTs

Separating Your Identity from Your Physiology

Four Aspects of Solving RUTs

Thought Diversion

“Turn Down the Heat” – Anger

Nurturing Creativity

The Evolution of RUTs

The Need for Mental Control – The “Ironic Effect”

We are brainwashed by our life experiences

The Physiology / Mental Mechanics

Consequences of RUTs

Clinical Manifestations / illnesses/ Diseases

Behaviors Driven by RUTs

Punishment Can’t and Won’t Stop Destructive Behaviors

Healing Principles

Addressing RUTs

Becoming a Professional at Living Life

“Letting Go” – Freedom from Mental and Physical Pain