Objectives
- Connecting to every aspect of your life is difficult but essential to help your body heal.
- “Being” with your past may be challenging, but it is necessary to learn and grow.
- It is the opposite of pursuing a stronger ego, which separates you from yourself.
- The “C” quence is connection, confidence, and creativity. Creativity is where deep healing happens through neuroplasticity.
Healing begins with connection through awareness. Mags Clark-Smith is an Irish woman living in Edinburgh and a somatic/movement therapist. She is a close friend of mine, and she focuses on connecting to yourself and others through your body. Since much of our past is unsettling for many of us, we tend to avoid thoughts and experiences that remind us of it. This article is a wonderful synopsis of her work, and the concepts are simple and clear.
Connecting deeply to your past provides “neuroshment”1 for healing.
Safety vs. threat
Feeling safe is a basic need and a core driving force of life. We’ll resort to whatever means are required to achieve it. Safety allows growth, regeneration, optimal function, good health, and a deep sense of contentment. Feeling threatened triggers a “fight-or-flight” reaction, which includes stress hormones, increased fuel consumption, excitatory neurotransmitters, inflammation, and anxiety. A term for this reaction is “threat physiology.”
Life is sustainable because the body regenerates and heals, but it must be in a safe state long enough each day to refuel, strengthen, and build reserves to fight another day. Even severe stress can be dealt with when there is enough time in safety to regenerate. So, healing happens by decreasing time in threat and increasing time in safety. These are separate but linked skill sets. One uses methods to lower levels of stress chemicals, and the other is learning to nurture your vision of who you wish to be.
This journey is reflected in a metaphor of a tree that I call the “C”quence of healing, which helps you move from reaCtive to Creative.
- Connection
- Confidence
- Creativity
ROOTS–CONNECTION
The ground represents every second of your entire past and is the source of learning and future growth. One major root in any tree, called the taproot, grows straight down in search of water and nutrients. The trees with the deepest roots are found in harsh, dry environments. A tree may show little growth for a few years until the taproot matures. Roots grow relentlessly and will even grow through rock. The more developed and complex the root system, the better the chances for survival and growth.
All humans have experienced some degree of trauma. Our needs aren’t always met immediately, even in the best circumstances, and adversity never stops. Many people have suffered severe, even extreme, childhood trauma, and there is plenty more to be had in adulthood. We don’t feel good about it and might even feel ashamed.
As a result, we spend considerable time and energy analyzing, fixing, covering up, whitewashing, or suppressing the past. Somehow, we feel that by spending a lot of time dealing with the past, we’ll have a better life. The problem is that your attention focuses on problems, not solutions. Because your incredibly adaptable brain develops where you place your attention, you magnify the unpleasant aspects of your life. Focusing on fixing the past also takes energy you could use to deal with the present and thrive.
“Neuroshment”
Specific skills are required to be with your past, as much of it may be unpleasant, painful, and difficult to face. Digging in and being with your past is the opposite of building your ego. One patient who successfully broke free from 55 years of pain coined a term for using the past for future growth, “neuroshment.” Your brain physically changes its structure as it adapts to ongoing sensory input. This property is called neuroplasticity, and you can shape your brain like a sculpture.
TRUNK—SKILLS
The trunk represents the confidence that emanates from being able to deal with every aspect of your life and not run from it. Because you process the past in many ways, you stay grounded and can handle even severe adversity.
This set of skills is called “dynamic healing.” It acknowledges how you and your circumstances interact to create flight-or-fight body chemistry. Each portal has many tools; none are difficult, but they require learning and repetition to master.
Anytime you are anxious or frustrated, you are reacting to something unpleasant from the past. You are in fight-or-flight, and your neocortex (thinking brain) is down-regulated. Blood flow shifts, metabolism slows, and it doesn’t function optimally. It is impossible to think clearly. Why do you think humans do so many irrational things when they know better? The more stress you are under, the worse your thinking brain functions. You have also lost awareness of the present moment. These survival reactions are powerful and automatic; you can’t control them.
This is why being with the past is difficult, and specific tools are required to regulate your body and bring it back into safety. Deeply connecting with every aspect of who you are provides “neuroshment” for future growth and the confidence to face life’s challenges. This sharply contrasts with seeking a stronger ego to “feel better” about yourself. You are not grounded.
THE BRANCHES—CREATIVITY
Connection and confidence are the skills needed to regulate your threat physiology, but healing happens through creativity. Brain circuits are stimulated, reflecting the life you want as you “rebuild” the brain (life) that you choose. You cannot “fix” yourself. Your attention stays on the problem, and your brain develops (neuroplasticity).
But you can’t pursue pleasure in order to counteract the survival circuits. They are too powerful and relentless, and your creative brain doesn’t work well while in threat physiology. Pursuing pleasure to outrun your unpleasant survival sensations has been shown to increase inflammation.2
The concept of healing through creativity is possibly the most important and difficult to comprehend and put into action. We are programmed to react and fix and are uncomfortable letting go. But you must let go in order to move forward. If you move the letter “C” from “reactive” to the beginning, it becomes “Creative.” You must become aware and create some “space” to see first, so you can make rational choices.
Deep healing
Sustained stress keeps your body activated, breaks it down, and increases the odds of developing a chronic mental or physical disease. The key factors are intensity, duration, and your coping skills. Consider how long it would take for your car to break down if you were driving down the freeway at 70 mph in second gear. What if the car (your body) wasn’t tuned up, hadn’t had regular service, or was a cheap model? Compare this scenario to cruising in a well-maintained luxury or race car in 5th gear at the same speed. You could drive for a long time. Your body isn’t so different. What model of car are you, and how are you caring for yourself? You have many ways to tune up and rebuild yourself.
Recap
“Neuroshment” from a complex root system and solid trunk allows a tree to grow branches of all sizes. You will connect into your creativity and train your brain to evolve in any direction. This is where the deepest healing occurs. You are moving towards joy and away from pain.
Nurturing joy requires skills that few of us are taught. Creativity requires awareness, and you must see “C” first to know where you are, then make ongoing proactive choices.
To reach higher, you must dig deeper first. Consider a tree as a metaphor for your healing journey. Become a professional at living life and watch your life change from reaCtive to Creative.
My self-directed, computer-based course, The DOC Journey, teaches you the skills you need to connect and move upward creatively.
Questions and considerations
- Many, if not most, of us have a less-than-ideal past. The human experience is messy. What you perceived as dangerous as a child is probably not threatening as an adult. But your brain doesn’t know that and will keep reacting to similar cues.
- How do you feel when your attention lands on emotionally difficult situations from the past, or when an event today triggers you? Reassuring yourself that you are OK actually places your attention on the problem and reinforces it.
- Connecting with every aspect of your past and allowing yourself to feel a wide range of unpleasant emotions can lessen them. However, the discomfort you feel may be intolerable. You can train yourself to sit with these feelings and move forward.
- Consider how much effort we spend trying to “fix” ourselves. It can’t, and it doesn’t. Remember when you felt that life had endless possibilities? How did it feel? Isn’t there a place you want to return to?
- The most important shift in thinking about having a better life is that it happens by nurturing creativity and joy. But you have to let go in order to move forward. It is a daily, ongoing process that lets you “rebuild” your brain and live the life of your choice. Quit fighting darkness; turn on the lights.
References
- Term coined by Rita Salvador, who learned to thrive after being in chronic mental and physical pain for over 55 years.
- Cole SW, et al. Social Regulation of gene expression in human leukocytes. Genome Biology (2007); 8:R189. doi: 10.1186/gb-2007-8-9-r189
Mag’s article: Grounding the Trust that We Are Firmly Connected to the Earth, and We Will Always Have a Safe Place to Stand.
Contact information: Resolving Chronic Pain
