Tips to help you deal with pain

The tips that follow are aimed at helping you to accept your primary suffering and reduce your secondary suffering.

  • See if you can stay in the present moment as much as you can. Whenever you notice that your mind has wandered off into the future or the past, gently bring it back. This doesn’t mean you can’t think about the past or future, but try not to get too caught up with these thoughts.
  • Investigate the process you call ‘pain’. You will notice it is in fact a mass of sensations, not a thing. Get to know it as actual, felt experience, rather than getting too caught up with thoughts about it. Notice how it is always changing from one sensation to another, no matter how dense and solid it may feel.
  • Move towards the pain. See if you can soften around any resistance you may feel towards it. This is counter-intuitive but if you try to ignore it or push it away, it will just scream louder. Use the breath to help with this (see meditation that follows).
  • Kindness and gentleness are crucial. Treat pain as you’d treat an injured loved one. See if you can find a tender attitude of heart.
  • Once you have gently acknowledged the pain you can then broaden out your field of awareness to look for any pleasure that is also going on in the moment. Notice experiences such as sun on the skin, being with a loved one, noticing flowers by the bed etc. There will always be something pleasurable in your experience, no matter how subtle. Let the pain be just one of several things you are aware of in the moment.
  • With this honest, tender attitude to all the shades of physical, emotional and mental experiences in the present moment you can then choose how you respond to things. This is the point of creativity – how we respond/act in this moment sets up conditions for the next moment. You can always insert a moment of choice no matter how far down the line you’ve gone into distress and anguish.
  • Any moment can be an opportunity for learning if we come back to the actual sensations of the present moment rather than getting lost in thoughts and reactions. See if you can let both pain and pleasure be held within this broad perspective: neither contracting tightly against pain nor clinging tightly to pleasure. Allow all sensations to come into being and pass away moment by moment.

Vidyamala’s CDs of guided meditations — developed as part of her Breathworks pain management program — are available for sale in our online store.

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  • Dear Vidyamala,
    I would like to thank you for the tips and advice on your website! I am about to give birth for the first time and have been battling with pelvic & pubic bone pain for the past 4 months or so. Your words are like a mind-lotion to me! I am not that experienced in meditation, just one of the many things I am interested in, but your website has definately given me something to look forward to and accept the birth of my child as a delightful experience and not excrutiating pain! I am going to pay a lot more attention from now on! THANK YOU AND BE BLESSED!

    • You might like to also get in touch with the charity The Pelvic Partnership. They can provide lots of practical support for Pelvic Girdle Pain experienced by many women during pregnancy.

  • Dear Ekatarina

    How lovely to receive your comments! I am glad that my words have helped you deal with the pain you are experiencing. I had a friend who had similar pain and it eased up after the birth, so I really hope this is the case for you too. And you'll have this wonderful new being in your life. If you want to try meditating you could try the CDs I have made, available from the Wildmind site.

    Best wishes to you, Vidyamala

  • Your words have helped me deal with emotional pain I have been having. My perspective has changed and I feel that I have the ability to accept it. Although it keeps coming back, it lessens every time. Thank you.

  • I cant thank you enough for the tips that were placed onto the site. It has given me a form of understanding over the emotional pain ive been going trough for the past month. Thank you

  • yes you are a very wise person thank you for sharing with the world i found this by fate and it has helped me
    i had an impacted wisdom tooth
    and had surgey to have it pulled
    the pain is great but when i focus on your technics THEY WORK !!!
    thank you

  • I came across this page because I am a long distance runner, and I deal with pain all the time. I couldn't believe it, but these techniques somehow lessened the pain. Thank you so much. I took 30 seconds off my 5k time, and I think I owe it partly to you!

  • Dear Vidyamala

    Thank you for Posting this. It is indeed true and it helPed me to systematically dissolve the Pain in my heart.
    Today has been one of those suPer bad terrible days. I feel heartache and alot of rage and injustice.
    I'm at work right now trying to let it Pass.
    If you can read this mail. And if anyone else can talk me out of this misery.

  • Dear Vidyamala

    I'm trying to follow the steps in your meditation but am stuck. I can't seem to move towards the pain, or treat it tenderly. I still see it as the enemy and have a lot of negative feelings towards it because it's stopping me from living my life and trapping me in my room. How do I work through this? Thanks

    Regards,

    Michele

  • Dear Michele

    I am really sorry I have not replied sooner but I've been away. It is very hard to treat pain tenderly! I know this so please don't give yourself a hard time if you see it as the enemy still. The way I see it is that it is a very GRADUAL process - we might have one moment of softness and then 100 moments of tension; then maybe the next day have 2 moments of softness and 100 moments of tension. The key is perseverance, not giving up and the way to bring about change is through practising meditation. I would really recommend daily body scans. This way you don't have to try and do anything to move towards your pain - it just happens through doing the practice. Very gradually you'll find your attitude changing through regular body scans. You can get a download or CD from wildmind. Good luck!
    Vidyamala

  • I have had back knee and neck pain for almost 3 years, listening to these cds help lessen my pain but when I am done listening to the cd's I still fight with anger of being in pain, being in a wheel chair and being imprisioned in my home due to the pain, hate going out because everytime I do leave the home my pain is greater gradually I hope to figure all this pain out to some how treat myself with more respect and learn my limits and just be able to learn how to live with the pain and still have peace in my life with 2 young children

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