| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| floorten |
Posted - 07/09/2007 : 18:02:26
For a while now I have been trying to reconcile Sarno's ideas with many discrepancies I see in the typical model of TMS-based symptoms. I've also been looking to integrate the ideas from modern spiritual teachers like Abraham, ACIM and Eckhart Tolle. This is really for my own clarity, but maybe these ideas will hold something for you too. If they do, that's great. If it seems like so much new-age mumbo-jumbo, then that's also fine. As long as we all heal in the end, right?!
I should say right from the offset that I'm a big Sarno fan and I'm not trying to discredit him, merely fill in gaps between what I'm told should happen and what I'm seeing happening in myself and others on this board, and at the same time unify it with my own "spiritual" beliefs. I don't really like the word spiritual, because I believe that everything in life is spiritual in one sense, but for now it serves as a useful label.
-= The Questions =-
Firstly I have a problem with the fact that all the TMS doctors talk about four to six week cures as if this is normal. I have no reason to disbelieve this is their experience for one-on-one treatment. However I don't understand why many of us self-helpers are still making very slow progress many months, sometimes years after discovering Sarno. This suggests to me something is incomplete here.
Secondly I don't like Freudian models of the unconscious as a reservoir of repressed negativity which can bubble up to the surface. This is my personal preference. All the teachers I am learning from say that the subconscious doesn't count for much in your present experience and that what you are believing here and now is what counts. (Many behaviourist psychologists agree with this and also all the NLP-ers.) I'm not convinced of the existence of this reservoir in the traditional Freudian sense.
The idea of reserves of negativity that are "let off" by journaling etc seems to contradict the many quick or instant healings that Sarno and others document. Surely they hadn't worked through the pain in that short time? And if not, then how is this theoretical reservoir relevant to TMS?
Equally if it has no bearing on TMS, other than being fuel for the fire, and the key issue is belief in TMS theory, how come people who have accepted TMS as the cause of their pain don't always heal - myself included? (I have zero doubt that TMS is at the root of my pain, and yet healing for me is crawling forward, one slow month at a time.)
Thirdly, I have a real problem believing that your subconscious is doing this benignly for *your own* protection! Sarno always argues that the pain is a distraction tactic that your mind is creating to protect you... but what kind of protection is crippling fibromyalgia or backache - the kind that makes you wish you weren't alive, and has already lead to some assisted suicides in the past?
This just doesn't add up to me. I know all the counter-arguments but still... it just doesn't feel quite right. I sense there's more to it than that.
So these are my issues with TMS theory as it stands. I'm not disputing any of the end-effects or any of the healings that have already taken place and appear to support this model. I'm just trying to frame what I know about TMS differently to account for not only the successes but the failures and/or really slow healings I see, obviously including my own.
Disclaimer!
So here are my current thoughts. It's a work in progress. And more importantly it's just a *model*. Or as the NLP-ers often quote: THE MAP IS NOT THE TERRITORY!
I'm not saying there necessarily are such things as "living thoughts" or "painbodies", merely that we can describe what happens AS IF there were. If you don't keep this in mind, and you're not familiar with such ideas, then this will all seem really wacko. So remember - we're just making a *model* here!
Big credit must go to Eckhart Tolle for his theories on painbodies and A Course In Miracles for the ideas about ego and creative thought.
OK, disclaimers aside, here goes...
-= Thought =-
All thoughts are creative. This means thoughts can beget thoughts can beget thoughts can beget thoughts and so on...
Put more simply, thought behaves as if it has a mind of its own. Once something is "thought" into being often enough, that thought starts to take on a life of its own.
Don't believe me? Think you're in control of your thoughts? Then try and not think a thought for ten seconds and keep your mind empty! It's nearly impossible.
All those thoughts you've put into motion in the past keep reappearing and trying to reassert themselves on the mind, as if trying to recharge themselves from the same human "mind energy" that gave birth to them.
What's more, they seem to have a cunningness built into them which allows them to re-invent themselves in different ways, and so the same thought form may appear many times, trying to recharge itself under different guises.
Thoughts grow like viruses (or "memes" as they are described by Richard Dawkins), as they are passed as verbal ideas from one person to another, and recharge themselves as one collective whole from all the people thinking "thought energy" into them. We can see religions and national socialism (nazism) in Germany as extreme examples of thoughts which have taken on massive proportions and truly have a life and survival instinct of their own.
Thoughts have an intelligence (and therefore cunning) of their own. We see examples of this for instance in the great inventor Niklas Tesla (inventor of AC electricity). He used to design his inventions in pure thought and debug them in his mind. He would talk of how he imagined an invention in his mind and then set it into motion and tested it, changing it on-the-fly if things didn't function properly in his imagination. He was therefore able to invent in much shorter time spans than if he had to build the thing physically to test it.
The great writer Napolean Hill ("Think and Grow Rich") also imagined into existence an entire board-room of wise historical figures who apparently came to life in his mind and would talk with a volition of their own, often giving him wise advise.
Furthermore many novel-writers also talk of the phenomenon of their characters "taking over" the book and running away with the plot themselves. These are all examples that thought forms behave as if they have their own momentum and intelligence. Or put another way, thoughts can create other thoughts.
-= Ego =-
Ego is a particular type of thought. It's the thought you have about yourself. Who you are. What your history and life is about. Like all thought-forms it has its own independent life and yet needs to recharge itself by constantly being re-thought, else it would just gradually wither away and be forgotten. It does this through conflicting with other egos and drawing you into the conflict. For as long as you are caught up in the conflict, the ego thought is recharged, because you are re-thinking it into existence each time.
The ego gets a particular "boost" if it can put others down and feel morally or intellectually superior. Therefore we get "us against them" mentalities. That's why such conflicts can momentarily feel good. You believe you "are" this thought form and you momentarily have increased your size and importance by triumphing over another. Only problem is, this only lasts for a short time, and then the ego needs recharging again. More conflict! More self-righteousness!
Nazism is an example of a collective ego gone crazy, needing ever greater amounts of conflict and pain to feed itself on. Most egos though are individual and confined to their creator.
-= Ego babies or "painbodies" =-
Eckhart Tolle talks about "painbodies" in great detail. I really like this idea, and I think it is central to my new understanding of TMS.
A painbody is basically a baby of an ego. Thoughts can also create little offshoot "babies" of essentially of the same essence or "vibe". Thus human egos can create baby egos or "painbodies" from stories of painful things that happened to them in the past. Because the human ego is in essence pure conflict, these painbodies are also in essence pure conflict and pain, and are generally focussed on negative personal histories.
Tolle talks of painbodies coming and going in people. They come, often triggered by a painful thought or action of another, and visit to "feed" by possessing the mind of the individual, leading it down negative thought paths, and then feeding off the pain they cause. Thought forms can only feed from other thought forms of a similar essence or vibe, therefore painbodies cannot feed on happy thoughts - they need you to feel negativity instead.
An example of a painbody attack or possession is when someone "pushes your buttons" and suddenly you find your mind possessed by a rage or hurt that you thought you no longer had, or believed you could control. It will stay around as long as it can get you to believe in its negativity, or until it is fully recharged, and can then go back to being dormant.
Like any thought forms, painbodies may not necessarily be tied to one particular person or ego, but due to the difficulty in persuading others to buy into your personal negative stories, they often are. However, I do see this as the root of the maxim "misery loves company". Tolle might rephrase this as "painbodies love people feeding them"!
Anyone who has been victim of such an attack will know that it quite literally feels like you are being possessed. Any good diplomatic intentions will go out of the window, once that painbody is running your mind. However, it can only do this with you consent, although this consent may be implicit and unconscious, by believing you are at the mercy of such random attacks, and that's just "who you are".
-= TMS =-
I see TMS as one or more powerful painbodies. Any painbody which has been fed enough negativity to grow large has the potential to create not just mental pain but physical pain too. Perhaps it functions through its parent ego, or perhaps it can create the pain directly merely through the power of your identification with it.
The negativity need not be on the surface - it can be unconscious in origin. Unconscious here just means out of awareness though. I don't see a requirement for each person to have a reservoir to store their painbodies. They are merely "out there", and return periodically to their source ego to recharge themselves. Tolle himself has talked about witnessing scenes where the painbodies appear to move from one person to another, though he doesn't speculate further. This may well be the root behind tales of "demonic possession".
Negativity can often be generated and not noticed by goodists or perfectionists, whose patterns of thoughts and egos are so geared to subordinating the innate negative feedback that it may not even reach their conscious awareness. This negativity may nevertheless be "eaten up" by a painbody, and the painbody can grow and grow until the first thing the person knows about it is that they are experiencing painful TMS symptoms.
-= Beingness, Identification, Awareness and Dissolving Painbodies =-
Behind the ego that thinks it is "you", there is You, the human. You, the being. You, the awareness which can look critically at yourself from a distance and feels greater (ie. more expansive, not "better") than all the stuff of petty day-to-day life. This is the "real" you and you has great creative power to change your experience, depending on where this awareness is focussed.
If you focus your awareness on your ego, then you get worry, unhappiness and conflict. If you believe you are your thoughts - and your thoughts are dominated by an out-of-control ego - then worry, conflict and fear will be your experience.
The ego and its child painbodies can feed themselves from you so long as you invest your identity in them. If you believe you are you ego, your pain, your symptoms, your life story, your problems... all of these things will simply cause the ego/painbodies behind them to recharge themselves from the negative feelings that are created. This results in no healing.
If on the other hand you withdraw your identity from them, by saying "this pain/painful story/painful symptom is not ME", then they can no longer steal power from you. They can only take your power with your implicit, unconscious consent. You are creating a separation between you (the source of their power) and the painbody and starving it with the awareness of this separation.
This is the power of awareness and meditation. In such states of mind, you are aware that you are much greater than just the sum of your problems and pain. This awareness is light which gradually dissolves the ego and its painbodies.
This, in Eckhart Tolle's terms, is what is happening when Sarno teaches his patients that the symptoms are merely a malfunctioning protection mechanism. Sarno has no explanation for why the awareness of that causes a remission of the symptoms.
However, looking at TMS in terms of it being a powerful "painbody", we would have an explanation, because awareness of the disassociation of your identity from a painbody will always dissolve it.
In explaining Sarno's success within this model, we could say that he demotes the symptoms to a benign separate "entity", your subconscious, and thereby creates disassociation from the TMS painbody.
This is where the "distraction" element comes in. Painbodies need to distract you from the truth to allow them to continually drain your energy. The truth is that the pain is not You. It is a thought parasite. It is a mental vampire pretending to be You.
The awareness of this simple truth is the sunlight which turns the vampire to dust, so to speak. But because all thought-forms, including painbodies, can "think for themselves" too (recall the book characters taking over the book), the painbody gets cunning to hide the truth from you.
It will distract you with all the catalogue of TMS symptoms that we all know, including physical pain, depression and anxiety. This has the double bonus for it of refueling itself on the negativity generated.
It has the rudimentary intelligence to hide behind plausible causes, and does so as a matter of its OWN SURVIVAL. It's survival depends on your not recognising what it actually is. Its actions are not a benign protection mechanism for you. They are a malicious protection mechanism for itself. This is Darwinian survival-of-the-fittest in thought-forms.
We can also explain the phenomenon of the healing power of self-talk on TMS symptoms, ie. telling them "I know you're just TMS. Go away and stop bothering me". Such an internal dialogue immediately sets up an awareness of the separation and disidentification between "me" and the TMS mechanism. This awareness alone will dissolve the painbody, if it is genuinely felt and believed and held in consciousness long enough.
It also explains why I, and many like me, have been unsuccessful in healing TMS symptoms with just the knowledge of TMS theory from Sarno's books. Personally, I had still been believing that the symptoms and my reservoir of past pain had power OVER me, and therefore not creating the disassociation and awareness necessary to dissolve them. I was believing that I was at the mercy of my subconscious and this weird "protection mechanism".
This protection mechanism was still part of "me", as far as I was concerned, and so I wasn't making the necessary disassociation of identity from the TMS symptoms. I am finally making progress in my TMS symptoms now I have figured out this missing piece to the puzzle.
-----
OK, that's about it. Thanks for reading so far. I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts and possible additions/modifications to these ideas.
And if you think this is far-out and wacko, remember it's just about creating a comprehensive model, and not about absolute truth. And if you think about it, what else is Freudianism and current TMS theory than such a model, albeit a more familiar one to the educated Western mind.
Peace, love and healing to you all,
Greg.
--
"What the Thinker thinks, the Prover proves."
Robert Anton Wilson |
| 20 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Curiosity18 |
Posted - 07/17/2007 : 20:44:09
floorten,
What an inspiring thread! I plan on listening to Tolle's CDs again more thoroughly this time. One question I have for you- How do you reconcile the idea of the "not-me pain body" with total acceptance of self? I always believed that in order to have true healing unconditional self-love was critical. I wonder if another way to look at the pain body would be to think of it (compassionately) as something that I created, that I completely acccept that I created it, but that it is not me, and is not serving me.
Thanks again,
Curiosity
|
| floorten |
Posted - 07/16/2007 : 07:41:58
Vego,
You're quite right that it doesn't really matter whether or not it's protection or self-survival. It was just an issue for me because I wasn't confronting the TMS, because I was thinking it was "part" of me and therefore would somehow want to co-operate.
I have no problem believing that distraction is occurring though. This much is 100% clear.
Now I see the TMS as something other than me, an imposter or such, and I'm finding it easier to get that crucial disassociation required to think psychological and carry on regardless. With my symptoms being so pervasive (24/7 headaches) I was finding it really difficult to just detach from the distraction effect enough to view myself psychologically. I'd always just keep getting caught up in the drama of the pain. Very tricky when you can't think straight cause your head is throbbing!
Greg.
--
"What the Thinker thinks, the Prover proves."
Robert Anton Wilson |
| vegomatic |
Posted - 07/16/2007 : 00:18:05
quote:
Thirdly, I have a real problem believing that your subconscious is doing this benignly for *your own* protection! Sarno always argues that the pain is a distraction tactic that your mind is creating to protect you... but what kind of protection is crippling fibromyalgia or backache - the kind that makes you wish you weren't alive, and has already lead to some assisted suicides in the past?
An excellent point. My answer is because pain is one hell of a distraction. A much better one than pleasure. And as bad as fibromyalgi and backaches can be (believe me I know), the mind believes it is nothing compared to what would happen if the repressed rage escaped. So even if someone commits suicide due to the physical pain, he may probably do it quicker if the unconscious pain breaks through and he doesn't know the cause.
See the story of Helen that Sarno has written about in detail in the Mindbody Prescription and touched upon in The Divided Mind. Her repressed rage made it into her consciousness and it was so bad that for 48 hours she wanted die before recovering fully. She relived sexual abuse from 30 years before like it happened the day before. The mind sees that as much worse than any physical pain. I would personally take 48 hours of deep emotional pain to recover as opposed to years of physical but the mind doesn't see things like that.
For example let's say that you are about to be killed by a gang of thugs. What will cause a BIGGER distraction to prevent you from being killed, therefore protecting you? A beautiful bird chirping (pleasure) or a car spinning out of control hitting you, breaking your leg (pain) but causing the thugs to flee? I would choose the latter. Your leg may be broken but you are alive. TMS is that car hitting you to save your life.
quote:
It also explains why I, and many like me, have been unsuccessful in healing TMS symptoms with just the knowledge of TMS theory from Sarno's books. Personally, I had still been believing that the symptoms and my reservoir of past pain had power OVER me, and therefore not creating the disassociation and awareness necessary to dissolve them. I was believing that I was at the mercy of my subconscious and this weird "protection mechanism".
This protection mechanism was still part of "me", as far as I was concerned, and so I wasn't making the necessary disassociation of identity from the TMS symptoms. I am finally making progress in my TMS symptoms now I have figured out this missing piece to the puzzle.
Whatever works for you is great. Cherry picking what works and discarding what doesn't is great too. However in The Divided Mind Sarno eloquently and humorously explains the protection theory. Check out his severe gastroesophageal reflux anecdote while traveling with his wife on p.125-126.
My history (good and bad) defines me and what not to do to live a productive future. Living in the moment is wonderful but we must be mindful of the past so we do not repeat it in the future.
My TMS pain is in me and not some outside force trying to make it's way in. When I have control and knowledge about what is inside me I will then be better able to deal with whatever the world throws at me. So bring it on you stupid world! I can take it. 
Seriously regardless if it's for protection or not (and I see your point - it is a strong one that will make me think), the most important thing is that the pain is a distraction and that is something we can agree with. As long as distraction is there, the reason for the distraction (protection or not) can be rendered irrelevant.
I am so glad you have found your way. Each person must find their own way as everybody is different. Variety is truly the spice of life. I hate ending on a cliche' 
|
| stanfr |
Posted - 07/14/2007 : 17:38:48
Gez;
I wholeheartedly agree that support is important: see the Candida post by Docsprocket as a great example how support can be immensely valuable and it does take place on this forum.
Doubt is not necessarily a killer. It can be compared with skepticism, which most definitely is a life-saver. Without it, i might be wasting my time treating myself with magnets or coffee enemas. The problem as i see it, is that TMS most definitely has a "spiritual component", but if you take the attitude that it is all spirit, that can be a hindrance towards general acceptance of the very disorder you are trying to 'defend'. There most definitely is science behind the TMS/psychosomatic mechanism, and unless that is addressed, TMS theory will always be just the 'fringe' feel-good method of a bunch of desperate sufferors. I don't want to see that. |
| gezondheid |
Posted - 07/14/2007 : 04:56:42
Floorten,
What i'am trying to say is that spiritual learnings have multiple meanings. They are like a diamond. the colours constantly change. It is difficult to compare those teachings with a theory which comes from another vector. Actually they say the same without Sarno knowing about painbodies. It is a question of levels and perception.
I think a side effect is that people who are struggling with their pain start to question their possible healing and stop themself. This is not what you intended but i think it happens.
This TMS board is unique and i see more and more posts with doubt and diversion. I think we should be much more supportive. Nobody else sees tms as cause. In mine opinion doubt is a killer and a strategy of your brain. Anyway it is not personal, its how i see it.
move-on |
| floorten |
Posted - 07/14/2007 : 03:46:22
Thanks for all the points, everyone.
I feel this thread is getting out of control and turning into a "Sarno vs Tolle" debate, which isn't really the point.
I think Sarno is right in every way apart from one - that the distraction is for your own "protection". I'm not trying to discredit him. I'm merely trying to expand upon Sarno's model using Tolle and also question the necessity and validity of some of the Freudian theory that it rests upon.
Tolle's ideas of painbodies which have their own cunning, need to feed on negativity but vanish when awareness is brought to them... this seems to match what I see better than the "protection mechanism" model. But if that model works fine for you, then just run with it!
Greg.
--
"What the Thinker thinks, the Prover proves."
Robert Anton Wilson |
| stanfr |
Posted - 07/13/2007 : 17:37:53
gezondheid, Thank You (that's how i respond to a 'gezondheid' )
Just a couple brief comments:
-By your analogy, the brain should create happy thoughts and feelings to distract from the repressed emotions, notpain; if i'm ashamed, i don't try to distract with other shameful information!
-I agree with Floorten that Sarno 'has no explanation' for why "awareness causes remission". In fact, Sarno explicity admits this in TDM, perhaps you haven't read this book. He speculatesthat somehow our conscious awareness makes it to the subconscious, but concedes he doesn't know the mechanism.
I'll have to read Tolle before i can really add anything to the 'debate'. |
| gezondheid |
Posted - 07/13/2007 : 13:39:08
Floorten,
I like to respond to your message about Eckhart Tolle,
Sometimes it is hard to see the same-sameness in things. It is also
not easy to compare things with things. What do i wan't to say?
The TMS theory of John Sarno fit's in most spiritual theories.
Only the startingpoint is different. This causes all sorts of misinterpretations when you start to compare Sarno/TMS and spiritual theories. It is mine opinion that you cause more doubt in the end than
is needed. You can compare but you have to analyse it very thorough.
For your information; i have red Tolle's books several times and i think their great. I also red parts of A Course in Miracles. I red Louise Hay and a lot of other spiritual books. I was also a member for 5 years of a spiritual group and with this knowledge i only see same sameness between Sarno versus the spirits. I wrote my comments under each of your "conclusions"
For a while now I have been trying to reconcile Sarno's ideas with many discrepancies I see in the typical model of TMS-based symptoms. I've also been looking to integrate the ideas from modern spiritual teachers like Abraham, ACIM and Eckhart Tolle. This is really for my own clarity, but maybe these ideas will hold something for you too. If they do, that's great. If it seems like so much new-age mumbo-jumbo, then that's also fine. As long as we all heal in the end, right?!
I should say right from the offset that I'm a big Sarno fan and I'm not trying to discredit him, merely fill in gaps between what I'm told should happen and what I'm seeing happening in myself and others on this board, and at the same time unify it with my own "spiritual" beliefs. I don't really like the word spiritual, because I believe that everything in life is spiritual in one sense, but for now it serves as a useful label.
-= The Questions =-
Firstly I have a problem with the fact that all the TMS doctors talk about four to six week cures as if this is normal. I have no reason to disbelieve this is their experience for one-on-one treatment. However I don't understand why many of us self-helpers are still making very slow progress many months, sometimes years after discovering Sarno. This suggests to me something is incomplete here.
COMMENT: NOT TRUE. SARNO SELF SAYS IT CAN TAKE LONG, MARC SOPHER SAYS IT IS HARD WORK AND CAN IT CAN TAKE A WHILE. SARNO EVEN MENTIONED NOT TO PUSH IT IN ANY WAY. EVERYBODY HAS HIS OWN TIMINGS.
Secondly I don't like Freudian models of the unconscious as a reservoir of repressed negativity which can bubble up to the surface. This is my personal preference. All the teachers I am learning from say that the subconscious doesn't count for much in your present experience and that what you are believing here and now is what counts. (Many behaviourist psychologists agree with this and also all the NLP-ers.) I'm not convinced of the existence of this reservoir in the traditional Freudian sense.
COMMENT: ALSO NOT TRUE. YES IT IS NOT ALL NEGATIVE. THERE IS A LOT IN THERE, POSITIVE, NEGATIVE OR EVEN NEUTRAL THINGS. A PART OF THE HUMAN IS AS A MACHINE. CODED THE WAY IT IS PROGRAMMED BY LIFE, IN CASE OF TMS THERE IS A UNFORTUNATE PROGRAMMING NEXT TO THE REPRESSION. THE PROGRAMMING IS LODGED IN THE UNCONSCIOUS. IT PARTY CONTROLES YOUR BEHAVIOUR. IT IS THIS PRINCIPLE THAT DRAWS AWAY FROM THE HERE AND NOW. REPROGRAMMING YOURSELF TO BECOME MORE IN THE NOW IS THE SAME PRINCIPLE AS REPROGRAMMING FROM TMS. AFTER YOU HAVE DONE THAT WORK THAN THE UNCONSCIOUS IS MORE IN LINE WITH WHAT YOU WANT. THE TOOL IS TO FOCUS ON THE HERE AND KNOW AND ACCEPTING THE REPRESSED EMOTIONS. THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT SARNO SAYS IN HIS WORDS
The idea of reserves of negativity that are "let off" by journaling etc seems to contradict the many quick or instant healings that Sarno and others document. Surely they hadn't worked through the pain in that short time? And if not, then how is this theoretical reservoir relevant to TMS?
COMMENT: FOR SOME JOURNALING WORKS, EVEN IN A SHORT PERIOD OF TIME. FOR OTHERS SCREAMING WORKS AND FOR OTHERS JUST ACCEPTING IT WORKS.
THIS IS NOT A THEORETICAL RESERVOIR. IT WORKS DAY IN DAY OUT THROUGH YOUR LIFE. WHEN YOU ARE BALANCED THE IMPACT IS LOW BUT WHEN THE PRESSURE IS HIGH IT GROWS. THEN TMS COMES AROUND. ALSO A LOT OFF PEOPLE HEAL WHITOUT JOURNALING. IT IS NOT A MUST.
Equally if it has no bearing on TMS, other than being fuel for the fire, and the key issue is belief in TMS theory, how come people who have accepted TMS as the cause of their pain don't always heal - myself included? (I have zero doubt that TMS is at the root of my pain, and yet healing for me is crawling forward, one slow month at a time.)
COMMENT: STRONG PROGRAMMING,PUT TO MUCH PRESSURE ON RECOVERY, FEAR FOR PAIN, UNFORTUNATE LIFESITUATIONS FROM WHICH IS NO ESCAPE , NOT REALLY RECOGNISING LIFE'S PRESSURES, NOT REALLY KNOWING YOURSELF, NOT THOROUGHLY KNOWING THE WORKING OF THE BODY, NOT CONNECTING MIND AND BODY OR SO TO SPEAK REPRESSED EMOTION/PROGRAMMING VERSUS SYMPTOM. THE KEY ISSUE IS NOT BELIEF. IT IS LEARNING AND IMPLEMENTATION OF KNOWLEDGE AND FOCUS ON WHAT YOU CAN, LIKE A GOOD SPIRITUAL TEACHER WILL TELL YOU.
Thirdly, I have a real problem believing that your subconscious is doing this benignly for *your own* protection! Sarno always argues that the pain is a distraction tactic that your mind is creating to protect you... but what kind of protection is crippling fibromyalgia or backache - the kind that makes you wish you weren't alive, and has already lead to some assisted suicides in the past?
COMMENT: THE UNCONSCIOUS WORKS AUTOMATICLY. YOU SAY TO YOUR BOSS THAT YOU DON'T LIKE HIS WAYS AND MEANS. YOU HAVE 3 KIDS AND YOU ARE DEPENDENT OF YOUR JOB. ADD 30 OF THOSE SITUATIONS (FAMILY, FRIENDS ETC)AND THE CHOICE IS SIMPLE. PAIN IS ACCEPTED, INTELLIGENCE NOT.
IF YOU REPRESS IT ALL AND THERE IS NO OUTLET THAN SYMPTOMS MUST OCCUR.
PAIN ITSELF IS NOT THE PROTECTION. THE DISTRACTION IS THE PURPOSE AND "PROTECTS" FROM NASTY THOUGHTS OR DIFFICULT THINGS YOU DON'T WANT TO FACE. CHOSEN FROM 2 EVIL THINGS. SARNO SELF SAYS THAT THE PAIN IS KILLING.
This just doesn't add up to me. I know all the counter-arguments but still... it just doesn't feel quite right. I sense there's more to it than that.
COMMENT: LET'S GIVE A CONSCIOUS EXAMPLE. WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN YOU FEEL ASHAMED AND YOU DON'T WAN'T ANYBODY TO KNOW. YOU DIVERS THE ATTENTION TO SOMETHING ELSE
So these are my issues with TMS theory as it stands. I'm not disputing any of the end-effects or any of the healings that have already taken place and appear to support this model. I'm just trying to frame what I know about TMS differently to account for not only the successes but the failures and/or really slow healings I see, obviously including my own.
Disclaimer!
So here are my current thoughts. It's a work in progress. And more importantly it's just a *model*. Or as the NLP-ers often quote: THE MAP IS NOT THE TERRITORY!
I'm not saying there necessarily are such things as "living thoughts" or "painbodies", merely that we can describe what happens AS IF there were. If you don't keep this in mind, and you're not familiar with such ideas, then this will all seem really wacko. So remember - we're just making a *model* here!
Big credit must go to Eckhart Tolle for his theories on painbodies and A Course In Miracles for the ideas about ego and creative thought.
OK, disclaimers aside, here goes...
-= Thought =-
All thoughts are creative. This means thoughts can beget thoughts can beget thoughts can beget thoughts and so on...
COMMENT: THOUGHTS ARE CAUSING BY NATURE. CAN BE CREATIVE, DESTRUCTIVE, BORING, INSPIRING ETC
Put more simply, thought behaves as if it has a mind of its own. Once something is "thought" into being often enough, that thought starts to take on a life of its own.
COMMENT: MOSTLY A THOUGHT STICKS WITH SAME KIND OF THOUGHTS AND FORMS A PATTERN. THOUGHTS LIVE IN THE UNCONSCIOUS/CONSCIOUS OR OUTSIDE THE BRAIN IN THE AURA OR THEY CLUSTER IN THE OPEN SPACE. THAT'S WHY YOU CAN PICK UP THINGS. SARNO POINTS IN THIS CASE TO THE UNCONSCIOUS.
Don't believe me? Think you're in control of your thoughts? Then try and not think a thought for ten seconds and keep your mind empty! It's nearly impossible.
PARTLY TRUE. THEY COME FROM EVERYWHERE, UN/SUB/CONSCIOUS AND BEYOND.BY THE WAY, YOU CAN TRAIN YOURSELF TO NOT THINK
All those thoughts you've put into motion in the past keep reappearing and trying to reassert themselves on the mind, as if trying to recharge themselves from the same human "mind energy" that gave birth to them.
What's more, they seem to have a cunningness built into them which allows them to re-invent themselves in different ways, and so the same thought form may appear many times, trying to recharge itself under different guises.
Thoughts grow like viruses (or "memes" as they are described by Richard Dawkins), as they are passed as verbal ideas from one person to another, and recharge themselves as one collective whole from all the people thinking "thought energy" into them. We can see religions and national socialism (nazism) in Germany as extreme examples of thoughts which have taken on massive proportions and truly have a life and survival instinct of their own.
Thoughts have an intelligence (and therefore cunning) of their own. We see examples of this for instance in the great inventor Niklas Tesla (inventor of AC electricity). He used to design his inventions in pure thought and debug them in his mind. He would talk of how he imagined an invention in his mind and then set it into motion and tested it, changing it on-the-fly if things didn't function properly in his imagination. He was therefore able to invent in much shorter time spans than if he had to build the thing physically to test it.
The great writer Napolean Hill ("Think and Grow Rich") also imagined into existence an entire board-room of wise historical figures who apparently came to life in his mind and would talk with a volition of their own, often giving him wise advise.
Furthermore many novel-writers also talk of the phenomenon of their characters "taking over" the book and running away with the plot themselves. These are all examples that thought forms behave as if they have their own momentum and intelligence. Or put another way, thoughts can create other thoughts.
COMMENT: IN THE LAST 6 PARTS OF TEXT I SEE INFORMATION WHICH IS VALID BUT IS IN NO WAY IN CONTRADICTION WITH SARNO. TMS IS ABOUT THE REPRESSION OF THOUGHTS AND EMOTIONS. IT CUTS BOTHS WAYS. THOUGHT CAN BRING YOU TO HEAVEN OR DIVE UNDER AND START TMS
-= Ego =-
Ego is a particular type of thought. It's the thought you have about yourself. Who you are. What your history and life is about. Like all thought-forms it has its own independent life and yet needs to recharge itself by constantly being re-thought, else it would just gradually wither away and be forgotten. It does this through conflicting with other egos and drawing you into the conflict. For as long as you are caught up in the conflict, the ego thought is recharged, because you are re-thinking it into existence each time.
COMMENT: THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENS ON UNCONSCIOUS LEVEL WITH EMOTIONS/THOUGHTS AND FEELINGS. SEE THEM FOR WHAT THEY ARE AND THE POWER IS REDUCED. FURTHER, THE EGO IS NOT A THOUGHT. THE EGO IS A DISTRACTION THAT KEEPS US AWAY FROM THE NOW. ACTUALY THE EGO DOES NOT EXIST. SARNO'S EGO ARE WORKINGS IN THE CONSCIOUS/UNCONSIOUS AND REFER NOT TO TOLLE'S EGO.
The ego gets a particular "boost" if it can put others down and feel morally or intellectually superior. Therefore we get "us against them" mentalities. That's why such conflicts can momentarily feel good. You believe you "are" this thought form and you momentarily have increased your size and importance by triumphing over another. Only problem is, this only lasts for a short time, and then the ego needs recharging again. More conflict! More self-righteousness!
AGAIN THIS IS NOT DE SAME EGO. TOLLE REFERS TO THE EGO THAT WANTS THE HUMAN TO BE SEPARATED FROM THE DIVINE TRUTH. THE ID-EGO-SUPEREGO ARE MORE WORKINGS/POWERSTRUCTURES IN THE PERSONALITY OF HUMANS. THEY ARE IN A WAY AUTOMATIC. IN THE SPIRITUAL LEARNINGS THINGS EXIST IN LEVELS.
ID-EGO-SUPEREGO HAVE TO DEAL WITH THE ACTIONS OF A PERSON. ONE WAY OF DOING THAT IS REPRESSION DEPENDING ON CIRCUMSTANCE
Nazism is an example of a collective ego gone crazy, needing ever greater amounts of conflict and pain to feed itself on. Most egos though are individual and confined to their creator.
-= Ego babies or "painbodies" =-
Eckhart Tolle talks about "painbodies" in great detail. I really like this idea, and I think it is central to my new understanding of TMS.
A painbody is basically a baby of an ego. Thoughts can also create little offshoot "babies" of essentially of the same essence or "vibe". Thus human egos can create baby egos or "painbodies" from stories of painful things that happened to them in the past. Because the human ego is in essence pure conflict, these painbodies are also in essence pure conflict and pain, and are generally focussed on negative personal histories.
COMMENT: IN OTHER WORDS, REPRESSION OF FEELINGS, EMOTIONS, THOUGHTS. IN THIS CASE CLUSTERED TOGETHER
Tolle talks of painbodies coming and going in people. They come, often triggered by a painful thought or action of another, and visit to "feed" by possessing the mind of the individual, leading it down negative thought paths, and then feeding off the pain they cause. Thought forms can only feed from other thought forms of a similar essence or vibe, therefore painbodies cannot feed on happy thoughts - they need you to feel negativity instead.
COMMENT: OF COURSE SARNO DOES NOT KNOW THIS WORLD OF FLOATING PAINBODIES. BUT NEGATIVE DEEP REPRESSED EMOTIONS INVITE EXTERNAL ****.
SO CERTAIN PAINBODIES OR REPRESSED EMOTIONS ARE IN THE PERSON
An example of a painbody attack or possession is when someone "pushes your buttons" and suddenly you find your mind possessed by a rage or hurt that you thought you no longer had, or believed you could control. It will stay around as long as it can get you to believe in its negativity, or until it is fully recharged, and can then go back to being dormant.
Like any thought forms, painbodies may not necessarily be tied to one particular person or ego, but due to the difficulty in persuading others to buy into your personal negative stories, they often are. However, I do see this as the root of the maxim "misery loves company". Tolle might rephrase this as "painbodies love people feeding them"!
Anyone who has been victim of such an attack will know that it quite literally feels like you are being possessed. Any good diplomatic intentions will go out of the window, once that painbody is running your mind. However, it can only do this with you consent, although this consent may be implicit and unconscious, by believing you are at the mercy of such random attacks, and that's just "who you are".
LAST 3 PARTS OF TEXT HAVE TO DO WITH THE WORKINGS OF THE ASTRAL LIGHT, SPIRITUAL STUFF.TO ATRACK ENERGIES BY ACTION. SAYS NOTHING ON TMS, IT CAN ONLY GIVE YOU MORE BAD EMOTIONS
-= TMS =-
I see TMS as one or more powerful painbodies. Any painbody which has been fed enough negativity to grow large has the potential to create not just mental pain but physical pain too. Perhaps it functions through its parent ego, or perhaps it can create the pain directly merely through the power of your identification with it.
The negativity need not be on the surface - it can be unconscious in origin. Unconscious here just means out of awareness though. I don't see a requirement for each person to have a reservoir to store their painbodies. They are merely "out there", and return periodically to their source ego to recharge themselves. Tolle himself has talked about witnessing scenes where the painbodies appear to move from one person to another, though he doesn't speculate further. This may well be the root behind tales of "demonic possession".
COMMENT: YOUR LIFE IS STORED IN YOUR BRAIN (UN/SUB/CONSCIOUS/AURA)EVEN BRAINPATHS CHANGE AS A RESULT OFF DIFFERENT THINKING. SO ITS ALL THERE, ALSO THE ****. YOU DON"T RESTORE PAINBODIES. YOU KEEP A PART OF YOUR HISTORY IN YOU. IT NEVER LEAVES YOU. YOU MUST LEAVE IT. WHAT COMES IN AND OUT A PERSON ARE ENERGIES OF CERTAIN NATURES TRIGGERED BY A SAME SIGNAL. AGAIN, THE EMOTIONS ARE THERE
Negativity can often be generated and not noticed by goodists or perfectionists, whose patterns of thoughts and egos are so geared to subordinating the innate negative feedback that it may not even reach their conscious awareness. This negativity may nevertheless be "eaten up" by a painbody, and the painbody can grow and grow until the first thing the person knows about it is that they are experiencing painful TMS symptoms. AGREE
-= Beingness, Identification, Awareness and Dissolving Painbodies =-
Behind the ego that thinks it is "you", there is You, the human. You, the being. You, the awareness which can look critically at yourself from a distance and feels greater (ie. more expansive, not "better") than all the stuff of petty day-to-day life. This is the "real" you and you has great creative power to change your experience, depending on where this awareness is focussed. AGREE
If you focus your awareness on your ego, then you get worry, unhappiness and conflict. If you believe you are your thoughts - and your thoughts are dominated by an out-of-control ego - then worry, conflict and fear will be your experience.AGREE, THIS IS IN OTHER WORDS ALL IN SARNO'S BOOKS. FOCUS ON THE BODY AND THE PAIN REMAINS. WORRY EN STRESS AND THE PAIN REMAINS
The ego and its child painbodies can feed themselves from you so long as you invest your identity in them. If you believe you are you ego, your pain, your symptoms, your life story, your problems... all of these things will simply cause the ego/painbodies behind them to recharge themselves from the negative feelings that are created. This results in no healing.
COMMENT: IN SARNO LANGUAGE, IF YOU GIVE THE PAIN POWER, IF YOU GIVE IT HIS OWN IDENTITY THAN THE PAIN REMAINS. IF YOU KEEP DOING THINGS THAT CAUSE REPRESSION THAN LOOK BETTER AT YOUR LIFE.
If on the other hand you withdraw your identity from them, by saying "this pain/painful story/painful symptom is not ME", then they can no longer steal power from you. They can only take your power with your implicit, unconscious consent. You are creating a separation between you (the source of their power) and the painbody and starving it with the awareness of this separation.
COMMENT: STOP THE FEAR, STOP THE NOT KNOWING, STOP PROGRAMMING, STOP YOUR OLD KNOWINGS ABOUT YOUR SYMPTOMS. FOCUS ON YOUR HEALING
This is the power of awareness and meditation. In such states of mind, you are aware that you are much greater than just the sum of your problems and pain. This awareness is light which gradually dissolves the ego and its painbodies.
SARNO EVEN MENTIONS MEDITATION AS A SOLVING PRACTICE.OTHER TMS DOCTORS TO.AWARENESS OF THE TMS WORKING STARTS THE RECOVERY
This, in Eckhart Tolle's terms, is what is happening when Sarno teaches his patients that the symptoms are merely a malfunctioning protection mechanism. Sarno has no explanation for why the awareness of that causes a remission of the symptoms.
COMMENT: YES HE HAS. IT IS THE RECOGNITION OF THE REPRESSED EMOTIONS. HE ALSO MENTIONED THAT TMS IS ACTUALY A CRY FOR RECOGNITION (HPB)
THE UNCONSCIOUS DOES NOT HAVE TO REPRESS IT BECAUSE YOU KNOW THEY ARE THERE. THEY ARE NOT FORBIDDEN ANYMORE
However, looking at TMS in terms of it being a powerful "painbody", we would have an explanation, because awareness of the disassociation of your identity from a painbody will always dissolve it.
SARNO SAYS THE SAME. THE PAIN IS NOT STRUCTURAL. YOUR CONSCIOUS MIND CAN CURE THIS WITH THE UNCONSCIOUS.
In explaining Sarno's success within this model, we could say that he demotes the symptoms to a benign separate "entity", your subconscious, and thereby creates disassociation from the TMS painbody.
This is where the "distraction" element comes in. Painbodies need to distract you from the truth to allow them to continually drain your energy. The truth is that the pain is not You. It is a thought parasite. It is a mental vampire pretending to be You.
IS AS SARNO. IF YOU WOULD NEGATIVE ATTEND YOUR EMOTIONS IT WILL BECAME MORE. RAGE BECOMES MORE AND MORE
The awareness of this simple truth is the sunlight which turns the vampire to dust, so to speak. But because all thought-forms, including painbodies, can "think for themselves" too (recall the book characters taking over the book), the painbody gets cunning to hide the truth from you.
It will distract you with all the catalogue of TMS symptoms that we all know, including physical pain, depression and anxiety. This has the double bonus for it of refueling itself on the negativity generated.
It has the rudimentary intelligence to hide behind plausible causes, and does so as a matter of its OWN SURVIVAL. It's survival depends on your not recognising what it actually is. Its actions are not a benign protection mechanism for you. They are a malicious protection mechanism for itself. This is Darwinian survival-of-the-fittest in thought-forms.
THIS IS THE RAGE AND THE ACTIONS OF A PERSON WHICH CAUSE MORE REPRESSION. PATTERNS IN A PERSON WILL REPEAT ITSELF, EVEN AT THE COST OF THE INDIVIDUAL
We can also explain the phenomenon of the healing power of self-talk on TMS symptoms, ie. telling them "I know you're just TMS. Go away and stop bothering me". Such an internal dialogue immediately sets up an awareness of the separation and disidentification between "me" and the TMS mechanism. This awareness alone will dissolve the painbody, if it is genuinely felt and believed and held in consciousness long enough.
IT ALSO REPROGRAMS THE UNCONSCIOUS AND SO CHANGES ITS REACTIONS
It also explains why I, and many like me, have been unsuccessful in healing TMS symptoms with just the knowledge of TMS theory from Sarno's books. Personally, I had still been believing that the symptoms and my reservoir of past pain had power OVER me, and therefore not creating the disassociation and awareness necessary to dissolve them. I was believing that I was at the mercy of my subconscious and this weird "protection mechanism".
BY ME IT WAS THE OTHER WAY AROUND
This protection mechanism was still part of "me", as far as I was concerned, and so I wasn't making the necessary disassociation of identity from the TMS symptoms. I am finally making progress in my TMS symptoms now I have figured out this missing piece to the puzzle.
SARNO NEVER SAID THAT THE MECHANISME WAS YOU. IT IS A PART OF THE BRAINS AUTOMATIC REACTIONS. SO CONSCIOUSLY YOU CAN MODERATE IT
-----
OK, that's about it. Thanks for reading so far. I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts and possible additions/modifications to these ideas.
I THINK THAT COMPARING ALL SORTS OF THEORIES IS CREATING A LOT OF DOUBT. I NEVER RESPONDED BUT THIS TIME I THOUGHT I WANTED TO MAKE A STATEMENT. WHEN WE COMPARE WE MUST SEE THINGS IN THE RIGHT CONTEXT.
BY THE WAY I RECOVERED UP TO 75% AND STILL STRUGGLE WITH THE VALIDITY OF THE SARNO THEORY EVERY DAY.
And if you think this is far-out and wacko, remember it's just about creating a comprehensive model, and not about absolute truth. And if you think about it, what else is Freudianism and current TMS theory than such a model, albeit a more familiar one to the educated Western mind.
move-on |
| stanfr |
Posted - 07/12/2007 : 21:55:19
An excellent point, Redsandro! We have a tendency to incorrectly think that aquired evolutionary traits must be 'forward moving' or 'helpful' when of course that is not necessarily the case! Depending on your spiritual views, one might argue whether "coincidence causes people" but i don't think that detracts from your point.
I do believe however, that the Sarno approach may not be enough for everyone. I have no reason to doubt the many (including myself) who accept the psychological-not-physical diagnosis 100% but still struggle on. One fundamental problem with the theory is that it was developed from the "back up", meaning it originated from Sarno looking at back pain and as he describes 'comparing it' to known stress-related ailments such as ulcers etc (which ironically are no longer really considered by mainstream medicine to be stress-caused!) and concluding that was the cause of the back/neck pain, then later on tacking on all these other disorders as "TMS equivalents". This is a bit too facile, IMO.
The advantage of Floorten's idea is that it looks at the big picture from the start. That resonates with me, personally, cause i can tell you that my recent symptoms (nasal congestion/sinus colds, followed by psoriasis) are much more insidious than the excruciating sciatica i dealt with years ago. Even Brady's AOS idea considers these symptoms as 'subordinates' and Sarno diciples are always quick to point out how these things miraculously disappear once the underlying problem (which they say is TMS/AOS) is 'cured'. Oh really? Well, when they start getting great results with teenage acne, i might start to buy that idea! |
| Redsandro |
Posted - 07/12/2007 : 20:54:40
Hi floorten,
First of all, I only read the first post up to (but not including) the disclaimer. So my words might have lost relevance, but I've already typed them;
This might not suit your mix of ideas to perfect your understanding, but here's a thought:
Sarno's thought about the Freudian idea of a reservoir of rage might not at all be how this works. But I believed it say 80%. Then I coincidentally got 80% better. The joy of seeing this work made me know it was all a trick of the mind, and that idea alone motivated my inner self to get rid of the other 20%.
I did not cure instant, but history tells us that I cured a lot faster than you. Pherhaps that's because I had a lot less doubt in the theory than you. If there's some story that we can believe strongly enough so that our subconscious knows we're on to it, thus letting the behaviour of throwing TMS symptoms lessen somewhat, we at least know there's no physical cause of the symptoms, making us understand that there must be some sort of jedi mind trick to rid us of stupid TMS. And then it actually doesn't really matter why it's working, right? Do you have to know exactly how a car engine works before you believe it can take you to places?
That's why I hope your multiple integrated concepts idea will be complete soon and it doesn't matter if I agree to it or not, the way you've lived your life influences the story you need to hear for your understanding of the mental cause for TMS to echo into your subconscious, making it dropping evidence that at least the suspision is correct.
Thirdly, I have a real problem believing that your subconscious is doing this benignly for *your own* protection!
Concider human life as a side effect of evolution. Brains devoloped over time, and they happen to work. But don't expect them to be all tweaked, logical and organised. What if this subconscious is just a bunch of neurons. It can't really think. It experiences certain of your emotions as a sting in the ass, because the neuron cluster that handles your emotions stupidly grew it's axons in the 'subconscious' neuroncluster's dendrites. The subconscious somehow experiences this as bad, and wants to stop it. It forces some neurologic activity into surrounding unknown dendrites just like trial and error, not knowing it somehow causes TMS symptoms. But it does, and in turn that causes us to be distracted, making the sting in the neuroncluster called 'subconscious's' ass go away, therefore applauding it to cause symptoms.
If coincidence can cause people, don't underestimate the possibility of immense sillyness in parts of the way we work.
____________
TMS is the hidden language of the soul. |
| stanfr |
Posted - 07/12/2007 : 18:15:18
Greg:
Thanks for the response! Certainly worth pursuing (particularly if it works!)
I don't think Sarno requires a "state of rage", merely that rage does exist in our subconcious. I find this very easy to accept. When i went through a 20+ yr old diary, i was shocked to see how angry i was back then--i had repressed all of that anger and wouldn't have had any recollection had i not written it down!
I don't believe memories fade (absent brain damage), only the ability to access them. I would say they remain in pristine form, as many have found through meditation, hypnosis, dreams etc.
In my case, "TMS" (broadly defined) began in my early childhood, and was especially active when i was a teenager (acne, back pain, tendonitis etc) I simply didn't know the connection back then.
I suspect some people are much more prone to TMS/AOS than others, due to both environment and hereditary factors. This is in line with the TMS type personalities.
Parasites leave the host. There's nothing to make me think painbodies can do the same. |
| altherunner |
Posted - 07/12/2007 : 06:11:45
Eckhart Tolle has been very helpful to me, also. My life situation has improved since reading his books. The ego and the painbody are real, once acknowledged. The painbody is so real, it runs many people's lives (lots on this forum). The painbody has shrunk away in hiding for me for the most part. The ego is still active, I try to notice it's activities, laugh at it, and would like it to shrink away, also. Not constantly feeding it seems to be the key. Anyone that has had pain moving from place to place in the body, can relate to the painbody as an entity, protecting itself from the light of your conscious presence. Rage and other emotions have less of an effect on your life situation, if you allow your true being to take over from the ego. They become like a ripple on the surface of a deep lake of consciousness. |
| floorten |
Posted - 07/12/2007 : 03:53:42
Hi Stanfr,
Interesting points...
I would actually personally question whether Sarno's theory isn't made up of nebulous ideas, because it relies on the concept of a subconscious, which forms a deep reservoir of collected feelings. It also requires the believer to accept the idea that it is possible to be in a state of rage and yet for it to be impossible to know this rage.
To me these concepts sound equally as abstract, but I am of course aware that because Freud's theories are well known today, they might appear on first glance to be less questionable!
I don't doubt that early experiences in life can set up powerful patterns for adulthood. I'm not 100% convinced that they set up deep unconscious reservoirs of emotion which will always hold us back until they are psychoanalytically processed though.
However, everything that I have read leads me to suspect that if you were to *believe* that this unconscious has the power to control you today then by that belief you would make it so! Likewise if you could truly let go of belief in the power of the unconscious and belief in your past stories, they wouldn't shackle you. (Of course this is a tricky business when each one is a painbody which has its own survival instinct and will keep returning and trying to possess your mind)
To answer some of your questions, here are my thoughts... (nothing more, I can't really call them answers ;-)
> You refer to a 'painbody' as a distinct entity. What is the evidence that such an entity exists?
None, other than it seems to behave in that way if you observe it. If it helps us more accurately predict and model behaviour to think of it as separate, then that's good enough reason to run with it, in my book!
Equally, one might ask what evidence is there for an subconscious in the Freudian sense, and arrive at the answer: none, other than people appear to behave in this way.
> What exactly does "feeding" entail/mean?
It means strengthening itself through re-experiencing the same kind of pain that gave birth to it.
> Why should a thought need to "feed" on anything? Why can't it simply exist?
I'm sure you've noticed that memories fade if not constantly remembered. Same goes for abilities you have which you don't use often ("Use it or lose it!"). Same goes for painful experiences or "painbodies". Thoughts want to survive in the same way that beings want to survive. Negative thoughts want to renew themselves with negativity. Positive thoughts want to renew themselves with positivity.
If you've heard of "rose tinted glasses" then you know the phenomenon of positive thoughts renewing themselves with positivity. They keep re-thinking themselves until you're left with a memory which only contains the positive aspects and none of the negative. That's the other side of the coin - survival of positive thoughts.
> If the painbody can drive you to suicide (as TMS can) how is this Darwinian?
It's not, at least not for the human. It's Darwinian for the thought-form, so long as its host is alive. I can liken it to a parasite which eventually kills its host. This is quite common in the world of parasites, I believe.
> At least if i just consider the TMS as a "psychological weakness" this certainly can easily be explained in evolutionary terms--I'm weak, therefore i get eaten probably before age eight!
TMS seems to set in in the 30s and 40s, so I don't think it really applies to survival of the young ones. If, as Sarno suggests, *everyone* is susceptible to TMS in one form or another, there's little natural selection involved here. It seems to be a burden that everyone carries equally, and therefore evolution favours no particular type of person, merely particular groups of life circumstances and personalities.
All the best,
Greg.
--
"What the Thinker thinks, the Prover proves."
Robert Anton Wilson |
| stanfr |
Posted - 07/11/2007 : 23:01:00
Floorten:
Thanks for the intriquing post, ill be looking into Tolle's ideas.
My frank opinion is that it's a bit on the new-agie side for me.
The thing that always made me respect Sarno's theory is that it seems very straight-forward to me, not at all nebulous or made up of abstract concepts. He acknowleges the difficulty in testing it scientifically, but at least it potentially could be, given enough interest. I am the first to criticize some of it's weaknesses, and we 'TMS' sufferors are probably best-suited to revise the Sarno approaches. Sarno worked perfectly for me 10 yrs ago, when i had sciatica, the fact that it's tougher now with accumulated symptoms i see as more work that has to be done. The stop-gap approach 10 yrs ago wasn't enough because the resevoir is still largely there and still growing, and my personality hasn't changed any (Sarno righfully advocates a psycho-dynamic approach to uncover sources of tension, but doesn't acknowlege how behavioral changes are needed to keep the 'resevoir' from constantly overflowing!).
I do think you have underestimated just how powerful and deep our subconcious is. I can barely remember a handful of events from my early childhood (say, before age 7 or so) and yet this obviously had a huge impact on my psychological (and physical!) growth.
You refer to a 'painbody' as a distinct entity. What is the evidence that such an entity exists? What exactly does "feeding" entail/mean? Why should a thought need to "feed" on anything? Why can't it simply exist? If the painbody can drive you to suicide (as TMS can) how is this Darwinian? At least if i just consider the TMS as a "psychological weakness" this certainly can easily be explained in evolutionary terms--I'm weak, therefore i get eaten probably before age eight! 
As i said, maybe i can clarify some of these questions by looking into Tolle, which i'll do, these are just my first reactions to your post. |
| floorten |
Posted - 07/11/2007 : 17:06:55
I'd love to know what Tolle has to say about this and if he's heard of Sarno ;-) |
| floorten |
Posted - 07/11/2007 : 17:04:05
My thoughts:
I wasn't really saying that you should use your awareness to resist anything as such. I think my point is basically about the sense of identity. When your sense of identity is bound up with the painbody, it's very easy not to question it. It's this questioning, this awareness that seems to dissolve it.
Saying "this painbody is not me" is not resistance. It's simply truth.
It's not necessary to label the painbody as bad to do this, simply to look at it square on and recognise that the vibe of the painbody is not equal to your the vibe of your true self. It may have once reflected one small fraction of you at some time in the past, but it's probably not relevant now, and in any case was never more than a splinter of a mirror reflecting the entire you.
I don't want to "integrate" the painbody into me. However perhaps looking at it with dispassionate awareness and acceptance may cause it to dissolve and integrate naturally into its rightful place in the universe.
I know the "mom" energy can be healing but for me it carries a large danger. There's a big boundary issue here for me. If I start to "mother" any particular problematic part of me, then there's a big tendency to buy into the story of its pain. Since the pain is the proof that the story isn't true, then I can easily be perpetuating the problem by feeding it rather than healing it... though the ego will love every minute of it and keep telling me what a "loving" and "caring" person I'm being!
The best example of how to approach this "mom" energy I have found is the ho'opono mantra to heal any ill. Just tell it: "I'm sorry for your pain. I love you" over and over again. You don't need to know the details of what it thinks is the cause of the hurt, as that would just perpetuate the illusion and the pain. Read this article... I guarantee it will inspire you!
http://serez.zaadz.com/blog/2006/8/im_sorry_and_i_love_you
--
"What the Thinker thinks, the Prover proves."
Robert Anton Wilson |
| FlyByNight |
Posted - 07/11/2007 : 15:23:36
Wavy
learning to feel the painbody for what it is really (the emotional issues and not the pain distraction) is indeed the first necessary step for the unawakened to identify the nature of his or her own personal painbody (the extent of it, the way it feeds, the way it behavesm under which circumstances, etc). Its important to explore one's painbody for what it truely and to deepen all aspects first. This is where Sarno rocks !
Second step is to differentiate our state of consciousness from this painbody that we learned to know so well bymeans of the TMS work. This is where meditation and Tolle's teachings are coming into place if you believe the rationale behind it. To me it makes a lot of sense.
After success of this sequential two step 'detox' process, I believe that there must be a maintenance phase (because the painbody can be starving and/or dormant as long as you dont feed it but unfortunately it does not die). This maintenance phase is learning to jump from the 'feel' or 'mom' state to the 'dissociate'/'dad' state and to play with thosse two states in both direction. Then you are free and the painbody becomes your playing partner, sort of... This way, you can be more aware of changes occuring inside you and more in contact with the 'dynamical' integrated being that you are , always adapting itself to life circumstances.
To put it simple, I think that mom and dad are indeed very part of the whole healing process.
Thanx Floorten and Wavy..
This is the most inspiring post ive seen on this forum.
Pat
|
| Wavy Soul |
Posted - 07/11/2007 : 06:12:22
Hi Greg,
Great! I'm pretty much with you - at least I'm tracking you. I've been thinking about all this stuff for a long time (including all the teachers you mentioned and memes, etc.).
quote:
awareness of the disassociation of your identity from a painbody will always dissolve it.
This is one of your essential points, and I want to say - well: yes and no!
If what we really are is pure awareness, and these entities you are describing are the forms awareness takes (albeit somewhat monstrous at times, like "my" fibromyalgia), then why does awareness have to resist "being" anything? Yes, it needs to wake itself up and realize that the thoughtform etc. is just a creation. But just saying it's just a creation can actually lead to a kind of spiritual bypass that doesn't really create integration.
I can characterize this (I think I used this before) by the example of a father peering over the side of a cot, watching his infant son screaming. He disidentifies with the child and walks away to greater things, like his computer, leaving the women to pick the kid up, feed it, etc. The child then develops a strong pain-body which causes him to walk away from people in his life, including his own children, when they are emotional.
I think mom and dad are both needed. Yes, disidentification is part of it. On the other hand, total identification in the form of non-resistant feeling of the direct sensations involved is part of it. Dad says, "I am not this child," so he can get on with life in the world. Mom empathizes, feels the childs feelings with it, and says "I am this child," and thus the child experiences some connectivity with his universe.
If you have been "taken down" by too much of one or the other of these faculties - too much feeling or too much "detachment" - then the other approach can feel like your savior. Then you will argue passionately AGAINST any approach that implies that you should feel your feelings ("don't want to become a drama addict," etc.).
If you have spent enough years in the cognitive inquiry/so-called "spiritual" camps, your salvation may seem to come when you venture into a deeper contact with the parts of you that you say are "not me." Then you may argue passionately against the spiritual folk, saying they are "bypassing" etc. I've seen and been all of this.
My experience in meandering back and forth on these personal growth plains for a few decades is that the most effective approach is a kind of spiral between them. The spiritual dudes go around saying "Not this, not that." The psychological babes insist "This is me, that is me." (Of course I am just saying they are babes and dudes to make the point that these two approaches are basically masculine and feminine).
Both are true, the healing journey will eventually take you in both directions, however determinedly we pitch our tents in one camp or the other.
Becoming and unbecoming all of it is the real dissolution.
I am getting better although it isn't instant.
I could go on, but then it would become morning!
xx
Love is the answer, whatever the question |
| Gemma_Louise |
Posted - 07/10/2007 : 15:26:11
Interesting article. I think it's good that you're questioning the theory and putting forward your own interpretation and ideas. TMS theory is still in its infancy really and who can be certain that all elements of Sarno's theories are 100% accurate? I totally believe the basic underlying theory of emotional stress/conflict causing the pain, but who knows for sure the processes that occurs in the body to cause this and why it occurs? It's open to interpretation I guess. |
| ralphyde |
Posted - 07/10/2007 : 15:18:05
Here's a YouTube video in which Tolle speaks about painbodies. Quite interesting.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2187303362957758944
Ralph |
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