| Author |
 Topic  |
|
|
davebhoy
United Kingdom
15 Posts |
 Posted - 03/23/2006 : 02:47:48
|
i have a lot of problems with meditation. when i try and do mindful meditation - just concentrating on one thing like my breath or a chant, my mind/body seems to hate it. afterwards i get dizzy, get a headache, bad-tempered and a relapse of the cfs symptoms i somtimes suffer from.
how might sarno explain this? |
|
|
ssjs
USA
147 Posts |
Posted - 03/23/2006 : 06:21:32
|
I have successfully beat tms for almost 20 years.
I do not journal, I do not meditate, I do not read or follow any self help books except Sarnos. I have been pain free for all this time. (I do get twinges, but I do a "dance" where I move in all the crazy ways possible, and/or I tell myself to cut it out and laugh at myself, and it immediatly goes away. This happens about once or twice a year...and I mean the type of twinges that used to lay me up for weeks, now only make me smile for seconds)
I too used to be on the floor weeks at a time, and even had a paralyzed foot from "siatica" for a time. Dr.s wanted to cut me up. Even Sarnos neurologist told me I need shots! Sarno dissagreed thankfully! No physical therapy, no chriopractors, no neurologists, no accupucture, nothing helped me. I was a mass of pain inside and out!
Until I went to Dr. Sarno, and started psychotherapy with one of his therapists...and eventually switched to another one knowledgeable in his theory.
Personally, I think everyone is different, and maybe you just do not like meditation and become resentful of it!
Personalities are so different, so rather than find the deeper meaning and what Dr. Sarno would say , find out what YOU would say. Make up your own mind. If you do not like to meditate, don't!!! Find something else! Not because it gives you pain...but because you do not like it!
As I said, only through knowing myself did I get better.
And I want to add...I didn't have to know myself deep deep deep and know every aspect of every slight or everything my parents ever did to me, or every time my kids ever bugged me. I had to know that I often was mad...still am mad...and it's ok and I have a right to it, and most important
THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH MY BACK...OR ME!
I had faith that the Dr. was correct.
And i have been fine for almost 20 years.
Sandy |
 |
|
|
lilykins
USA
25 Posts |
Posted - 03/23/2006 : 18:43:51
|
| ssjs, thank-you for your post. I have been struggling with how much I need to "resolve" in order to get better. I have gotten better to a certain point, and then stalled. I keep thinking it's because I haven't found the true "source" of my anger yet but maybe it's just because I'm not 100% sure of the diagnosis yet. I must still have some lingering doubt about hurting myself. Anyway, thanks for the post! |
|
|
|
drziggles
USA
292 Posts |
Posted - 03/23/2006 : 18:59:19
|
One explanation would be that your unconscious brain doesn't like your doing anything that attempts to get in touch with the emotional part of yourself, such as meditation. it wants you to have physical symptoms and continue with TMS. therefore, meditation sends up the red flag! the unconscious' response could be to make you feel lousy so you will not continue to pursue that any further...
another possibility is that it just isn't for you. you have to decide... |
|
|
|
moose1
162 Posts |
Posted - 03/23/2006 : 20:31:01
|
quote:
Originally posted by drziggles
One explanation would be that your unconscious brain doesn't like your doing anything that attempts to get in touch with the emotional part of yourself, such as meditation.
I would agree that this is a possibility. I began meditating not to relax but to sit quietly enough to bring as much focus as possible to my TMS thinking. I sit for 15 or 20 minutes, about 5 or 10 minutes of which I spend thinking about my anger, its possible causes, and all my other TMS "talking points" that I have with myself. For me, it has worked very well. I've been able to accomplish with meditation what three years of just thinking about it during the course of my day couldn't. In any case, it's worth a try. But there's no doubt in my mind that anytime the unconcious feels threatened by something that allows the conscious mind to really bear down on the truth behing the symptoms, the unconcious gets quite annoyed and will let you know about it.
Good luck.
Moose |
|
|
|
ssjs
USA
147 Posts |
Posted - 03/23/2006 : 21:13:19
|
I think, without question, that you can go nuts if you spend too much time trying to figure out every last thing about every moment of your past. It can scare the crap out of you! It can stop you from really living, and become a distraction from real life.
We are trying to stop having pain...not stop living life.
Spending too much time trying to find the "answer" stops you from getting better because you can never dig deep enough...because you can never say enough affirmations, or pray enough, or meditate enough or have enough pins stuck into you or find your inner child or demons or whatever.
You can never read enough opinions by these quacks, these ever smiling lunitics who get you to pay to read a new set of rules to be happy by. And I include religion in that. Religion is nice, but it can never get you anywhere if you do not activly get involved with real life. and stop trying to analyze everything. Analyzing everything over and over becomes a distraction from life just like pain. And I am into therapy and Freud...to a point.
The act of finding out that I was angry...that my parents sucked, that my kids make me nuts sometimes and that I could accept that, was enough. I still do therapy on and off when I feel needy or stuck...but it teaches me to rely on myself. I really had no idea how unhappy I had been as a kid and how neglected I was. How I had no one. I analyze and then go on with life.
Knowing that has liberated me from being a person who was afraid of life, and a drop out, in constant pain, to a college graduate and a business owner, with a really col family. Something I never saw in my future...and all of the pep talks and goofy afirmations in the world wouldn't have helped. You can never measure up to those sappy books.
I also wonder about journaling. If you keep writing about your anger if you even can tell when you feel it, and you have no one like a therapist to bounce it off of...what good is it?
Sometimes my therapist made me see things I never would have seen without her. sometimes I disageed with her...but sometimes, it was pure gold.
And again...I do not feel you need to know everything, and beat a dead horse. Just KNOW that things may suck...but that there is nothing wrong with you. THE KEY...THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH YOU!
That was my key. and then I was fine.
I admit...the posts I read set something off in me...an anger that too many of you are trying too hard to find an answer outside when the answer is right inside you.
I wonder what that is all about. this anger I feel. I suppose the act of writing this all out is journaling of a sort...
and everyone needs a different path. But I worry that some of you think that you do not measure up if you cannot meditate "the right way", or understand the next great self help book. I worry that you do not see what is right in front of you. that you just worry that you arn't doing things "correctly"
and that Dr. John Sarno is absolutly correct in his theory and that life can be great.
Just stop trying to beat a dead horse.
These are just my opinions. Do what is best for you.
Sandy
|
|
|
|
Curiosity18
USA
141 Posts |
Posted - 03/24/2006 : 01:23:41
|
Sandy,
thank you for your post. It was very thought-provoking. Although you clearly benefited and resolved your TMS issues through psychotherapy and self talk, I do not believe that most people require it in order to get well. In a sense you still look toward the therapist for answers (whether through reflection, validation or interpretation.) I suppose that if one has not really had the opportunity/insight to deeply explore one's feelings, therapy may be useful in the recovery process. But I think that the value of self-reflection cannot be overstated, i.e. meditation, contemplation, journaling. I agree that one can become overabsorbed in their thinking or in this work, but I believe that the potential for over- analyzing is just as real in psychotherapy. Ultimately each person must discover what works best for them.
Curiosity
forThis answers, and maybe prior to therapy you had little innsight/acceptance into your emotions you had never felt validated Although you didn't specifically recommend psychotherapy in your post, it is clear that you still believed that you were dependent on that relationship in order for you to heal (which you clearly did!) Doesn't make sense that if you're really going to find answers within yourself
|
|
|
|
ssjs
USA
147 Posts |
Posted - 03/24/2006 : 05:58:23
|
Curiosity,
I am very aware that I did depend on my therapist to a certain extent, as others depend on new books and lifestyles, but i think that the difference is that if you do most of your inner reflections and journaling alone,
you can keep on perpetuating the same mistaken ideas. I never would have seen what was really going on. I just would have wondered why i hit a brick wall.
Sometimes my therapist would say something that I agreed with, sometimes I absolutly wouldn't agree, but it would keep my mind in motion and not thinking over and over the same thoughts.
I do believe in the idea that you can never be truely independant unless you know you have someone that you can depend on (for example...kids in gangs. People needing family and freinds). I had no one... Yet I so needed someone that a book telling me how good I was or 10 steps to a fuller life...or sitting and meditating, or praying to a higher power for guidance...Or analyzing stuff that I didn't even understand, when I didn't even know the possibilities or how hobbled I was... just wouldn't have fit the bill for me.
I would have just looked for reasons not to be mad at my family...after all, they did the best they could for me! Bull###...I learned that they did things WRONG...and no matter how much they didn't mean it...it affected me badly...and I was mad. And i learned to be comfortable with that.
I needed action, and to me that is the difference between all of that stuff and a good therapist. The spirituality affirmation pep talk stuff was just so much fluff to me.
I needed to see what was past, what was out there now, and believe that the pain was done! Not on its way out, not leaving bit by bit, but OVER!
I needed to get out in the world. I am a totally different person than I was and the action continues. I do not see a therapist now, but I know how to get things done. And I still can get the guidance of a person I know I can depend on if I need it!
Well of course i do get stuck sometimes. My life isn't perfect...but it is happy and pain free!
Oh yea, I am well aware that this writing might signal that i am a bit angry now and maybe burnt out a bit in real life!
Oh well, That's (real)life!
Sandy
|
|
|
|
Curiosity18
USA
141 Posts |
Posted - 03/24/2006 : 13:36:05
|
Dear Sandy,
Point very well taken. I realize that my own frustration at my seemingly slow progress (following weekly phone sessions with a TMS therapist for a year and a half) is souring my view toward psychotherapy for TMS. My symptoms actually became worse, in fact I developed a "new and improved one" that I'm still struggling with months later! The bizarre thing is, I have been aware of my anger for years and I'm pretty sure I allow myself to feel it. I also have no doubt that my physical symptoms are, and always have been TMS. Following a very painful decision to terminate treatment, I am again faced with the other option of going inside myself via journaling and self reflection. So when I read your post, my current sense of failure just got the best of me! I know (rationally) that we are all individuals and that we must find our own path of what works for us, but it sure feels like my TMS road has been pretty darn rocky.
I do however truly appreciate your posts, as you are definitely a success, and your recovery is inspirational.
Curiosity |
|
|
| |
Topic |
|
|
|
meditation
