dimensions of navigating pain
Sara Vatore
So many of us silently struggle with pain in different ways. We live in a society that normalizes being in pain. Because of this, for those of us living with chronic illness and pain, it can be easy to disregard our experience or actually prioritize making the space to care for and heal our bodies. In this episode of Multidimensional Transmissions, I explore the dimensions of navigating pain and share my experience with a recent flare-up.
As someone who has lived with various layers of chronic pain and illness on and off for my whole life, I am great at being “fine”. I have a high tolerance for pain and I learned at a really young age how to ignore it and override my body’s cues, sucking it up and presenting like I was okay, so I could keep up living my life.
Talking about the dysfunction in my body or the pain I experienced was not something I would do often. If I didn’t acknowledge it or talk about it then it was easy to pretend it was not happening. This ignoring often caused an increase in my symptoms and led to even more collapse, shutdown, and pain in my body.
Over the years I've learned the importance of meeting my body where she is at, recognizing and accepting my body when there is an expression of pain (physical or emotional), and vocalizing when I'm struggling so I can receive help and support.
Join me in this episode as I share my recent journey through the last 8 weeks of intense back and leg pain and how I worked to activate my body's healing potentials by shifting my attention to small moments of relief and working with gentle intuitive movement, the MELT Method, strength exercises, and the support of practitioners, guides, and ancestors.
I also discuss the theme of surrender and the power of taking space to tend to our body in order to facilitate and activate healing within our own systems. There are mindset shifts and intentional somatic practices we can do that can lead to profound healing, even in the face of excruciating pain.
In today’s episode we discuss:
How pain is an alert system notifying us that something else may be going on
My recent experience navigating 8 weeks of intense pain
Moving from meaning-making and figuring out the “why” behind pain/discomfort to activating healing and finding relief
The importance of giving our bodies permission to be physically struggling
How I navigate chronic pain and ways I have found relief
How taking care of my body at a foundational physical/structural level allowed my body to activate healing potential
The profound healing that can happen when we set the intention to heal
What the MELT Method is and how I work with this modality to provide relief and healing for my body
My core, foundational belief about pain
What we can intentionally orient to that helps us focus on things other than pain/discomfort
Whether you are experiencing physical pain or emotional pain, or both, these times can be a signal to us to orient our focus and attention back to our selves and back to the basics of making sure our needs are being met.
I hope that this story-sharing and mirroring will provide you with some options and insights on how to think about what might be going on in your own physical body. I encourage you to observe the little shifts that unfold in your body as you play with different practices so that you can start to see how they stack up to make big changes.
It feels important to me that we all have access to these kinds of simple somatic/body practices to cultivate feeling good/relief/neutrality/pleasure in our bodies, especially when things are hard.
Because of this, I have felt called to create more in-person group movement and MELT Method experiences. I am excited to announce two movement classes/workshops with me that you can check out if you are local to my area!
On June 10th from 4-6pm I invite you to join me for Release and Receive: A MELT Method and Intuitive Movement Infusion.
I am also offering an Intro to MELT Method workshop on Sunday, July 9th from 11-12:30pm.
Both classes will be held at Venture Way Collaborative in Hadley MA.
Thanks again for creating the space to listen to this episode of Multidimensional Transmissions. If there was something here for you that really resonated, please share this episode with the people in your world and leave a rating and review.
Links:
Click here for more details about the RELEASE and RECEIVE class experience
Sign up for Intro to the MELT Method: Melt Away Pain and Stress on Sunday July 9th in Hadley MA
Click here for more details about the Intro to MELT Workshop
Learn more about how you can work with Sara
Quotes:
“Pain is a signal that something needs attention. Something needs help, support, and healing.” -Sara
“The human body is designed to be in self-healing processes.” -Sara