Physical Pain: The Emotional Connection
Any physical issue or pain you experience is a symptom of what is going on in the body and mind. It is all connected, so body and mind cannot be separated. TCM has long understood this wholeness. Focusing solely on symptom treatment has kept a lot of people in a cycle of masking what the body is saying and therefore continuing to suffer.
BioNeuroEmotion (BNE) is a method that studies a new way of understanding emotions and their relationship to beliefs, perception, body and interpersonal relationships. It’s designed to identify the underlying emotion behind a symptom.
Though we may have many types of feelings, there are only five basic biological emotions. They are anger, sadness, fear, disgust and joy. Emotions are a physiological process, which create chemical reactions in the body. These chemicals have helped us adapt to things we face. They reinforce our responses, guiding us into action. Therefore, it’s easy to become stuck in the cycle of these emotions and keep repeating situations/reactions. This blocked energy then transforms into pain, bodily symptoms and behavior.
How can we deal with the emotions affecting our bodies?
First, we must “befriend” the pain. As Carl Jung said, “What we resist, persists.” We should appreciate the pain or symptom because it wants to tell us something. We need to listen and discover what is happening inside. In therapy, we start by exploring when the symptom started and what prompts it. We can also look at the type of pain for clues. Certain patterns are connected with particular symptoms or parts of the body. For example, knee pain often relates to issues with moving forward, while neck pain and migraines can be connected to the need for control. Lower back pain may relate to lack of security (financially or general stability).
We learn to stop using the language of “fighting the illness” and defining health only as an absence of illness. Instead, we can think of this as an opportunity…to evaluate, prioritize, make changes, rest, etc.
Next, we work on how the patient is thinking of himself and what ideas he holds. We explore the mental narratives, which are not helping release the symptom. Sometimes patients identify so much with their symptoms they unconsciously won’t release them. They can’t benefit from any physical treatment because of this. So, we might explore the way they think and talk about themselves and their physical symptoms. And, in order to get long-lasting relief from medical treatment, we need to change the underlying belief system and emotions.
The Emotional and Physical Healing Process
As therapist, my job is to help the client with awareness. I follow a specific BNE protocol. The healing work comes from within the client. My main objective is to give clients tools to transcend unconscious individual, family and cultural beliefs, with the aim of achieving emotional freedom. It promotes a vision in which everything they live has to do with them. Therefore, they can stop being victims of a situation and they have the power to transform it by changing perception. I assist the person to identify the patterns and see they have power and choice. We also have to love ourselves with or without the symptom. So many times, people are waiting to live life until their symptom goes away. Physical obstacles don’t have to prevent us from doing many things and enjoying life.
Suffering from pain or chronic illness can be draining. Emotional support helps. And, together we can try to unlock anything that might be holding you back from healing. With proper physical treatment and good emotional balance, many patients gain freedom from problems that have long plagued them.
If you need support to overcome physical pain or work through challenges you’re facing, contact Body & Soul to make an appointment. Bibiana is a holistic psychologist who combines clinical psychology, psycho genealogy (Family Tree therapy) and alternative techniques to help her patients be more aware and live happier lives. Body & Soul’s multidisciplinary team also provides manual therapy (including physical therapy, osteopathy and chiropractic) and TCM to complement Bibiana’s work on releasing the symptoms.