Dealing With Pain

If we look at the mechanism of pain, we find that wherever there is an injury, disease or stress on a part of the body, a ‘vibration’ starts there, in many cases what medical science would call ‘inflammation’, that triggers a nerve impulse to send the signal to the receptors in the brain, where the impulse is then interpreted and experienced as pain.

Pain management works to interrupt this series at one spot or another along the way. Sometimes cold is applied at the source of the pain. This tamps down the inflammation and the vibration that the area is creating to send up the nerve fibre. Steroids are sometimes injected at the local site to accomplish more or less the same thing. Acupuncture, for example, disrupts the stream of the vibration flowing along the nerve, effectively preventing it from reaching the brain. Topical anaesthetics work to deaden the impulse, while general anaesthetics tend to shut down the conscious awareness on the other side of the process in the brain itself. Hypnosis therapy similarly shuts down the awareness on the side of the brain reception. Pain relievers can be of several types including non-steroidal anti-inflammatory aids which reduce the inflammation and the resultant experience of pain. They can also be of the “opiod” type which attach themselves to the brain receptors and thereby prevent the signal from being experienced by the brain as the receptor is already occupied.

What is interesting about all of this is that the body itself produces its own form of “opiods” in the form of what are called ‘endorphins”. These act to block the brain receptors and are generated by the system internally. They also attach themselves to the brain receptors, replacing the experience of pain with one of well-being. They help reduce stress, relax the being and block pain all at once. They can be generated through exercise (such as the well known phenomenon known as ‘runner’s high’, or dancing or other forms of pleasurable movement, meditation, negative ions (such as are generated by waterfalls or lightning) or pleasurable music, reading or focus on any field of interest, among other things. Endorphins increase tolerance to pain. What is interesting here, is that they supply a link to the method described by the Mother here. The more we “concentrate” on the pain, we are tuning our awareness to it, and it gets accentuated, we tighten up, increase stress and let the pain receptors in the brain become flooded with pain signals. To the extent that we can shift the attention and awareness away from these pain signals, and even concentrate on things that otherwise are positive and enjoyable experiences, we give the body the opportunity to shift the ‘tuning’ away from the pain signals and allow the stress level to come down and the endorphins to block the pain receptors.

Obviously pain can develop at various levels of intensity and the more severe it becomes, the more difficult it can be to manage it effectively. The very intense vibrations simply overwhelm the system in that case, and shifting the awareness or even blocking the awareness becomes more challenging. In his writings, Sri Aurobindo describes the intensity of the vibration of either pleasure, or pain, as being beyond what most people are capable of handling and that is due to the narrowness of the conscious awareness that is receiving and trying to process these vibrations. By widening the consciousness, the capacity to handle intense vibrations is increased and thus, the negative reactions are reduced.

An example of this was provided by Milarepa, the renowned great yogi of Tibet. He had been poisoned by a jealous priest. The priest challenged him to transfer the pain to him so he could see that Milarepa was actually experiencing pain, given that he was acting quite calm and discoursing normally at the time. Milarepa indicated that out of compassion he would not do that, as the priest would not be able to bear the pain level, but just as an example, he would transfer a small portion of the pain to a nearby door, which began to creak and strain under the pressure. Milarepa was able to receive the intense pain accompanying a lethal dose of poison through the wideness of his consciousness and ameliorate its impact on the individual body-life-mind he was occupying at the time in that way.

The Mother notes: “There are minor methods [of stopping pain] and they have smaller results; they are not very easy either, that is, the knowledge of the power to cut the connection between the suffering part and the recording brain. One cuts the connection, then the brain does not register. That’s what one does, what the doctors do with anaesthetics. They cut the connection of the nerves between the spot that’s ill and the brain; so the brain no longer perceives anything or it is reduced to a minimum. And it always comes back to the same thing, one way or another; and all this calls for an occult power or a training. Some people have it spontaneously; there are not many of these — very few. But obviously, without going so far, there is one thing that one can try to do, it is not to concentrate on one’s pain, to turn the attention away as much as possible, not think at all of one’s pain, think as little as possible and above all not be concentrated on it, not to pay attention — ‘Oh, I’m in pain’, then it becomes a little worse; ‘Oh, I’m in still greater pain’, then it becomes still worse, like that, because one is concentrated on it; and this is the mistake one always makes: to think, be there, attentive, awaiting the sign of pain; then naturally it comes, it comes increased by the concentration of the attention given to it. That is why, when one is not well the best thing to do is to read or have something to read, you see; it depends on the condition one is in. But if one can turn one’s attention away, one no longer suffers.”

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, Powers Within, Chapter XIV Power Over Illness and Pain, pp. 118-119