Pain, Fear and Safety

Pain is not dangerous, our fear of pain is. But the fear of pain can actually lead to chronic pain.

Pain is simply a signal about danger, it is a messenger. Physical pain is designed to alarm us that our body is being damaged in some way. Emotional pain is the same, it is designed to send us an alarm signal so we can attend to our thoughts and realign to the current reality and our own truth.

But somehow in our society we are trained to avoid pain at all costs. We can’t seem to be able to tolerate any amount of pain. Painkillers of all sorts are not only readily available, they are intensely encouraged. So, instead of figuring out why our heads hurt, we take a painkiller. Instead of figuring out why we are stressed and exhausted at the end of the week, we have a stiff drink, eat abnormal amount of food, scroll social media, smoke pot, go shopping, go gambling and do a million other things just to stop feeling the emotional discomfort.

I notice it in myself too. When a challenging task comes up, I tend to avoid it and make myself busy with something else. Why is it?

We are so used to numbing our own pain of all kinds that we can’t seem to tolerate any amount of pain or discomfort.

But why? Why are we so afraid? Is it dangerous? No.

Pain is not dangerous.

Emotions, even difficult ones are not dangerous. Emotions can not kill you. What kills people is when they go into self-distruction mode BECAUSE THEY CAN NOT TOLERATE THEIR FEELINGS.

I am not saying that bad things don’t happen to people. There are a lot of things happen all the time. But if you were able to survive the bad thing, you got to live to tell the tale and read these words, now your well-being depends on how you can tolerate the discomfort inside of you, how you can hold that pain inside of you.

Somewhere along the way we decided to believe that discomfort is not safe and therefore we fear it. Unfortunately, that fear stops us from so many things. The fears become our prisons.

The fear can look different, but when you get deep down, it’s all the same - fear. Here are some examples of common fears.

• Fear of being wrong. Some people will do a lot of crazy things just to prove their rightness. They will talk over you, they will fight, they will insult, etc. It doesn’t look like fear from the outside, but deep down they are just afraid.

• Fear of not belonging. Social anxiety for example. A lot of people will reject themselves for the sake of being accepted in a group. In the meantime self-rejection will cause more and more discomfort because it is painful to pretend to be someone you are not. (Unless you are an actor by trade, but that’s different.)

• Fear of other people’s emotions. How do you react when someone is upset around you? Do you get sucked into the upset or you are able to keep your cool? How do you feel when your boss is in a bad mood - do you shrink or you remain calm? Or what do you feel when your kid has a meltdown in the middle of a busy supermarket - do you drop into shame or you can keep calm inside?

• Some people will go to work that they hate day in and day out. They will feel like they are dying inside, but they will keep going. Why? Because they are afraid that they won’t be able to make money any other way, perhaps afraid of starving or losing their home and ending up living under the bridge. I have heard many different variations of that fear.

• Fear of missing out. We all have experienced that one at least one time, should I say more?

• Rushing to finish something by a deadline. When I briefly worked in accounting we had strict deadlines for the reports, monthly, quarterly, annual, never ending deadlines. Then the boss spent the whole 30 seconds looking at the reports and moved on with their day. Accounting is about recording history, there is really no emergency there, but we keep putting people into a chronic fight or flight response. Why? Because people who are afraid are much easier to control.

• We are afraid to mess up.

• We are afraid of our inner bully.

• We are afraid of our own fear. People have panic attacks because they are afraid to have a panic attack.

• So many people are afraid to admit they are afraid.

  
  

I probably could go on about the different fear scenarios, but my point is that our modern life is full of those artificially created fears.

All those fears listed above are not real dangers. They are not snakes or lions we need to urgently run from. Yet, our response to those situations is wearing down our nervous system, all for nothing.

I am listening the book called “The Way Out” by Alan Gordon. It’s about chronic pain and how to get rid of it but it could totally be a book about coaching because a lot of us live our lives in a chronic pain of our psyche. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say, chronic pain of our authenticity because it is our authentic self that gets constantly attacked by our over-inflamed fears.

There’s kind of a glitch in our perception of the world. A lot of things are just not worth the investment of fear that we are giving to them. Our belief systems are stuck in a mode of self-destruction.

So, should we just white-knuckle it and go through emotional pain? No. That won't be helpful, it might make it even worse. Because high pressure puts brain on high alert and therefore leads to more pain and fear.

Instead learn to notice your emotional and energetic state without pressure, with lightness, just a matter of factly, with genuine curiosity. With generous amount of kindness and self-compassion, which are perhaps the most important two ingredients.

When discomfort is mild, we invite more exploration.

What thought am I thinking right now?

How does it feel in my body?

What does it feel like in my body to be annoyed?

What does it feel like in my body when someone is impatient with me? What are the physical sensations?

All the while also saying to yourself - it’s ok, I am ok, I am safe. Also, notice how those words feel in your body.

You literally simply notice what you feel in your body with no expectations but with genuine curiosity and learning that those sensations are totally safe. Not always pleasant, but safe.

When the discomfort becomes too much, we sooth it, being consciously aware of what we are doing.

Learning to feel safe with your own self is probably the first and most important thing you should do in a hostile world that we live in.

It’s important to understand that emotions are simply messages. To numb emotions is like burning a letter without reading it, except once a letter is burnt it’s gone and emotions try and try because it is their job to get the message to you. The magical part is that when you receive the message, the emotion just melts away, not as dramatic as in Mission Impossible movies, their energy simply moves through and transforms into something else.

So, what I want to communicate is that emotions, even the painful ones are totally safe and we absolutely need to learn to receive messages from those emotions.

The fear is a normal reaction of your brain to external stimuli, but it’s up to you to access the danger and decide whether it is safe or not and what to do about it. You are not meant to be stuck in fear, you are meant to discern and take appropriate action.

You are not meant to live in survival mode. Instead you are meant to live in a state of joyful creation.

So, face your fears, learn to feel safe and finally start enjoying your life.

Also, book a session or two with me for extra support, because you deserve it.

book here

But no matter what, it's going to be OK.