All of us at some time or another are experiencing
back pain, even children today are suffering with it. For some the pain can become unbearable and bring a lot of
misery into our lives where normal daily things can become very difficult,
causing us a great deal of unhappiness and sorrow. And for others it is just that annoying niggle that you just
can’t seem to shift, again disturbing every day life.
In modern science it is very easy to pin point where
the back pain is, but it is not so easy to cure. And this can be because we are looking in the wrong place
for the cause of the pain and hence the wrong solution. Back pain can be physical due to
injury, strain on the muscle, damage to the vertebrae or disk, or pressure on a
nerve. Also it can be caused by
other diseases i.e. kidney or heart problems, cancer or tumours, obesity
etc. But quite often the pain is
caused by psychological stress.
The mind is very clever and the subconscious mind can create the pain to
escape reality. For example
suddenly before a big meeting you don’t want to attend or an exam or interview
you are very nervous about, you get a fever or terrible headache, the
subconscious creating these so you can escape whatever it is that is causing
you the stress. The pain or the
physical problem is being caused by a psychosomatic issue; that of an emotional
or mental issue. To feel the pain
the prana (energy) has to be disturbed, and when you have the pain you focus on
the pain creating tension in the muscles.
If it is stress causing your pain then often the treatments you are
having will not work as you are only addressing the physical and not the mental
issues.
Therefore stress management has a very important role
in back pain. Of course there are
heat treatments, wearing supports, strengthening exercises, sleeping on a hard
mattress and massage,changes to our diet and lifestyle that can help. However by
following some simple relaxation techniques you can really relieve your back
pain. De-stressing your mind can
make the pain vanish.
The practice of yoga can help to both relieve stress
to the mind and to the body, in practising meditation, yoga nidra, chanting of
mantras, chanalysing your prana lying in savasana and a technique called cyclic
relaxation, where the relaxation takes place in a standing position, for those
of you who simply can’t lie in savasana.
These techniques are vital for all of us but for
those of you suffering with back pain, I believe that this is where you should
start to approach the problem by de-stressing.
A simple meditation technique is to simply sit in a
comfortable position that you can maintain for some time, place your hands in
your lap the right over the left (dhyana mudra) you may sit on a chair as long
as the spine is free and straight, or you can do it lying on the floor or
standing upright, close your eyes, making sure you are not going to be
disturbed for the duration of your practice and begin to watch your
breath. Follow your breath from
the tip of the nose up through the nostrils feeling all the sensations, keep following
deep into your lungs, then follow it back out again from the lungs up and
through the nostrils. Become aware
of nothing but your breath, the subtle sound it makes and the gentle movements
of your tummy as it rises and falls, letting go of everything else going on in
your life, just breathe and find your peace. You will naturally begin to release any tension in the
muscles during this process.
Choose a realistic amount of time that is going to be doable and stick
to that time for the practice, it could be just a few minutes or up to half an
hour or even longer, that is up to you.
It is amazing how stressed we can become without even
being aware of it, so be careful and really take the time for proper relaxation
where the whole body and mind can rejuvenate and you can free yourself from the
pains in your body.
For now be calm and content and find peace
Om Lokha Somasta Sukhino Bhavantu
May all living entities find harmony and balance
Om shanti shanti shanti
Peace peace and perfect peace
Mangala / Nicky.
No comments:
Post a Comment