Dynamic Healing with David Hanscom MD and Les Aria PhD

This podcast looks at gratitude as a powerful tool in regulating your flight or fight physiology to that of safety. You are allowing your body to heal itself. However, gratitude is not a bypass to counteract threat physiology, which has to be addressed as a separate, but linked effort. To have a good life, you must live a good life. It takes practice and nurturing gratitude is one of the core concepts. Catch the Gratitude wave! Sign up to see the film for free https://mindbodyspirit.fm/showcase/gratitude/ Connect with David Hanscom, MD here Les Aria PhD Pain Psychologist Find books from Dr. David Hanscom and other MindBOdySpirit.fm podcast hosts in the online store Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, Les Aria, PhD and David Hanscom , MD are hosting a special guest, Dr. Michael Stein. Michael Stein, MD is an award-winning author of six novels and four books of non-fiction. He is professor of health policy at the Boston University School of Public Health and executive editor of PublicHealthPost.org. The book we are discussing in this episode is Accidental Kindness. He is an internist who has looked at the effects of both positive and negative interactions with their physicians. Physicians are charged to care for their patients at the deepest level there are many forces that interfere with this interaction. There are many actions we take that can be received as being kind or not. Kindness is not a concept that we are taught in our training. Yet the data shows it is not only a powerful healing force but is at the core of being a medical professional. We had a wonderful time listening to his thoughts and insights and he is well ahead of his time. Michael Stein M.D. find out more David Hanscom M.D. Les Aria, PhD Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Although there are additional demands of the Holiday season there are additional stresses that can contribute to Holiday chaos. Creating an awareness of the triggers allows you to develop strategies to navigate them and enjoy your time with your family and friends. The Holidays are stressful and although we all want to experience peace and joy, it is challenging to do so. So, dashed hopes and expectations make it even worse. There are ways to have a joyful Holiday season and understanding the factors that sabotage it are the first step. The key is learning to understand and process your triggers, regardless of the circumstances. Do You Really Need Spine Surgery? by Dr. David Hanscom Find other books by Dr. David Hanscom in the MindBodySpirit.fm online bookstore Find out more about Dr. David Hanscom here Dr. Les Aria Ph.D Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Being triggered and stressed is so common during the holidays is so common that it is somewhat normalized. There are many ways to enjoy your family during this time of year regardless of their behaviors and your stresses. It is a season of peace and joy. Keep your perspective! Know you are an adult, and you have choices. Keep focused on who or what is important to you. How do you wish to show up for the holidays? Practicing the skills we discussed, especially noticing when you are triggered and doing something about it will help you keep your love, peace, and joy during the holidays. As always –be kind to yourself. Let the Holidays begin! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Love is more than a concept. It is a physiological state of safety – profoundly healing. Why? There are many types of love and here are five examples. The common link is being connected to yourself and others. · Passionate love (Romantic love) · Family love · Friendship love · Mankind (human race) and things on this earth · Self Love Essence of chronic mental and physical disease is prolonged exposure to threat physiology. It is well documented that CHRONIC stress kills. Note the chemistry of love, which is the opposite of the physiology of chronic stress. Chemistry of love consists of: · Anti-inflammatory cytokines · Oxytocin – core hormone of love/ bonding – powerfully anti-inflammatory · Dopamine · Serotonin · Growth hormone · Anabolic The podcast finishes with an exercise to generate self-love on the run. Self-love is always the starting point. Be kind to yourself. Connect with David Hanscom, MD and Les Aria, PhD Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It is common, if not the rule, for people in mental or physical pain to discuss it with anyone who will listen – especially their family. It wears people out and drives them away. An important aspect of healing is nurturing a close support system – connection and love. Discussing your pain blocks this critical step. David Hanscom, MD Les Aria, PhD Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It is common, if not the rule, for people in mental or physical pain to discuss it with anyone who will listen – especially their family. It wears people out and drives them away. An important aspect of healing is nurturing a close support system. Not discussing your pain is a major step. Find out more about David Hanscom, MD Les Aria, Ph.D. Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There are many concepts about the meaning of the word, “love.” However, Anthony DeMello, in his book, The Way to Love, condenses it down to one word, “awareness.” Awareness is “being fully present in the moment you are in.” Anytime you are anxious or angry, you are connected to the past and have lost awareness. However, since we are programmed to survive, mentally and physically, we are always on the lookout for danger. These reactions are not controllable, and it requires tools to process them and then being in the present can emerge. Awareness is at the core of successful human relationships, yet close relationships are the most powerful triggers. Instead of being an opportunity to heal, they often are an additional source of stress (pain). Today, we are just focusing on the word, “awareness” as the word for love. How can you positively interact with someone or solve problems without being aware of who they are and how the world may look through their eyes? How can you listen if you are already projecting your opinion onto them? Anthony DeMello suggests that awareness may be all you need to heal. He is probably correct. These concepts are particularly relevant to close relationships in context of being in chronic mental/ physical pain. Get the book The Way to Love by Anthony DeMello Find out more about David Hanscom MD Les Aria, PhD Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All of us need to have a place where we feel safe and nurtured. Home is the place where this needs to happen. How safe do you feel in your own home. How does your family feel? How do your close friends feel around you? But remember, the first place to feel safe is with yourself from your own mind. Once you can create this level of safety, you can create it in other areas. Then as your home and circle of friends feel safe, it works in the other direction. Connect with Dr. David Hanscom Les Aria, PhD Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the final episode of the PRT (Pain Reprocessing Therapy) series. There are many ways of calming down your nervous system, but the real healing occurs as you train your nervous to move into the life that you want. You can learn to create a felt sense of safety versus fear of your pain – mental or physical. “To have a good life, you must live a good life.” David Hanscom REVIEW: What is Pain reprocessing therapy (PRT)? PRT is an approach that trains the brain to reinterpret sensory input by (1) Breaking the pain-fear cycle and thereby (2) reducing or eliminating pain by training the brain to reprocess pain signals as safe. What do we mean by creating more positive feelings and sensations towards your pain? Besides reducing a person’s fear of their pain, PRT also aims to increase an overall feeling of safety - using the lens of safety. We become conditioned to quickly engage in wanting to get rid of the pain that we spend all our awakening hours trying to do various things, including distracting ourselves or not even moving because we hurt. One of the goals of PRT is to help the person shift from “danger mode” to “safety mode.” The therapist can help the patient attend to pleasant sensations in their body (e.g., the breath) through a lens of positivity. Using your breath, self-compassion, imagery - and associated with pleasant feelings of something that mimics the body sensations (burning pain with hot tub). We become what we practice. What do you want? The goal of, “Getting rid of my pain” places your attention on the pain and it will continue to run the show. David Hanscom, MD Les Aria, Ph.D. Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Unpleasant emotions are painful and no one wants to hurt. So, your brain represses it (unconscious response), or we suppress it (conscious act). You must first train yourself to feel your own pain before you can reprocess it. Quote: “Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive and will come forth later in uglier ways.” Sigmund Freud Emotional and physical pain share the same neurological circuits in your brain. Emotional pain has a bigger impact on your body in that you can’t escape your thoughts. Suppression/ repression is all we know, and it really fires up the threat response. It also causes the hippocampus (memory center) to shrink in size, and the amygdala (fear) to enlarge. In order to solve your pain, you have to first feel it. Awareness is at the core of healing. Then there are specific strategies that allow you to cope and reprocess your emotions. Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT) encompasses most of these approaches. David Hanscom, MD Les Aria, PhD Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode is focused on the third component of Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT), which gently “leaning into your pain.” We tease out the difference between “mind over matter” compared to “being with your pain.” It is also much different than “accepting your pain.” A central skill in in PRT is called “somatic tracking”, which addresses this specific need to “lean into your pain. The goal of somatic healing is to help the patient attend to pain sensations through a lens of safety. At the same time, you must be kind to yourself – you don’t have to like being in pain, and you must nurture you. Another view of this phase is to, “give up and move on.” Pay more attention to the rest of your life instead of your pain (classic phase of healing). Your pain circuits will atrophy and your capacity to enjoy life will grow. Find out more about the hosts of Dynamic Healing- David Hanscom, MD and Les Aria, PhD. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The second component of Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT) is gathering and reinforcing personalized evidence for the brain origins and reversibility of pain. One way to combat the belief that there is a “structural”/peripheral cause of the pain is by gathering as much counterevidence as possible – evidence reinforcing that the pain is actually due to central processes, as opposed to a structural problem in the body. Indicators of centralized pain include: Pain originating during a time of stress Pain originating without injury Inconsistencies in how pain presents Presenting with a variety of different somatic symptoms Pain triggers that indicate centralized processes (e.g., social contexts, etc.) The therapist and patient work together in a collaborative effort to gather and reinforce the evidence that their pain is not a function of underlying structural pathology. The therapist can assist the patient in developing an evidence sheet - a list of all the support that reinforces that patient’s pain is due to central processes. Find out about David Hanscom, MD and his books, products, and events here Les Aria, Ph.D. Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“Medically Unexplained Symptoms” (MUS) is a term that came into use around 2002 that implied that your medical provider knows you are suffering, he or she is not sure why, and they will try to help you live the best you can with the pain (mental/physical). This is a deadly term in that it further takes away hope and nothing could be further from the truth. There is always a reason for chronic symptoms. They are caused by the body’s stress chemistry. Understanding the nature of chronic mental and physical pain allows for solutions. A more accurate term would be “Medically Explained Symptoms” (MES). It has been shown that suffering from chronic pain has a similar effect on the quality of your life as having terminal cancer – except that is worse. You often don’t know the nature of the problem, and no one is offering viable solutions. A foundational component of Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT) is education. Chronic pain is a complex set of issues and all of them must be understood in order to successfully address them. There are several steps in the evolution of it. · Source · Sensitized · Memorized · The modifiers Find out more about David Hanscom, MD Les Aria, Ph.D. Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Understanding the nature of chronic pain and that mental and physical pain are essentially the same entity allows you to create new circuits in your brain and the pain will markedly diminish or resolve. However, there is a sequence that is important to acquire this knowledge and skill set called PRT (Pain Reprocessing Therapy). This podcast presents an overview of the five components that will be discussed in detail in future episodes. Connect with David Hanscom, MD here Connect with Les Aria, PhD Pain Psychologist here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Disruptive thoughts are commonly and somewhat lightly referred to as the “monkey mind.” It is not a joke and has a serious impact on our capacity to enjoy life. Since we can’t escape our thoughts, what do we do? There are three core aspects to calming down your racing thoughts – 1) separating/ diverting from them 2) lowering threat physiology 3) moving on. This episode will address ways to lower the threat physiology. There are many ways to calm down the body’s activated threat response by stimulating the calming effects of the 10th cranial nerve called the vagus nerve. Some of them include: · Breath work – many techniques · Music – unique to each individual · Rhythm/ dance · Humming – stimulates the 7th cranial nerve close to the vagus nerve · Rubbing forehead – stimulates the 5th cranial nerve and then the vagus nerve · SSP (safe and sound protocol) provides auditory cues of safety (8th cranial nerve) that powerfully stimulates the vagus nerve. These tools just last for a short time but are intended to be used enough that they become somewhat automatic. They are necessary to get your brain back “online” in order not to act out. Find out more about David Hanscom, MD here Find out more about Les Aria, PhD. Pain Psychologist here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Many people are frustrated by experiencing “unpleasant repetitive thoughts” (URT’s). There does not seem to be an endpoint and we feel trapped. There are three critical aspects of dealing with this perverse trickery of human consciousness. 1. Understand that anxiety is protective but not who you are 2. Separate from your thoughts and 3. Calm down your nervous system It is a solvable problem by learning the skills to deal with these factors. There are ways to divert your thoughts, separate your identity from them, and calm yourself. This episode will address the nature of the problem and principles behind the solution. Solving this phenomenon will dramatically improve the quality of your life. Find out more about David Hanscom, MD here Les Aria, PhD. Pain Psychologist here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We are delighted to talk to Lynne McTaggart. She is one of the central authorities on the new science and consciousness, is the award-winning author of seven books, including the worldwide bestsellers The Field, The Intention Experiment and The Power of Eight®. Lynne McTaggart is cofounder of the international magazine What Doctors Don’t Tell You , the health expo Get Well, and the architect of the Intention Experiments, a web based “global laboratory” to test the power of intention to heal the world. A major aspect of deep healing is connecting to yourself, others, and the world around you. An even more powerful step is regaining your connection to life itself. This energy pulls you a long way from suffering. She has done an impressive amount of work in this area including developing a process of harnessing the power of social interaction in groups of eight. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Disruptive thoughts are universal and part of human consciousness. For many, they can become intense enough to compromise the quality of life. They arise from human’s need for mental control. Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. Viktor Frankl Disruptive disturbing thoughts are extremely common, and it is difficult to know what percent of the population experience them at a level that disrupts quality of life. They arise from the unconscious brain, are powerful, and not subject to rational control. However, they are so unpleasant that there is still a strong need to control them. They are worsened if you fight them and become independent circuits that we call, “phantom brain pain.” Even more frustrating it that if you try think positive thoughts such as being happy, your unconscious brain will again sabotage you, and you’ll end up sad. In upcoming podcasts, the general approach to them will be discussed and then specific solutions. It is a solvable problem, but it does require specific tools. Find out more about David Hanscom, MD and his books, products, and events here Find out more about Les Aria, PhD and the next The Next Remedy Pain Recovery Group Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) is a term that has many connotations, and most people feel the term does not apply to them. In fact, many if not most people experience unpleasant and disruptive thoughts that detract from their quality of life. They are a manifestation of chronic anxiety, which is a physiological state of threat. It does not respond to rational interventions, as it all arises from the subconscious brain. There are many manifestations of OCD, with there being both external behaviors and internal “mental battles.” One reason people don’t feel the diagnosis doesn’t apply to them is because they are not aware of “internal OCD.” There are no outward manifestations and there are repetitive disruptive thoughts and counter-thoughts. “OCD is like having a bully stuck inside of your head and nobody else can see.” Krissy McDermott This episode will discuss the traditional diagnosis and clinical presentation and then point out that a better term might be, “obsessive thought patterns” that are disruptive. David Hanscom did experience severe “internal OCD” for over 15 years and managed to solve it. We will discuss the nature of the solutions in future podcasts. Obsessive thought patterns are a big problem for a given person and it may be a societal epidemic. Find out more about David Hanscom, MD here Les Aria, PhD. Pain Psychologist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices