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[post_content] => In this video, Dr. Peter Borten explains why he's seen neck pain become so prevalent in the last decade, and shares some really effective and easy ways you can treat (and avoid) your own neck pain at home.
Do you have tips for combatting neck pain? Please share with us in the comments below!
[post_title] => Talking Wellness with Peter: Treating Neck Pain
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[post_date] => 2020-07-23 19:35:07
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I saw a woman being interviewed about her opinion of Trump and Obama. She felt quite strongly that one was the devil and the other a saint. The interviewer asked why and she gave some simple reasons. Then the interviewer proposed, “What if I showed you evidence that would disprove your reasons?”
She responded, “Nothing you can say will change my mind. I don’t need any evidence to know what’s true.” Have you ever felt this way about a person or issue?
It’s very enticing to think in black and white terms. We like the unambiguousness of it. It’s comfortable and easy to be able to say with conviction, “This man is good, that man is bad,” or “Chemical pesticides are wrong, natural ones are right,” or “Pain is bad, pleasure is good.”
When we choose a fixed stance, it seems our work is over. There’s no need to sort through the facts. There’s no need to navigate the discomfort of possibly being wrong, or the discomfort of allowing for multiple points of view. There’s no need to stretch. The only work left to do is convince others who don’t share our point of view that they’re wrong.
Every fixed point of view bolsters the ego. Each time we marry our identity to a position, we form a more rigid sense of who we are (and aren’t). Even though there’s a certain kind of peace in choosing a fixed stance, there’s also an innate conflict. We feel compelled to block out or reject any experience or information that doesn’t fit with our position. This fragments us, restricts our freedom, and prevents an authentic, unmanipulated experience of life.
I’m as attracted to polarized positions as the next guy, but I’ve seen too many times that they’re not good for me – or my relationships. Besides the various forms of personal suffering that black-and-white thinking causes, it’s a major impediment to creating community, solving big problems, and fixing the social divisions that make our country so disunited.
For those interested in recovering from this habit, a willingness to be wrong is a good start – yet, it’s often a difficult concession for us because there’s some truth to our position. It’s usually less painful – and closer to the truth – to recognize that we’re not wrong, we’re just not entirely right. That is, we’re focused on a thin sliver of reality and mistake that to be the whole.
It’s like the old parable about the blind men feeling the different parts of an elephant and describing what kind of animal it is. One feels the elephant’s trunk and says, “This animal is like a thick snake.” Another, who is touching the elephant’s ear, disagrees: “No, it’s more like a fan.” One touches its leg and says an elephant must be like the trunk of a tree. Another touches the tail and says elephants are like a piece of rope.
When we practice openness and humility, we discover a greater need for the word and. Is the truth this way or that way? The answer is almost always YES. This way and that way. Both.
This practice asks us to stretch in order to make room for a reality that’s broader than we thought – and stretching can be uncomfortable – but it also brings peace through the recognition that we don’t know everything, we can’t know everything, and therefore we can let ourselves off the hook of needing to know everything.
I’d like to explore polarized positions on two subjects that are near and dear to my heart – managing the wayward mind and managing pain.
When it comes to managing the mind, the most common polarized positions I encounter are: (1) We should exert discipline over the mind, learn to control it, more intentionally choose the contents of our thoughts, perhaps even stop its meanderings entirely. (2) The mind is an incessant stream of chattering that doesn’t need to be controlled or judged; freedom comes from witnessing it impartially, noticing how it works, learning not to automatically give our attention to its content (thoughts), and ultimately transcending it.
Which is right? In my opinion this is a perfect time for the word and. It doesn’t need to be one or the other. Both are valid and true. It is possible to stop thinking. We can make the mind more peaceful, we can think more optimistic thoughts. AND without attempting to modify the way we think, we can learn to witness the mind, to be unmoved by violent or fearful thoughts, and to let awareness itself begin to displace the ego as the driver of this life.
When it comes to managing pain, two opposing positions I encounter are: (1) Get rid of it. Pain sucks and rarely has a useful purpose. (2) Pain is an opportunity – to expand, to be empowered, to know ourselves, to heal old wounds, etc. If we get rid of it without exploring it, we may miss an important chance to grow and heal.
Which is right? What should we do? AND to the rescue! When I began constructing my online course, Live Pain Free, I started by making a long list of all the strategies I could think of for eliminating pain. Then I thought of the people I’ve known who weren’t able to get rid of their pain – because, for instance, it was due to an inoperable tumor pressing on a nerve – but were able to achieve freedom despite the constant presence of pain. I thought of patients who have used their pain as an impetus for unraveling trauma and years of unhealthy patterning. And I also thought of patients in pain who were angry, depressed, or fearful, who became lighthearted and joyful as soon as we stopped the pain. In the end, I chose to dedicate a significant portion of the course to viewpoint #2 above – that is, helping people to heal and feel free regardless of whether or not pain is present.
The same goes for managing painful thoughts and emotions. When Briana and I were writing Freedom, a workbook to help people move through these thoughts and feelings more smoothly, we asked ourselves do we want people to simply release them and get on with their day or do we want to help them understand the deeper roots of these thoughts and feelings so they can know themselves and heal more deeply? I’ve heard cognitive behavioral therapists make a strong case for the former, saying, “You simply need to learn to modify your thoughts – and your relationship to them – as they come up. We don’t need to talk about your childhood.” A Freudian psychoanalyst would probably say the opposite.
For us, the answer again was both. Sometimes – especially if we’re currently scheduled to be doing something other than self-maintenance – there isn’t time or space to do the deeper processing, and we just need a quick and efficient way to release infringing thoughts and emotions. But it’s also worth making the time to delve into the bigger, more fundamental work, because if we can heal our deepest wounds we’re likely to have a great reduction in disturbing thoughts and the need to manage them.
In what ways do you tend to think in black-and-white terms?
Where has your thinking been polarized?
How has your identity been shaped by your positions?
How do you feel when you have a fixed position about something or someone? Can you perceive both the appealing feeling of “rightness” (or even self-righteousness) and the edgy feeling that comes from an inability to allow for opposing viewpoints?
What comes up when you consider opening yourself to opposing points of view? Can you feel the stretch of it? Can you also feel the relief that would come from relinquishing the need to have the answers or to be right?
Wishing you peace, perspective, and lots of ANDs,
Peter
[post_title] => The Power of AND
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Over the years, my therapeutic focus has shifted increasingly toward what I would call “expansion.” I continue to see patients for issues as apparently one-dimensional as a sore knee, but what I really want for them is so much more than the disappearance of their knee soreness. My highest intention is that they will have an experience of lasting peace, happiness, and freedom. (I want this also for anyone who reads an article or book I’ve written, or takes one of my courses – and also for everyone else, too!)
The tricky part is that we tend to have these virtuous qualities wrapped up in causes. For instance, we may think, I feel peaceful because my surroundings are safe and it’s my day off. Or, I feel happy because I have good food and friends. Or, I feel free because my country has laws that protect my rights and I just dumped my boyfriend.
Yet, in order to embody these states in a deep, lasting way, they must become uncaused. That is, we find our way to them regardless of what’s happening with our body, our mind, or our life circumstances. And I believe the most likely way to discover such uncaused happiness, peace, and freedom is through an expansion of consciousness.
Limited or narrowed states of consciousness get us into trouble. When we identify with only one facet of all that we are, this sets us up for suffering.
Let’s look at some states of “contracted” consciousness. One of the most detailed frameworks for such an examination comes from the Tantrik tradition, which defines a set of layers of the Being. Although as a human you are all of these layers simultaneously, in any moment you’re likely to be identifying primarily with a single layer.
The center of the being is called cit (“chit”), which means absolute, nondual, nonlocal consciousness. It is consciousness that is completely unbound from a body, a mind, a personality, or any other labels. It is undying and eternal. You experience cit at all times, but it’s very difficult for a human to identify with it because it’s so basic, and so beyond our humanness.
The first layer outward is called sunya, which means emptiness. It is stillness, like what we experience in the deepest, dreamless sleep. It can also be experienced in meditation. Sometimes it feels so right and restful to a meditator that they believe this is what they are. While this is true, if it is worn as an identity to the exclusion of their more human layers – as in, “The human part isn’t the real me,” – then it’s still a contraction of consciousness, and brings problems – such as neglect of the body and inability to relate to others.
The next layer outward, called prana, is our vital energy, like the Chinese concept of Qi. Prana is considered to be an interface between the body and mind. And even though we have an individual experience of prana, like the two deeper layers previously mentioned, it’s a communal layer – we share it with everyone.
The next layer outward is citta (“chitta”), meaning “heart-mind” – or the layer of thoughts and feelings. In Tantra Illuminated, author Christopher Wallis explains that thoughts and feelings are considered essentially one, with the difference that thoughts are vibrations with a greater linguistic or logical component while feelings are vibrations with a stronger affective or “felt” charge. Humans tend to be more identified with this layer than any other. If our consciousness is mainly narrowed to this level, our thoughts and feelings run the show. We might say things like, “I am sad,” or “I am stupid,” as an expression of our identification with this layer. Because the mind and feelings can change so rapidly, when we live in this layer, we attempt to create stability by building repetitive patterns and forging rules for how the world should behave – and this greatly squelches our freedom.
The next layer outward is deha, the body. When we believe “I am my body,” – and especially when we simultaneously forget all the rest that we are, we base our self-worth on it and we feel vulnerable because of it. We know, of course, that it’s bound to age and decay.
Finally, there is a layer so superficial that it’s not even really part of our being. It’s called vastu – our possessions or “stuff.” Our possessions have a way of going along with us through life, they reflect our self-image, and it’s quite common to identify ourselves with them. This causes us to invest a lot of time and energy into accumulating, tending to, and protecting this stuff. We may even feel personally assaulted if our stuff gets stolen or damaged.
It’s important to note that there’s nothing bad about identifying with any of these layers, even the “stuff” layer. As you enter and embody each of these layers, there’s rich opportunity to experience, explore, and play. Again, the trap is in identifying with some small portion of all that you are – to the exclusion of the rest.
So, the simplest instruction I could give is to remember. Remember that you’re more than whatever facet of yourself you’re currently immersed in. The more you are able to expand your consciousness to include a broader, all-inclusive sense of self, the greater your potential to access peace, freedom, and happiness.
Give it a try and let me know what happens.
Be well,
Dr. Peter Borten
[post_title] => Welcoming the Many Layers of YOU
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[post_content] => In this video, Dr. Peter Borten explains why he's seen neck pain become so prevalent in the last decade, and shares some really effective and easy ways you can treat (and avoid) your own neck pain at home.
Do you have tips for combatting neck pain? Please share with us in the comments below!
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