Good evening. Everybody and welcome to session 3. And, my name's Doctor Mike Scanlon, and I'm just gonna introduce myself tonight, which kind of works as well, doesn't it?
Although it's always nice to hear people say nice things about you. . So, I think we've got to know each other, but I've been working with the webinar there for quite some time now, delivering these, these sorts of webinars.
It's become quite an interesting part of my, work portfolio, really. And it all seems to be, sort of jelling at the moment. So tomorrow I'm speaking.
At a national prescribing conference on the topic of . Non-pharmaceutical, options for helping people manage pain, particularly looking at the stuff we're doing today. And as I was looking at my slides for today, I just thought, well, let's slide one of those, those ones in, because, something I've learned about working with the veterinary profession is you guys seem to really love your science and your research.
So, let's introduce it. So, it's lovely to be with you. This evening and .
We're really gonna be, focusing on things like barriers, the barriers that show up in our response to them. We're gonna continue with that whole sense of, recognising that link between threats, anxiety, the urge to push away, which only makes pain worse. And.
A very, it, it, it's a strange thing, isn't it, this, this sort of stance, because it, at some level, it, it almost doesn't quite make sense, you know. Why would I move towards pain when every ounce of my common sense perhaps is saying run for the hills. But it's that exact conundrum that we have to work with and, and overcome.
So as usual, as a profession, you're very, very blessed and lucky to have, an organisation like VLife. But we do know that, I saw in therapy, actually, today, the wife of somebody who, gave up. On their struggle against trying to get off opioids and ended up taking their own life and.
I was Sitting, doing some therapy with her today, and it sort of dawned on me, gosh, you know, this, this, her husband probably could have really benefited with this sort of input a long, long time ago, before that reliance on opioids became just too much. So it was a very tragic, episode with her. But it kind of gives you that sense of.
You know, what we're doing tonight, this importance of reconceptualizing our approach to pain remains so important because it blights so many people's lives. So this was the slide that I slid in, and. The, each slide, sort of links across to the research, if you know what I mean.
You click on it and it pops up. And, if we look at the, the, this is really good recent, research. So, we've got a pilot randomised control trial here, which really did illustrate that, This Psychological.
I love what they've done there, psychophysiology. I, I've never even said that word before, but I guess that's what we do, really. It is a sort of blending of the two, you know, there's no health without mental health, I suppose.
But when I look at these three, and I looked at these three research studies and spent some time reading them in preparation for the conference that I'm speaking at tomorrow, it really does back up that this approach that we're taking on our course. Is where it's all about and you know the other way. That we can always tell when, .
Research and there's a a paradigm shift in, the way that science is beginning to, newly appraise something that's been stuck for many, many years is money follows it. So we have organisations like Curable, popping up. We have numerous, .
Pain specialists that are really sort of setting up new, apps and sites and finding new ways to sort of blend into this new science, because it is a relatively new science, this stuff. And, you know, when money starts really following it, then you know, I think that, and really following it, and the research starts to. Be taken up by these organisations.
And I, I think that that's when you start to realise, goodness me, there is a real strength of opinion and feeling going on here, and people are willing to put their, their, the, you know, to bet their livelihoods on recognising that this science has real legs going forwards, and I think it really, really does. And this research is good, high quality stuff. And so if you choose to have a look.
I think you'll be really impressed, and essentially it's what we do. There's a lot of what we do, if you look at the contents within this, that links beautifully over to the course that we're sharing. So we're a bit a bit cutting edge, I think.
And I always like that. So, let's see how you're doing, because I suppose. What we do on our course on a Tuesday evening.
Matters, but what matters more. Is the extent to which you. Move into that stance whereby you're, finding out what's gonna work for you, what does work for you.
And then doing more of it and remembering that You can't make change to something like pain that you've been experiencing in a certain way and responding to in a certain way. In a week. Or 2 weeks.
Or even 3 weeks, and maybe even 4 weeks, but you can start experiencing real gains after 5 to 6 weeks. And you only experience those gains if you maintain a degree of. Buy in of motivation to stay with the exercises.
So, you know, if we're gonna create a new neural pathway, if we walk that path once. No pathway will develop, but if we walk back. That new path in a very sustained regular way, our brain does start to create new neural pathways.
It does start to discover new truths, and that's when we start to see a cessation in that threat response. And that's when we start to hear clients of mine, clients in the research trials I looked at earlier, talking about how this can be transformative. For their ability to live lives well.
With pain Albeit reduced pain in a great many. And a great many times. So I think that's really is important.
And some of the stuff that we're asking you to do is quick, you know, when we feel pain. To gentle ourselves in with curiosity and smile at our mind and say. You know this doesn't make any sense.
Why would you be sending me? Increased levels of pain right now. Why are you diverting my attention away from the stuff that matters towards my pain?
Why are you wanting me to focus in on this feeling of discomfort? What's going on? And to meet it with curiosity, as we've said before, means that we're completely making a shift there, you know, that why, why, why thing.
Why are you doing this? So we're meeting the pain in the moment with some curiosity, and it takes seconds, and we won't always find an answer. And If we're clever and resourceful about this, and we spend our time, we may always come up with a possible answer.
And that possible answer perhaps is that. Our brain rather likes us being recipients in the sense of thrall to that part of the brain because remember its job is to just keep us safe. So Always really keen if people are wanting to share where they are, what's working, what isn't working, what they hope is going to start working.
So, hopefully, now you're playing with, and I think playing with and, dipping your toes into and more of really staying with and practising on a daily basis, the, body scanning. Either the body scan. Where we sit with our pain and breathe with it and accept that it's there.
Or the more. Confrontative body scan where we actually take our attention to our pain and then deliberately mindfully on purpose, move our attention to another part of the body. And at another time, we actually sit down and we start to work with the pain reprocessing work, which is much more along that side of the somatic tracking, where we learn to reprocess our response to pain.
Through that meditative Approach and every time we're meditating, every time we're doing some somatic tracking, some body scanning, we are just reminding our brain that there are options here, you know, really important options. And the more we do that stuff, and the greater mastery we get over our response to the pain that we experience, we start. Sometimes, sort of like sneakily our brain does this stuff and if our mindful mind is switched on and that notice a part of the brain is really switched on, we actually start to notice.
Do you know what, I'm enjoying spending time with the people that matter in my life a bit more. I'm. Spending more time with them, I'm finding my attention is being diverted towards the stuff that matters and away necessarily from my over preoccupation with the deficits I experience in my life because of the pain.
And You may remember that . You may remember that last week we started that process of beginning to chip away at the links between our struggle with sleep. And pain because the two go hand in hand.
Sophie's just come back and shared. Thank you, Sophie, for this, but I'm loving the somatic tracking and finding it more effective than body scan. I think it's the fact that I can visualise the pain that resonates with me.
And, you know, thank you, Sophie, for that. And today, I was doing some 1 to 1 therapy with somebody, some pain management 1 to 1 therapy with somebody struggling with depression alongside. Their pain, and they were saying the exact opposite, that what they like about the body scan is that I don't have to visualise anything.
I just have to sit with my pain. So I guess it is that sense of horses for courses and I think it's why it's worth, Continuing in that spirit of investigation and curiosity. And I'd be really curious to see how, how have people done with the leaves on a stream.
Meditation, which encourages us to let go of any cognitive stuff, any emotional stuff that is still there as we close our eyes intending to sleep. Because when we do that, we let go. The whole let go process also helps us just to get that sense of softening some of the musculature as we drop off to sleep as well, which can only Be good for sleep, but more importantly, it's.
Beginning to telegraph a message to our brains, now is not the time to go a processing. I've done my pain processing earlier. Now is the time for letting go.
And I think that's where the leaves on the stream meditation becomes such a big part of this course. And of course, looking at your. Lifestyle changes, and I asked you, do you remember last week, just have a look and see if each week.
Real opportunity this, each week, can I make just one change to my sleep hygiene, just, just one slight change. Something I've done. Most recently is .
Because I'm such an uber geek where this stuff is concerned, I, I listened in and participated as a. As a participant into a . Into a sleep webinar that had a couple of the real sort of .
The great brains around sleep, the, you know, your Matthew Walker, the Eric Berg, the people like this, and one of the recommendations was that something that can help with sleep and for people struggling with sleep and pain. Was to move taking your vitamin D in the morning, to taking your vitamin D at bedtime. And this week, I'm kind of playing with that a little bit as well.
And I'll keep you up to speed with whether it seems that makes any difference at all. So I'm hoping that you guys are, do you remember we talked about that sense of hope is fabulous? Hope.
Coupled with commitment where pain is concerned, transformational. And I'm gonna really jump onto, I think one of the. Difficulties that so many people living with pain.
Find as soon as they hear any one quietly say to them that dreadful word acceptance. And So often, it almost feels like somebody is challenging us. You know, and it so often feels like when somebody says, you know, perhaps a way forward would be to get a little bit more accepting.
That the chronic pain. Or the pain that we're experiencing in the context of how things are now. It's gonna stay At least for the foreseeable future.
And maybe if we stop fighting that and become more accepting of it. We can actually start to throw ourselves into some of the work that Mike and others are suggesting might be so efficacious and useful for living a more meaningful, happy life. And I think But there's something about that word, acceptance, isn't it?
That if we're not really careful, as the slide says, what we hear and what we rear up against sometimes is, no, I'm not bloody well accepting. You know, the, this pain, I'm gonna fight it. And when we listen to the language we use and we think about that, and it's that sense of, you know, we fight when it's the right thing to do.
And we fight when. We can make a difference and we fight when there is no other option. And I found myself thinking tragically then about Ukraine.
However, We do not fight when there is another option. And there is Another option where pain is concerned. And that other option, I'm gonna play with words for a second guys, is I'm actually gonna start calling it willingness.
Willingness to. Have my pain and respond to it. Differently And Personally, when I'm working with people, I tend to use the word willingness, and some people might be sitting there on my course tonight saying, Mike, isn't that just semantics?
I don't think it is because too many people associate the word acceptance with resignation. And willingness is not. Resignation, you know, you're not giving up anything.
You're actually picking up new practises. You're taking up a mantle and you're making choices. You're not lying down and giving up, which I think is resignation.
Acceptance and willingness. Are facing the struggles as my slide says. For what they are seeing them as painful human experiences.
And if we can find. A level of willingness. Within the context of where I am right now where the science of pain management is right now.
I can live my life moving towards the stuff that matters. So Let's have a look at. The sort of responses that people jump onto.
And why it's so important. To . Find that willingness.
To live well with chronic pain. Shannon, you've told Shannon, that's so, so, I'm, I'm gonna share this. I think it's wow, says Shannon, this is me now.
Finally, after years of fighting pain. I think Shannon, you're getting to a place of willingness to. Drop the rope.
Associated with the struggle. And to find a degree of willingness and acceptance. That works that has science.
That can take us in the direction we want to go in. And what willingness means, look at that top one and let's get this right. Willingness means that we let go of the pursuit.
Of science coming up with. Something of a cure. Now, We let go of that pursuit, because at the moment if we're chasing something.
And we're exhausting ourselves chasing that. Rest assured, should any major breakthrough in pain medication occur. You won't miss it.
It will be everywhere. You know, and when that and if that occurs. Fantastic.
Now on our final session, I will be doing a. Gentle introduction to some of the aids that are out there that actually work that help us in our journey towards willingness. As soon as, and I really hope that you, you, you, you guys experience some of this stuff, as soon as you really do start to find that level of willingness.
Along comes enhanced self efficacy because then you stop chasing and you stop being battered and you stopped fighting long enough to find. A degree of self-efficacy whereby you make choices based on what you want. Going forward And we are able to accept that I am no longer.
Somebody with a fixed attitude towards self. I have a flexible self-identity. Today I am experiencing a lot of pain.
So today I'm in a bit of a place of struggle. And tomorrow it may well be different. And As we find this willingness, this acceptance, we open.
And we start to explore, and we start to become more curious, and as I've said so many times, curiosity is perhaps the mindset that takes us where we need to be. A big part of this willingness. This willing this switch to willingness is accepting that.
It's not like, although I sometimes talk to my clients about having a willingness switch that we need to remember to switch it on. This is a journey. And it takes time to undo all of those years of fighting our pain or struggling not to have it and perhaps the best way.
To I, I, I wonder, here. Shannon. Whether this cartoon here.
Makes some sense. So in my therapy room, there is a coil of hemp rope, and an exercise I sometimes do with people around this is because I'm pretty big, I, I dread a client coming, in fact, I probably wouldn't do this exercise if they were bigger than me. But, so I weigh about 14 stone.
And, . I am quite a big fella. So if I do this, very.
Interesting exercise. You should see people's faces when I first get up off my chair and go and get a piece of rope and ask them to stand up, please, and then draw a chalk line on the floor in my therapy room. And you see them looking at me, thinking, Oh my God, what is he gonna do?
But basically, what I do is I say, OK, this chalk line represents a chasm. OK? And I want you to just think about it for a minute cos sometimes it may feel as though.
The pain you experience is the pain monster, you know, and it's big and it's scary, and it's sneaky, and it gangs up on us, and it pounces sometimes and other times it creeps up and we can see it coming and we feel like we can do nothing about it. And then at one point, that paying monster. If We decide we don't want this bloody pay monster.
At some point, the paying monster says, right. One of us is going to win this fight, and we take the slack and we start to pull, and what we're doing is we're desperately trying to make that pain monster disappear by pulling it into that chasm. And so I stand there and I say, no, I'm your pain.
Pull me. Into that chasm And I anchor myself and I hold, and I watch as my client sweats and pulls and tugs and tries lots of little jerky techniques to try and pull me over the the chalk line. And then I say to them.
Imagine that something is happening over there with a group of people from your life that you really would love to be joining in on. And you're determined to win this fight. Can you?
And they can't, because they, they, they, they're too engaged in trying to pull me into the chasm. And after a while, cause this exercise, when I do it in this way, lasts a few minutes, I say, how are you feeling? Quite often they look at me and go, Well, actually, Mike, a bit confused and quite angry, actually.
I'm wasting my therapy session. I don't know why you've got me playing tug of war, but it feels a bit crap and a bit useless. And I say, OK, get that.
You feel angry, do you? And they say, yeah, do you feel frustrated? And they say, yeah.
And I say, OK, keep pulling, keep trying to win. And they keep going, I say, if this goes on for 5 or 6 hours of you fighting. To pull me, make me go away, make me disappear into this chasm.
How would you feel after that, and they said, Mike, I would be so tired, I'd probably have to sleep for a week. I see, yeah, so right now. Notice the choices you have.
Keep fighting, keep struggling, or drop the rope of struggle. Now where this really works so beautifully, and I wish we could do this in some way is you watch them and the second they actually let go. Of the rope The shoulders drop.
And a sort of knowing smile comes onto their face and they go, oh that feels better. I say, yeah, it does, doesn't it? And look, I'm still here.
But I'm holding the rope. And you no longer are. And I'm still there.
And you've made the choice to stop trying to win. And in that moment we find acceptance. And I find that metaphor one to remember.
When we catch ourselves in the middle of the day fighting our pain, trying to make it go away, cursing it. Getting all magical on it. Praying in an unhelpful sort of way, please, please go away.
Drop the struggle. So Let's just move in and. Have another go at a body scan.
And Then what we're going to do is we're gonna have a, a, so we're gonna do a body scan, followed by a. Somatic tracking exercise. So this is that part of the evening where we stop, get yourselves into a dignified position.
So the body scan is about 5 or 6 minutes, and the somatic tracking is about 7 minutes long. So we've got a period now, which is dewy stuff, as I call it. So let's start with.
The Body scan OK. So we make sure that we're sitting. In a dignified.
And comfortable Position And We find that mindful half smile of acceptance, which means You know, I'm not quite sure what we're gonna do. But I'm gonna give it a bit of a go. And there's a smile.
And that smile reassures the brain and says, well, do you know what if they're smiling like that. Then this is gonna be a pretty safe thing to do and it is. So we go find our breath.
And we connect our attention to our breath. And we just noticed that. The beauty of being attached to the breath.
Is because as we take a gentle breath in in this very moment. Which in this very moment turns into an out breath that we exhale. We have reminded our brain.
That we are entering. Another Brand new moment. In our lives.
And everything before this breath Is history And there is nothing Ahead of the next breath. Yeah In this present moment. And as we find this present moment.
I just want you to take your attention to the Top of your head And Begin to scan down. And what we're doing is we're just looking. For where our pain Is sitting Right now.
So we body scan from the top of our head. And we come down Checking out the jaw. The back of the neck.
Throat. We checked the shoulders. Check our chest.
We check our back We move down the spine and check our lower back. And we find As we scan the whole of our body. We find where our pain.
Si And We gentle our attention there. And we Just focus in. And we Acknowledge the pain.
There you are. And we sit with it. And we Bring an awareness to any thoughts or feelings that come up, and we let go of those.
And we stay Me And the pain I'm just sitting with it. Noticing Every now and then I will choose to deliberately on purpose. Let go of the focus on the pain.
And find my breath once more. I've left the pain. And I've taken my attention just to the breath.
And I take a gentle breath in through my nose. And I exhale. And I follow the breath.
And I anchor my attention. To the bra And I'm curious about the temperature of the air. That I breathe Does it change on the in breath?
Through to the out breath. If I listen Can I hear the Sound that the in breath makes. And is it of a different tambre?
Different pitch to the outgrowth. And I let go of my focus on the breath. I bring my attention once more.
And I just sit. With the pain. As it is I don't try and change it.
I don't try and Move it or take my attention elsewhere. It is just pain. And I sit with it.
And when I choose. I smile once more. And I let go.
My attention from where the pain sits and I refined. The very next new moment in my life. By connecting to my breath.
I quietly say to myself. Breathing in And breathing out. New moment.
Breathing in Breathing out. And I smile And I gentle my attention with willingness to have it. There's my pain.
Mm. And I sit with it. Again, With no intention to change it.
Make it different, ease it. Move it. I just sit and accept.
This is pain And this is me And this is my breath. And I refine my breath. Again I quietly label what I'm doing.
I'm just breathing in. And I'm just breathing. Oh.
And I can sit. And flex this muscle. Of willingness and choice.
For as long as I choose actually. Shifting from pain to breath. From new moments.
To a new new moment. Body scanning When we're ready, Very gently. Just gentle yourself back into.
Tonight's session. And what we're doing there. It is with choosing Our response to whatever shows up.
And we're recognising that the one thing that you have got that seems to hang around is pain. And the other thing that you will always have as a human being all of your life. Is your breath So we move 2 A somatic tracking exercise where we deliberately on purpose go find emotion.
We label it And we go and be curious about And What thought is that emotion? Carrying with it And what we're using is the. So why are you alerting me to my pain right now?
Curiosity stance. I like that. So once again, let's.
Like a shift And let's Close our eyes. And smile And let's take our attention outside of the room that we're working in. And listen and if I listened carefully.
I can hear a television set somewhere in the house. What can you hear? Outside of the room you're working.
And then see what sounds can I hear. In this room Where I'm tracking. And then take your attention right into you.
And Connect with it. And listen What sounds do I make? I breathe.
My tummy gurgles a bit. My foot just shifted and made a noise. Now that we centred our attention.
We've connected with our bodies. Deliberately on purpose, go find. Your pain Wherever it sits.
Take yourself there. Shine a torch. Searching ah.
When you find your pain. Just sit with it. And Maybe score it.
Where one is This pain is not bothersome. And 7 is this pain is really uncomfortable, and I wish it would go away. Just give it a rough.
So the score. Hm. And let's get all curious, the brain.
Why? Are you Wanting me To attend To this pain that comes and goes and. Is sometimes a 2 and.
Sometimes a 7. And sometimes A one and sometimes. A 5.
And we sit with that. And as we ask our brains, so. Why are you alerting me?
To my pain. Right now. Go check out.
What's the emotion? That our brain has sent us. To accompany our.
Meeting With our own pain Is it frustration? Which is quite a fast emotion boat. It travels quite quickly a frustration emotion.
Is it a Quiet Dull Resignation Which is a slower More turgid Journey from The brain to our consciousness. Is it fear which is Like a boat with an outboard motor. That crashes in Desperate for attention.
Just get a sense of. What's the prevailing emotion? That sits.
And sidles up to my pain today. And if my emotion is a vehicle. By which to Transport my thoughts.
To help me respond to this pain. What thought Sits with the emotion. That is most Prominent in my experiencing.
Right now. We sit back and. With curiosity.
What is the thought? I wish it would just go away. Interesting.
I'm finding this difficult. Hm. Just check out and notice that.
As we connect with our pain. Our brain sends us in motion. And thought We can sit with this stuff because They are just.
Emotions and thoughts. And they change And where thoughts are concerned they're just words. And pictures that come.
And go Hm. And when we find the emotion. Tune right in now guys.
As soon as we name the emotion that we find. Can we find that very tiny softening in the frontal cortex that Letting go. This is just frustration.
This is just a bit of fear. This is just doubt. And these are just Thoughts That accompany emotion.
And they come And they go. We don't identify ourselves. With stuff that comes and goes.
Because we are constant. And when we're ready, Very gently. Just gently yourself.
Bye Hold on. So Just give yourselves a moment. Cause it's rare that we sit with our pain in that spirit of curiosity.
For as long as we did then, but look, we can do it. You did it. So I just want us to think at the moment.
About the psychological barriers. That might well show up and get in the way of us. Practising what we've done tonight.
Psychological barriers that. Just get in the way, look what I've put here, as well as devoting time, cos that's the big and from Wigan, isn't it? That little voice, that thought that says, I'd love to do what some somatic jacking, I'm not sure I've got the time.
Just a thought. You know. And for you guys, I guess.
If you care to, now, what are the barriers that you're finding? Are showing up and getting in the way of you. Practising Letting go of the struggle.
The barriers that are getting in the way of you shifting your focus to the stuff that matters and away from your pain. And sometimes it's worth just Having a think about that. Because There are a great many barriers that people talk about, but the big one.
Where people like. You guys who work in a profession that is as busy. And as all consuming sometimes is the classic.
I'm not sure I can, I've got time for that right now. It's 7 minutes. It's 5 minutes.
It takes 30 seconds to meet my pain with curiosity. Just bringing awareness. To the barriers that show up and get in the way.
And meet them with curiosity. One barrier is the tiredness. That the pain causes.
And I often fall asleep during the period of mindfulness. Yeah, Alison. I think I would just try and stay with it and be accepting that, do you know what, if part of my experience is that.
And my tiredness is there that I, I miss a bit of the meditation, so be it. I'm resting. I'm restoring.
Don't be hard on yourself about that. And maybe have a play with. Doing your meditation at different times during the day.
Just some thoughts that perhaps because tiredness is huge, however. Tiredness, that that feeling of tiredness. Is often accompanied by emotion and thought.
Our brain can trick us, you know, sometimes into believing. That we are more tired than we actually are because the moment we hear ourselves say, oh my God, I'm knackered. We feel knackered.
Just I'm not saying you're not, by the way, here, I wouldn't dare, but just meeting it with a degree of curiosity. So our final. Exercise tonight is.
To consider whether one way to remind ourselves to do something. Positive Something evidence-based, something quick. Something effective.
5 or 6 times. Every day is to cue ourselves into. A recognition that maybe it's time to do something.
So my favourite way of doing that is to either, if you're . Super techy Is to find the . Find the bold.
Find the breath. About 5 or 6 times a day. Now you may choose to get your phone to go off ping.
5 or 6 times a day and when your phone pings at you or makes a more restful sound ideally that's when you may choose to stop and do a bold. I'll talk you through it in a second. A Whenever you stop.
To make yourself a drink, or somebody kindly provides you with a drink, use that opportunity for a one minute bold. So the drink's just arrived and we stop and we take one mindful breath. And you see this, my slide has got that sort of stop sign hand signal.
The B is to stop. Take a breath and just stop doing whatever you're doing. Move into your observing self and have a little peruse of How busy you are, what you're doing.
The way you're responding today. Hm, and then lean in and just ask yourself simply. Is this the person I want to be?
Is what I find here. The actions, the responses, the behaviour. The way of being of the human being that I want to be.
And if we get the answer, yeah, I love this version of me. This version of me is kind, responsive. This version of me is.
Mindful Useful has workability. The D is make a decision, do more of it. However, if you realise when you do your bold and you lean in that you've been rushing.
At 90 miles an hour all day. Well, Maybe Use the D space. And Make a decision to do something different.
Make a decision to slow down. Be more mindful. Respond with kindness.
Take a decision to like yourself enough to do something. That works to help your. New response to pain.
So Very quickly In your packs that you sent in your workbooks, you'll have seen. The cognitive shuffling, but let me take you through it. This is for when pain wakes you up in the night, or you just find yourself waking up before you really want to.
Now, what we do at that moment is we definitely do not rush off to the loo. If we go to the loo, float to the loo and float back. Then we lie back down in bed and the job is now we want to gently cajole and.
Encourage your brain to believe that you haven't actually woken up at all, that you are in fact just surface sleeping, which is the precursor to dreaming and dropping off into a deeper. Sleep So we take a word like. Let's take breath or breath or bedtime in this case and we lie there in bed.
And I really want you guys to try this. And you quietly say. This script Mike Picture Something beginning with B.
Mike. Picture a bear. Walking through a wood.
Picture A balloon Flying through the air. Picture Brown bread smothered in butter. And I've run out of bees.
So I moved to an E. Picture an elephant. Just traipsing across the savannah.
Picture an egg boiling in a saucepan of water. Guys, you see where I'm going. What you do is you use those words picture, picture, picture.
What your brain produces is a random set of pictures and words that have no cognitive linear link, which is exactly the same as what happens in our brains when we surface sleep. So our brain is cajoled into thinking, well, do you know they're not awake at all. The surf is sleeping, and if their surf is sleeping, there must be no threat.
Back to sleep. Give it a go. So before we get to a quick reminder, Gregg's just come through and said, Mike, did you find my answer to the question about whether receptor levels in the pain recover once opioid use is stopped or or reduced?
Gregg, I tried really hard. I searched, I googled, I, had a look at, my book. My paying book, nothing.
Yet I will keep looking, but it seems As far as I can find that nobody else. Has actually ever asked that question, my. Guess is that the, that you do get recovery only because .
People that have successfully reduced and stopped opioids that I've worked with. Do start to re-experience. Pain relief from endorphin release, which I think would suggest that probably there is some sort of recovery process.
And that's the best I could do on that, Greg, so please accept my apologies on that one. I did look. So keep checking in with yourselves.
Keep building your mindful muscle with the somatic tracking. Have a go at leaves on a stream, sleep hygiene, and definitely. Cognitive shuffling Play with bold.
Try and do a bowl every time you have. A drink And what I'll send out with over to the Wonderful Dawn as well, is a film reminding you of why bold and how to do it. But the most important thing is taking every opportunity in the day.
With a real genuine sense of willingness to meet your pain with your curious mind. So I haven't left a lot of time for questions or thoughts, but if anybody has anything that they'd like to ask, please. Give it a go or send over to me.
Via the webinar that I'll always happily answer any queries or thoughts. So I hope you found tonight restful, useful, and I hope that it's continuing to take you towards that meaningful life. With less struggle with pain.
Have lovely weeks. And I'll see you all. Next week.
Thank you so much.