Meditation for Pain: Does Meditation help with Chronic or Acute Pain? How?

Jon Kabat-Zin and his research team discovered in the early 1980s that individuals suffering from chronic pain who used meditation methods had significant physical and psychological changes, and these improvements continued for up to 15 months.

As per one more study of the year, 2005 researchers compared the effects of meditation techniques and routine massage therapy on chronic pain. People who used mindfulness methods for pain didn’t see a difference in their symptoms right away, but they showed major psychological changes after a 12-week follow-up. Participants who received massage therapy, on the other hand, registered a significant reduction in pain immediately, but this was not continued at the follow-up.

According to a 2016 study, people with chronic low-back pain who practised meditation techniques improved more in physical issues and back problems at 26 and 52 weeks than others who got conventional therapy.

What is Meditation for Pain Relief?

Meditation, according to research, activates neural brain circuits that reduce pain sensitivity and maximize the efficiency of the brain’s own pain-relieving opioids. Meditation is worth considering if you suffer from chronic pain. Many guided meditation for pain relief guides is available for free, making it simple to give it a shot. When you start doing meditation, for physical pain, meditation for body pain or meditation for severe pain, it will not affect you immediately, and remember one more thing. Meditation cannot eliminate the pain, but it can give you relief as it can change the equations between you and your mind and your mind and meditation to help with the pain.

In general, the goal of meditation for pain and sleep is to teach you how to accept certain changes that have occurred in your body as a result of a disease or accident. You should investigate the reason for the pain. Most of the time, we try to push away the pain immediately by taking medicine to just end it. But in the long term, that affects your body, which is not good for your health.

So here, meditation teaches us how to take a breath back and try to relax the pain, whether it’s something long-term and chronic or something minor that’s bothered you for a brief time.

There are no specific methods to practice mediation or mindfulness for pain. You need to follow the regular meditation steps as said below.

Step 1

Sit comfortably and fix the timings to mediate.

Step 2

Relax your mind

Step 3

Identify the centre of the pain.

Step 4

Concentrate your mind on the pain.

Step 5

Check to see how the chronic pain increases.

Step 6

Gradually guide your mind back to the object of your meditation, which is a focused consciousness on pain, whenever your mind wanders.

Practice meditation for pain reduction every day for few minutes and you will definitely get the results and you will start practising meditation to heal the pain.

Meditation as a Treatment for Chronic Pain

Meditation is one type of medicine that can be practised for thousands of years. During meditation, you can increase your focus and reduce your problems. It can help you to balance your mind and body. After research, mediation gets a lot of positive feedback that it is beneficial for the brain and keeps you happier and you can control your emotions as well.

After a review of 47 clinical trials and involving thousands of people having mild anxiety and depression, they found that those who are practising mindfulness mediation experience improvement in their nature after eight weeks, which is the same effect seen in people on medicine. So, these types of research are done by experts.

When we are talking about pain relief by meditation, one analysis of mindfulness and pain published in 2014 concluded that there was “insufficient proof” that mindfulness decreased pain intensity. In people with chronic pain, however, it reduced depression and anxiety, according to the same report. Healthcare providers should incorporate yoga into their pain management plans, according to the report.

In a trial of 350 adults, mindfulness meditation-based stress relief was shown to increase lower back pain by more than 30% in a study conducted in 2017.

We know meditation is not a complete solution for chronic pain, but regular practice of mindfulness meditation for pain relief can reduce your long-term pain and give different positive vibes to get recovery earliest. When you are positive in your mind, no one can break your confidence and meditation gives you that aplomb to fight against any kind of chronic pain.

Pain Relieving Methods

Release of Myofascial tension

Myofascial pain syndrome is a type of chronic pain. In this condition, you feel pain in particular points of muscle and different areas of your body. So, as a treatment to release Myofascial tension, stretching is one of the best exercises. A gentle exercise you can do by consulting your therapist or expert for the same.

Routine Exercise

Multiple studies show that exercise is one of the best options to get relief from pain immediately. Exercise can help reduce chronic pain, increase muscle activity, reduce the effects of neuropathic pain, and even help with depression and anxiety.

It is difficult to begin the exercise, but once you do, it feels so good to be pain-free. It can guide your body to relax muscle pain as well as any chronic pain.

Meditation and Pain

As we discussed the benefits of mediation multiple times. To get relief in pain again, mediation can be helpful for us. Just like depression and anxiety, mediation can stay away from us from the pain. This is not the only treatment to reduce the pain. However, mediation gives you courage and increases your tolerance to pain.

Meditation and mindfulness are techniques that are almost similar. Basically, mindfulness is a technique to concentrate on a particular thing without being judgemental. In the same way, if you focus on the reason behind your pain and try to analyze it, you will get a result. Of course, it is a long-term process, but you will get positive results for sure, as we have already seen at the beginning of the topic about little research.

Practice meditation for 10-15 minutes daily by sitting in a comfortable position and relaxing your body, which may control your nervous system as well as regulate your blood pressure. The majority of us spend our time with electronic devices. But try to spare a few minutes from your schedule and practice mediation not just to get relief from pain but for you and your better growth as a person.

Distraction

If you are not succeeding in finding relief from all the above, exercise distracts your mind. This is the best method ever. If pain is fleeing you, just run away from there. If you can not distract your mind and make it free from the thoughts, then distract your pain. Separate the meditation and pain relief techniques.

If you like to play video games, or you are in the mood to read a book, do it. If you like to solve puzzles, try to solve them, but keep your mind busy. And you will get a bit of relief from your pain.

Why Meditation for Pain?