Beyond the Pain

My wonderful landlady Dragita gave me a book for Christmas 2010. It was a miniture edition of Rick Warren’s “The Purpose-Driven Life”. I didn’t read it right away, figuring it was the usual fundamentalist Christian bullshit.

I don’t remember when I actually first read through it. The book has 40 ‘chapters’, 40 being a significant number in the bible. The idea is to read 1 chapter a day and reflect on the lesson, kind of like the daily bible reading we did when I was a JW.

I have reread The Purpose-Driven Life 3 or 4 times since Dragita first gave it to me. Today I am reading Day 10. The lesson is about surrendering to God. And, the notion is that when we surrender to God we MOST become US. That is, surrender is not about becoming some sort of robot but about being “all we can be”.

And, I began to think about the notion of surrendering to some greater purpose. A number of religions talk about surrender: I think it is part and parcel of the essence of Bhuddism. I know it IS an aspect of Christianity: the Desiderata says of God, “however you conceive him to be”. And, the Serenity Prayer teaches us to let go of the things we can’t change. Finally, a keystone of the 12-step program of AA is the notion of surrender to “your Higher Power”.

I just reread Deepak Chopra’s “God” for the third or fourth time. It contains the stories of 10 Spiritual Seekers. People like Job, the Apostle Paul, Rumi, and Julian of Norwich. Their seeking, in different ways, leads to the final chapter of the book where Deepak uses the 10 examples to examine the nature of God. He suggests that like the cells are part of the body WE are part of God. When I was a JW I was taught that God was “in heaven”. I thought of him – and he was a HE – as a wee bit schizophrenic or at least he had a mood disorder; for he was either VERY ANGRY or he was LOVING.

I mean the Old Testament God is one pissed off dude. Then between the first and second acts he transforms into the Loving Father who sacrifices his Son to save Mankind. REALLY, said in a snarky voice.

ANYWAY! (As Ellen says). I digress. My journey over these 29 years since I left the smothering womb of the JW religion has been the realization that God is

NOT seperate from me but is part of me and I am part of him/her and hers/his Universe. That notion is particularly freeing for me.

For you see, I AM NOT A SINNER because to be a sinner is to be apart from God. I am a part of the Universe, so I CAN NOT be apart from God. Ergo I can not be a sinner. Of course, this notion plays havoc with the teachings of most, if not all, Christian churches.

What if I am not a Sinner but just a Human Being trying to find his way in the world by listening for the voice of the God in me: gently giving Guidance.

Does this happen to you?

You get so fixated on working toward a goal that you don’t acknowledge or notice the progress you’ve made.

Happens to me all the time. I could blame my perfectionism, which would be true to a degree. Or, I could blame being overly focused on the goal, which would be true to a degree. Or, I could blame it on not having marker points in my plan, which would be true in large measure.

You see when I set out to go Beyond The Pain I didn’t have a plan. I just found the first thing that made sense to me and tried it. And, then when that didn’t work I thought about what I’d learned and tried the next thing, and the next thing, and the nexdrt thing. I tried some pretty weird treatments, lots of pills, and a boatload of psychological treatment. At the same time I kept scrupulous records of weather, stress, and what now. I’ve since learned that keeping medication, pain, and other records is a keystone of the Self Management program at the Calgary Pain Centre. Good on me!

In the Spring of this year I confirmed something I’d long suspected. It wasn’t just changes in air pressure that triggered my pain. It was changes in air pressure coupled with temperature changes and alterations in wind speed, particularly wind gusts. Since I couldn’t do much about the weather, except dress up or down, I turned my attention to what I could control.

I determined five natural or mind-based strategies I would use in my research. Then I devised a spread sheet I would use to record details of the pain management strategies and whether they worked. The pain continued at a severely fairly constant level through out the summer. Then in August, based on non pain based symptoms I was experiencing I began to suspect that a medication my urologist prescribed for BPH was the maincause of pain. I would not have known that if I didn’t keep detailed records of all the symptoms I was experiencing.

I stopped the medication and informed the urologist I had done so. Within a week I was pain free and I enjoyed a September mainly free from pain. Then October arrived with tumoltous cold weather. And, I was back to early morning pain.

And, failed to notice something rather important.

Yesterday I went to my former therapist, Lynn Lambert, to address concerns I had about Post Traumatic Stress arisng from my car crash. When I discussed the progress I had made with Dialing Down The Pain she said something that suprized me.

She said, “Wow! That’s fantastic. You’ve found something that works most of the time for pain.”

We went on discuss the things I tried and what I had been like.

And, I got it.

This is stellar progress. It really is significant. I’ve arrived at a critical point. I need to acknowlege it.

One way of acknowledging it is this blog post. I need to ponder what I am going to do.

Thanks Lynn for helping me see what I wasn’t seeing.