“I feel, Therefore I am” is a belief I first learned about from one of my mentors, a therapist I met in Hawaii that I have known for over 20 years that I still consult with. He lives off the Grid in the Desert in Arizona now. He was a former high ranking naval officer as well as one of the first consciousness objectors of the Vietnam War who became a Somatic Therapist. He only takes referrals from word of mouth and is one of the emotionally healthiest humans I know. This concept is completely opposite from the belief of “I think therefore I am”. With all due respect to the human condition, he said most people are talking heads without any connection to their emotional body and are disconnected from their inner compass that lead them to recreate painful life experiences over and over until they learn to feel again.
Through my studies, professional and personal experiences, what I have learned is that all of our experiences are filtered through our senses, repurposed in each present moment, then recycled into a new experience and perception. Chronic pain, chronic health conditions and/or iatrogenic illness induced by medications such as Opioids and/or Benzodiazepines all have the long complicated pilgrimage on their road to wellness. As humans, we live through our perceptions in a relatively small window of about 2-3 weeks before our present moment and can only really see clearly where we will be 2-3 weeks into the future. Likewise, the past 2-3 weeks are basically a culmination of all past experiences, so we are relatively always grounded in our entire life experiences in the present and it is also a combination of present circumstances in a backdrop of our life experiences. This is important to know when recovering from an injury because a person needs to be able to suspend and challenge their current perceptions to remain hopeful while they are recovering from a physical injury and/or their nervous system is rewiring.
The nervous system is the slowest healing system in the body. If you physically cut a nerve, it takes at least 3-4 months to start to regenerate, if it does at all. It is common to know someone who had that one surgery or injury where they still have a bit of numbness due to the nerves not reconnecting. The good news is that with neuroplasticity, regeneration is absolutely possible. Like with anything, what we place our attention on grows or improves. That is why physical therapy is so important. Typically prescribed 2-3 times a week to give that time and attention to what we need to heal or grow. We also know how expensive it is or patients don’t know how to access this service in their insurance plan.
One of my clients, by the time we met, had thankfully found YouTube to teach himself how to walk again with his new prosthetic legs because he could not figure out how to get into physical therapy with his insurance plan. He already understood the strong connection between the mind and body and would have become completely deconditioned if he did not challenge himself to find access to resources quickly. In addition, he had lost his limbs below the knee from complications of diabetes and was now dealing with phantom limb pain. Since he was open to mind body therapies, we worked on the body scan meditation that helped integrate the sensations that built up in intensity so strongly and didn’t know where to go. We were able to take the sensations and pull it all the way down into his toes as he would imagine them and break up the pent up energy that was stuck there. When he would describe the pain to me, it reminded me of the video game Pac-Man where the ghosts are stuck in the middle box just bouncing off each other. What was needed was a valve to release those sensations and if we think we are only energetically contained in our body, we are limited, but when we can use our mind to expand our awareness and consciousness to integrate our sensations then we are boundless.
The state tells the story. What we feel will generate certain thoughts that lead to certain actions. When we are tired or in pain, our mind will tell a false message to not move because it sees it as dangerous or possibly causing more fatigue and pain. However, when we challenge our thoughts and recall that when we move our pain decreases and our energy typically increases, we are more likely to move and increase functioning and sensations to rebuild the body. This goes for everything else in life too. How we feel are affected by so many factors, such as what we eat, how much sleep we are getting, stress, different random experiences throughout our day and if we don’t stop to check in with how we feel or whether our thoughts and perceptions are based off facts or just feelings, it can lead us to take certain actions that may not serve us well. Engaging in a daily practice of mindfulness meditation can help increase the connectivity between our brain circuits as well as induce relaxation to help reduce reaction times and help us better respond to our thoughts, others and stressors.
