Easing pain with meditation

One method of working with pain and physical illness is through meditation. Using visualisations, it is possible to affect how the body feels and assist it to heal. While it is not clear how this works, it is apparent that a range of physical conditions may be assisted in this way.

This is not a substitute for medical treatment, but rather a way of augmenting it. Meditation and visualisation appears to support the body’s natural healing process and is thought to improve remission rates for cancer, ease chronic pain or enhance recovery after surgery. There is no evidence that visualisation is harmful. 

If you suffer from pain, you might try the following visualisation. It is best to do it regularly, maybe once or twice a day over a few weeks, then use as required. In the visualisation below, if there is an image that does not work for you, adapt it as you need to.

Find a time and place where you can sit comfortably and won’t be disturbed. Make sure you are comfortable, perhaps closing the eyes if you wish and spend a few moments bringing your attention to your breath. Don’t try to change anything, just feel the breath enter and leave your body, let yourself settle and relax.

When you are ready, imagine yourself sitting in the sunshine under a clear blue sky. Feel the warmth of the sun on your skin. From out of the sky, an indigo silk scarf floats down gently, landing in your hands.  You feel how soft and warm it is. Take it and place it on your body close to where you experience pain.

As you watch it melt gently into your body over the pain, feel it sink inside then wrap itself about your pain. You notice that somehow a corner of the scarf is still showing itself and that you can pull it out of your body without any problem. Do so and as it comes, it takes the pain it is wrapped around away with it. Once you have pulled it out of your body, throw it away. Let the pain be gone.

Meditation and visualisation will not always be useful, rather like no course of treatment works for everyone. Try for yourself and see if it works for you.