When I see people trying to sort out their pain, I see them making their lives harder.
- Doing core exercises.
- Correcting their posture.
- Going to endless appointments to be fixed.
This is what I did for a long time too. I was following advice. It was stuff that ‘made sense’, but it was always more effort or more time. Until I learnt more about how pain actually works and realised that working harder is rarely the answer. At least for the pro-active, independent copers that I work with.
You need to learn how to make your life easier. This might be hard ‘work’ at first because it involves a mindset shift and habit changes, and both those things are tough!
How to make life easier? An over-simplified, and very incomplete list:
Think movement vs exercise
Exercise, yes, but just do what you enjoy/don’t hate and doesn’t wind your pain up too much. Thinking of adding movement wherever you can often works better for people with pain – it tends to go with an idea of ease and lubricating your joints and not stiffening up. These are more useful for pain than the ‘go hard or go home’ attitude that can get attached to the word exercise.
Stop ‘correcting’ your posture
You are probably over correcting and making it a stressful chore. If a posture is pain provoking for you then tiny changes to make it easier, done more frequently, work better.
Reduce excess muscle tension
We all generally hold postures and do movements with excess work. Especially when you have persistent pain. You can learn to do everything with more ease, and save your energy for actual exercise rather than slogging through everyday life.
Infuse everyday life with more ease
Notice and change your stress reactions. Take moments to check in with yourself and breathe freely, unclamp that jaw, etc etc. Then you don’t have to take so much time doing special de-stressing stuff.