Pain is a tricky beast. Acute pain, like injuries and sprains can be upsetting and stop us from doing things we want to do. Chronic pain gets under our skin in a different way. Some of us make every attempt to ignore chronic pain, while others of us get very emotionally attached to it.
Put out the welcome mat!? Sounds crazy, right? This article by Jon Kabat-Zinn in the magazine Tricycle talks about doing just that. He isn't suggesting that you'll just wish your pain away. Kabat-Zinn suggests, "If you distinguish between pain and suffering, change is possible. As the saying goes, "Pain is inevitable; suffering is optional." What he is saying is that by paying attention to the pain and observing how we relate to it, we can actually decrease our negative experience of the pain, and learn a few things about ourselves a few things along the way:
At Home In Our Bodies | Tricycle.
Acupuncture can do wonders for pain - both acute and chronic. It both eases the pain and helps you bring greater awareness to your body as a whole entity. Your acupuncturist can't be there in the middle of the night, however, or at your desk at work, or at your dinner table. This approach has helped many people deal with pain in a healthy way, no pills required!