# Spiritual Health + Gratitude + Higher Self ##### Untangling Pain ---  --- ## tl;dr **Spiritual health and woo-woo stuff** - Includes gratitude, higher self, creativity, surrender, self-compassion, authenticity - Focused on SIMs → what makes us feel safe and reduces nervous system sensitivity **Gratitude** - Associated with reduced pain and stress - It’s a practice → start with glimmers - Tiny things that shift focus from pain - Keep a gratitude diary - Look for glimmers, record and reread them **Connecting to higher self** - Can mean God, universe, soul → very personal - It’s the part beyond fear, anxiety, and pain - Helps reduce pain by changing thoughts and emotions - Promotes safety and trust, lowers threat response - Spiritual well-being linked to lower pain intensity and better tolerance - Can be your support system → doesn’t need to be religious - Use meditation, mindfulness, prayer, affirmations --- ## Transcript Now finally, we're going to look at the spiritual health, or the woo-woo stuff, or at least the stuff that people sometimes consider woo-woo, and this includes gratitude, connection to our higher self, creativity, Surrender, Self Compassion and Authenticity and how all of these can contribute to your pain or rather reduce pain as tends to be the case. This area really is looking at SIMs mostly. You know this spiritual health is looking at the stuff that makes us feel safe, that reinforces that safety and as a result reduces the sensitivity of our nervous system. So firstly, gratitude. Research suggests that gratitude has positive effects on pain and well being. And they found that gratitude is associated with reduced pain, and this is usually because of the reduce in stress. But basically the main point of this is that focusing on gratitude And what you do have can actually help reduce that pain. Now, I completely understand again that this is difficult when we are in pain to see the good things. But gratitude is practice. it's about noticing those glimmers, or at least that's where it could start. The things that despite all the shit that's going on, That there is that little glimmer of hope, of joy, the little things that we are grateful for, just the tiny little things that take our focus away from all the pain that we're in. I have mentioned before about keeping a gratitude diary. And again, I completely stick by that. And again, if gratitude is too big of a word, this is why we're looking for those glimmers, those little things that create a tiny little smile or just make you feel warm inside and make you feel safe and happy and that bring a little bit of joy. It could be for literally a split second and that is enough. Record it write it down reread what you've written and the more you look for the glimmers the more you're actually going to find them. Now we're on to connecting to our higher self and how that influences pain. firstly, I need to talk about the definition of a higher self. For some people, it may be God, the universe, spirit, soul, whatever it is. For others, it may be a feeling that they are connected to something more than themselves. This is very personal. I think the thing is for many of us our higher self is just maybe that part of us that maybe we can't even explain but we can feel and it's part of us that we connect to when things are quieter when we slow down and when we breathe. It's, you know the part of us that is more than fear and anxiety and pain. It's just something more within us. So whatever it is that you call it, research suggests that spirituality, that connecting to whatever it is, connecting to something more than us, plays a significant role in pain management and coping for those with chronic pain. Again, it makes sense because Spirituality can help us with those pain experiences by changing our thoughts and emotions. So this is when we're trusting something more than ourselves, we're able to promote those feelings of safety and security. That then obviously reinforces to our brain that there is less threat and that we don't need protecting as much. So you can see how this makes sense, how people with greater spiritual well being and faith actually report lower pain intensity and how they report better pain tolerance because their brain feels safer, they feel cared for, they feel like they have a support system. So a support system sometimes doesn't need to come in the form of an actual person, it could be connecting to your higher self. This could be your support system. Now, I'm not talking about joining a religion or making prayer a daily thing because again, this is all personal for you, but it's knowing that being connected to our higher self, to the universe, to our spirit or soul, whatever it is, whether it's through meditation, mindfulness, prayer, affirmations, they can all help by increasing that safety within us. So I don't know what this will look like for you personally. I know what it looks like for me. But it is something for you to think about. How can you bring this connection to more than just yourself, to more than just pain into your life? How can it help you with your SIMs, creating that safety in you? --- Next lesson → [[Untangling Pain – Module 2 Lesson 13|next lesson]] %% - [[Spiritual Health and the Woo-Woo Stuff and pain]] - [[gratitude has positive effects on pain and well-being]] - [[Connecting to Our Higher Self influences pain]]