# Creativity + Surrender ##### Untangling Pain --- ![](https://youtu.be/Ij2wf8Ixo8Q) --- ## tl;dr **Creativity and pain** - Creative art therapy can have positive effects on pain and well-being - Enhances positive mood, which can reduce pain severity - Being creative can help express pain experiences and reduce need for medication - Makes us feel safe and takes our mind off the pain - No negative effects of creativity found **Bringing creativity into life** - Creativity is a big umbrella → drawing, painting, writing, music, etc. - It’s about bringing joy and focusing on the good stuff - Start small → first red hold, two minutes, then build up - Let your brain feel safe - Think about what creativity you could bring into your life **Acceptance and surrender** - Acceptance can improve pain outcomes → less distress, disability, and depression - ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) helps shift relationship with pain - Not about giving up → about letting go of resistance and being present - Chronic pain is exhausting, but resistance adds to suffering **ACT and moving forward** - ACT encourages alignment with values and meaningful life - Let go of the need to control or escape pain - Be present, focus on what we can do - Start with small changes and build up - Surrender to where we are now, not giving up but accepting --- ## Transcript On to creativity. Research has found that creative art therapy can have positive effects on pain management and overall well being as well. This comes from the fact that this enhances positive mood, which again we know can reduce pain severity. There's also a project which demonstrated that being creative can help people express their pain experiences and potentially reduce the need for pain medication. Again, this sort of makes sense too, because we want to tell people what we are feeling and experiencing. And when we don't do that's when things can get worse. So this could be a great way of explaining how you're feeling. And again, I think it becomes a SIM. It makes us feel safe when we are doing something creative. It makes, takes our mind off the pain. And even if we have just a brief moment and, the less we think about pain, the more likely our brain is to feel safe. And the more we feel safe, the less sensitive it's going to be. Now, from what I could find, there were no negative effects of creativity. So where could you add in some creativity in your life? Do you love to draw or paint or photograph things or write or do you love to play the piano? Creativity is a big, huge umbrella. It covers so many things, but it's about bringing some joy back to your life and about focusing on the good stuff. Although you may not be able to do what you did before, potentially before the pain, there's always somewhere we can start. And I mentioned before, do you remember me saying before about starting with that first boulder? That first red hold. And then once you've done that, you can come away, let your brain know it's safe when it does this. And then you can do it again. And then tiny bit more. Now this is what it might look like when it comes to creativity too. So drawing or painting for two minutes and then coming away and then the next time doing three minutes and then build it up gradually. We can do that. We can always start somewhere. So think about how you could bring creativity into your life. Find that joy, find that thing that will make your brain feel safe. Let's look at surrender or another term for it could be acceptance. So research shows that acceptance can play a significant role in pain management and outcomes. And in fact, high levels of pain acceptance and surrendering to the pain are actually associated with lower levels of distress, disability and depression. Now the biggest therapy for this that is known is actually called ACT, A C T, or Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. And this is like a really powerful approach, that focuses on helping people shift their relationship with pain. The idea is that instead of trying to eliminate pain, or fight it, which usually ends up leading to more frustration, and more suffering, ACT Therapy and Surrendering encourages acceptance of pain as a part of being human. Whilst at the same time commitment side of it is committing to actions that align with personal values and a meaningful life. Now surrender in this context, it's not about giving up, but it's about letting go of the need to constantly control or resist pain. We're often so afraid of pain and It is not nice at all. But it goes back to that famous quote that pain is inevitable, suffering is optional. And again, pain is fucking horrific, especially chronic pain, and it's exhausting. But what causes even more problems, and I've seen this for decades, It's our resistance to it. When we try and ignore it or push it away or run from it or try and control it and change how things are in this present moment, when sometimes surrendering to what is can actually help us with things. So again, it's not about, it's not about giving up. It's about being present and accepting what is right now. Now, I highly recommend looking up Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. There's a lot of books out there as well that are coming out and I highly recommend them. But it's just a different way of looking at things. Again we're looking for the good stuff. We're trying to not distract ourselves as such, although that is a benefit too. But it's about what is actually happening right now. It's about being present and accepting what is and accepting What we can actually do about it because more often than not, we can actually do much more than we actually realize, there are steps that we can take, but I think it's looking at the things that we actually, that actually matter as well. When we take that first step and just make those small changes that's where the sort of commitment side of it comes in. But again, the more we can surrender to our expectations or the need to be somewhere other than where we are right now, that's when things can help, We can make those small changes. Yes, absolutely. We're not surrendering to the fact that we can't do anything. We can, but it's accepting where we are right now and taking those small steps to where we want to get to and just being accepting and letting go of all other expectations. And this is a massive part of this. So I highly recommend checking out acceptance and commitment therapy. But yeah, look at where you are actually fighting this pain. What are your, again, going back to thoughts and beliefs and expectations, what do you expect? So this can be a massive part of helping with your pain. --- Next lesson → [[Untangling Pain – Module 2 Lesson 14|next lesson]] %% - [[creative art therapy can have positive effects on pain management and overall well-being as well]] - [[Finding Creative Joy in your life]] - [[acceptance can play a significant role in pain management and outcomes]] - [[ACT and Living Meaningfully]] - [[Acceptance Is Not Giving Up]]