Written By Alan Good
One result of aging, for most seniors, is pain. We may ache in the knees or other joints and may not have the mobility we once enjoyed. Arthritis or other ailments become a part of most seniors’ lives.
Having experienced knee and hip limitations due to arthritis, this writer can vouch for the discomfort and pain before and after surgery. There may be a sense of being alone—especially while bed-ridden. The injury, the pain and discomfort, can take your focus away from living. But the pain you have at the time can be eased, and not by drugs.
But you say, “The ache is now!” “I feel the pain now, at this present time.” It was my experience that breathing deeply and focusing on my breath brought me into the present and away from the pain.
After some reading and self awareness during the above events—and now—it is my belief that what we focus on becomes larger. If we are in pain and that’s all we think about, the pain will be more noticeable. Just consider an injury you may have experienced in the past—perhaps as small as a papercut.
It happened and it hurts. Every time you think about it, there it is, throbbing for attention. Now, remember when, at that time, you became preoccupied with some tasks like droving a car, for example. Hadn’t you forgot the pain? Later you looked at your finger and, behold, the pain returned!
It’s the same with the pain we may feel at being old or forgotten. We may spend most of the day ruminating on the fact that we are no longer 40, or 50, and others we know have moved on. Any negative thought we direct our minds to and spend time getting deeper into can cause pain of some sort. It may be heartache, but the pain is real.
Just like with the papercut or arthritis, we can lift our thoughts away from the pain and experience relief. It takes practice and some discipline but it’s doable.
In a book entitled, Healthy Aging: A Lifelong Guide to Your Well-Being, by Andrew Weil, the author states we can, “Learn to identify habitual thoughts and images that produce feelings of sadness or anxiety, particularly those about the process of aging and changes in your body and appearance”.
The Greek philosopher, Epictetus, developed a science of happiness. He taught people to unlearn the habit of judging everything that happens as good or bad, and to learn to distinguish what is within your power to change and what is not.
“Make the best use of what is in your power, take the rest as it comes,” he is quoted as saying. “The thing that upsets people is not what happens but what they think it means”.
In other words, it’s not the problem that causes your stress, it’s what you think about it. When we constantly ruminate about how bad we think an event or thing is we give them power.
Once you are aware of habits of thought that lead to negative emotions, you can begin to substitute new ones. For example, whenever you notice yourself pondering on a theme like, “I am worthless and this latest setback just confirms it,” you can consciously substitute, “This setback is just something that happened; I will get through it, because I am capable and resilient.”
It is impossible to hold opposite thoughts in mind at the same time, and the impact of a negative thought—like sickness and disease—can be canceled by thinking a positive one. As you practice the substitution of positive thinking for negative thinking, it will gradually become the dominant habit.
