Several years ago, I experienced what I did not realize at the time was the beginning of a life-changing journey into chronic illness.
It started with me noticing shortness of breath when I bent down to pick something up from the floor, and it quickly increased in size. I felt as if I had entered an alternate reality, where I had transformed from a healthy person whose life included walking, dancing, and traveling, into a person whose body was no longer cooperating with life. At my worst, my heart rate rose throughout the day and night to levels that would send healthy friends to the emergency room. I was exhausted and sometimes too weak to walk.
Already a Buddhist meditation teacher and hypnotherapist, I found myself on a crash course in treating a complex medical condition and learning how to live a meaningful life inside a radically changed body.
This was the beginning of a complex condition involving almost every system in my body, which ultimately dated back to the period when I was living in a small shack that was unwittingly harboring an uninvited tenant: black mold. At the time, I could not have imagined how profoundly this experience would change my body, my life, and my work.
Already a Buddhist meditation teacher and hypnotherapist, I found myself on a crash course in treating a complex medical condition and learning how to live a meaningful life inside a radically changed body.
Over the years that followed, I worked to create spaces for healing, resilience, and joy, rebuilding a life that felt in many ways happier and freer than the one I had lost. I also found myself supporting more clients who were dealing with complex illnesses themselves. I have seen time and time again how mindfulness and hypnosis can help people feel a renewed sense of hope and the ability to relate to their lives and bodies differently.
The nervous system mobilizes against the threat
When we live with chronic illness or pain, we often feel stuck on high alert — and for good reason. The body is designed to detect danger and mobilize quickly against the threat. We have survived through generations of human evolution because of this finely honed system. It’s a great gift – until it isn’t.
Pain, stress, illness, and other issues can send signals throughout the body that something is very wrong. It’s our system’s way of saying: “Hey! Stop! Please take care of me.”
“Maladaptive neuroplasticity“It occurs when the body and mind begin to reorganize in order to address a constant threat that is occurring. Unfortunately, we do not always reorganize in a way that helps us in the long run or in a way that helps us in the long run or particularly. For our mind and body, it is about one thing and one thing only: our survival.”
But in chronic conditions that occur over time, this repeated activation can make our nervous system more sensitive to threat. Our body’s alarm system starts firing over and over again, responding to even small changes in body position, environment, or life circumstances as if it were a five-alarm alarm. This is part of the reason for hypnosis and meditation It has been shown To be extremely supportive of chronic illness and pain, when used with proper medical care.
You’ve probably heard the term “neurons that fire together, and connect to each other,” meaning that when we repeat anything Over and over again, we build powerful neural pathways that operate automatically. This trait is great in many situations: we easily remember how to drive a car, see the face of someone we love and have a feeling of warmth, wake up and go to the meditation cushion because it is a regular part of our routine.
Our brains are incredibly efficient. They want to save energy, so they create shortcuts to do so. This is often helpful, but when it comes down to it Chronic pain And illness, this can lead to increased sensitivity, which some researchers call Maladaptive neuroplasticity.
What does that mean for us? Essentially, the body and mind begin to reorganize in order to confront the constant threat that is occurring. Unfortunately, we don’t always reorganize in a way that helps us in the long run or feels particularly good. For our mind and body, it comes down to one thing and one thing only: our survival.
Over time, an internal algorithm is created in the brain, body and nervous system: we are exposed to a stimulus or feel the onset of symptoms, and automatically, a series of chemical, physiological and emotional responses are triggered within a fraction of a second. Emotions intensify, thought loops begin to spin, discomfort worsens, and the neural pathways linking things like fear, sadness, despair, frustration, and physical symptoms grow stronger.
The great thing about neuroplasticity is that you have more control over this process than you might imagine, especially when it comes to navigating habitual thoughts and reactions, distress, and fatigue.
Neuroplasticity means you have more power than you know
It is understandable that these processes seem large, automatic, and beyond our control, but this is not the whole picture. The great thing about neuroplasticity is that you have more control over this process than you might imagine, especially when it comes to navigating habitual thoughts and reactions, distress, and fatigue.
This is where mindfulness and hypnosis can provide real support. Both practices help you notice when alarm bells start going off, so you can interrupt the chain reaction and learn to direct it in a different direction. By relaxing, He breathesWith a focus on attention, visualization, and active work with the subconscious mind, you can begin to support the nervous system and create a space where recurring triggers, symptoms, situations, and thoughts can be met and worked with.
The more you practice developing qualities such as safety, compassion, kindness, relaxation and comfort, the more grounded and spontaneous you will become. Just as you strengthened the muscles of stress and exhaustion, you can strengthen the muscles of ease, confidence, and permission to rest and take care of yourself.
One of my clients described this process as being able to access her “little sanctuary”—a place where she could rest, remember her wholeness, and feel at ease, even in the midst of a complex, years-long illness. With this, her sleep significantly improved along with her overall sense of hope, personal strength and well-being.
Address the whole person
Of course, this does not mean believing that we can just “meditate” a condition that needs treatment. These practices are best done in conjunction with medical care, because they allow us to navigate the full range of our experiences—from the stress of doctor’s appointments and treatment protocols, to changes in our lives. Relationships And professional, to celebrate victories and progress when they come. Living with pain and illness touches our bodies but it also touches our identities, our spirituality, and our worldview. These practices can allow us to do this appear For all its parts.
Adding meditation and hypnosis to our chronic illness care regimen can reveal that we have more power than we think: the ability to interrupt familiar thought loops, create moments of comfort and inner safety, and even reshape emotions, beliefs, and patterns that can make life with chronic illness seem harder than it really is.
Adding meditation and hypnosis to our chronic illness care regimen can reveal that we have more power than we think: the ability to interrupt familiar thought loops, to create moments of rest and calm. Internal safetyEven reshaping feelings, beliefs, and patterns can make life with chronic illness harder than it already is.
This is very powerful because in the type of mental states available through meditation and hypnosis, the mind becomes more flexible, creative and adaptive. In fact, early research It is suggested that mind-body practices such as meditation and hypnosis may influence brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), a molecule associated with neuroplasticity, learning, pain modulation, and the ability of the nervous system to adapt in response to stress.
When we add these practices to our toolbox, we partner with the subconscious so we can reshape our relationship with illness from the inside out.
