Christiane Wolf, MD, PhD is a former physician who is now an internationally known mindfulness and insight meditation teacher. While practicing medicine, Christiane began noticing the mediation practices she was sharing were making a profound difference in the lives of her patients, and she is here to explain those changes with us today.
In our conversation together, Christiane dives deep into explaining the science behind how pain and our brain work (we have quite the geek out session). You’ll learn the 3 components of pain, how the words you use regularly can affect that pain, and which mindfulness techniques are helpful in both managing and lessening your experience with pain.
If you are experiencing chronic pain (or are even a physician who treats chronic pain) this episode is for you. Christiane wonderfully blends Eastern techniques with Western medicine and provides mindfulness practices that are simple, effective, and a true gift to anyone who is struggling with pain.
Christiane Wolf, MD, PhD is a former physician, internationally known mindfulness and Insight (Vipassana) meditation teacher. She is board certified as an OB/GYN and holds a PhD in psychosomatic medicine from Humboldt University in Berlin, Germany. Dr. Wolf is the lead-consultant and teacher trainer for the National Mindfulness Facilitator Training at the US Department of Veteran Affairs. She is the author of “Outsmart Your Pain – Mindfulness and Self-Compassion to Help You Leave Chronic Pain Behind” and the co-author of the classic training manual for mindfulness teachers “A Clinician’s Guide to Teaching Mindfulness.”
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Zack Arnold: I am here today with Christiane Wolf, who's a former physician and mindfulness teacher and also a teacher trainer. You're also the parent of three teenagers, you are an ultra marathon runner, you are certified Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction, MBSR teacher, you are the author of two books. The latest one that we're going to talk about today is outsmart your pain, mindfulness and self compassion to help you leave your chronic pain behind. And you also are a teacher and mentor to a very important person in my community. And on my team, fellow coach Debby Germino. So we are both very, very happy to have you here today, Christiane.
Christiane Wolf: I'm very, very happy to be here today. Thank you.
Zack Arnold: So I have every intention of talking about chronic pain and talking about your book and diving into the details, because you put a tremendous amount of time and effort into putting it together. What I actually want to talk about first is going to be a little bit more off the beaten path. And I don't want to make this a soapbox. soapbox episode. But I have been very, very passionate for several decades now about how important the combination of Eastern philosophy and Western medicine is. And I'm, obviously I'm going to assume you feel the same way. Because you have that unique combination of a lot of Eastern philosophy and Buddhism. But coupled with Western medicine, Western medicine training, you've got degrees, you've practiced Western medicine. So I want to talk a little bit more about you and your why and how you ended up going from practicing traditional Western medicine to blending these two together?
Christiane Wolf: Yeah, thank you. You know, it's interesting, like, like, you don't grow up saying, like, I'm going to be a meditation teacher when I grow up. And definitely like, when I was a kid that I didn't even know that existed. And now it's kind of a career and a lot of people go into mindfulness because they find really how useful it has been for their own life, and then they want to share it. And for me, it was really something I was looking for bigger meaning of life or spirituality when I was a teenager. And I already knew that I wanted to go into medicine. But then I stumbled across Buddhism. And like, for me being a very inquisitive young woman, somebody telling me what I had to believe never worked for me. And so that the Buddha said is like, you don't have to believe anything, you just have to practice and see if it works for you. That was very convincing for me. And that is something that I have actually kept up until today, like, I'm still doing this. So if it works, then I'll do it. Right. So it's like less like, why is it working and the philosophies is like, in like, as a physician, or like in the healing field, it's really I always say, like, whatever heals is right. And I don't really care where it comes from.
Zack Arnold: I can already tell that you and I are kindred spirits, because I grew up exactly the same way to this day, you're not going to tell me what to think you're not going to tell you what to believe. Right. And there's something there's some some ninja like psychology and Buddhism, pun sort of intended, or like, believe whatever you'd like. And then you realize you're believing this belief that's telling you, you don't need to believe it, right. And I kind of, I kind of stumbled into it the same way, my path was different in that I was very obsessed with martial arts, and training martial arts for years. And through that, I learned more about meditation. And from there when I got to college, so a couple of classes about Zen Buddhism, like, cool this allied to the martial arts training, like very young energy, very masculine, and then I got into it more. And I'm like, this is really, really interesting. And it's kind of become a, I don't want to say a lifelong hobby, because I don't know if you can call it a hobby, but it's really informed the perception with with, with which I see the world. And I think that when we when we dive deeper into chronic pain management and the things that you talk about in the book, there's no question that the Buddhist view of suffering seems to factor very clearly into a lot of the work that you do.
Christiane Wolf: It does and then so as people sometimes get a little bit concerned, or they say like what we're teaching is stealth Buddhism, right? So when I go into hospitals, or like some organizations like it feels I have to be careful to not mention the the word like the Buddha, but it's actually the Buddha was just a human being and he stumbled across like some really liberating teachings about the mind we call it mind training or mind and heart training. And that has nothing to do actually with religion. So we say like the Buddha wasn't a Buddhist, it was just something that was kind of created afterwards. And he was actually very clear. He said, like, no statues like No, no, don't make me into a deity because I'm not I'm a human being. And if we're thinking about like learning to work with your heart and mind to yourself feel better, and for the world, like to make the world a better place. I mean, I think that is actually at the core of all religions. Yeah, so I'm actually quite straightforward. This is what it comes from, where it comes from. But it actually, I'm not interested in making anybody and Buddhists, because that is such a personal path,
Zack Arnold: of course, and which again, is kind of one of the interesting things about the reverse psychology of Buddhism. You realize you're becoming a Buddhist, but you weren't even you weren't ever supposed to be a Buddhist. But that's one of the things I admire about is its level of flexibility. What I'm curious about next, and this may be a little bit of a chicken and an egg conversation. But do you feel that the interest in Buddhism and Eastern philosophy came first before the Western medical training in the interest or what I've also heard from many, many physicians that I've talked to over the years, that when they go through the traditional Western system with the idea of really helping people, they realize I'm kind of being trained just to treat a disease or treat a symptom and never really treat the patient? So I realized that it's not an either or, but what was your your kind of, you know, the path to go from? Was it the Buddhism first, which informed Western medicine was the western medicine that informed the Buddhism? I'm curious how all this came together?
Christiane Wolf: That's a that's a really an awesome question. So I think for me, what actually came first is that I had a very strong sense that I want to I mean, it sounds grandiose, a little bit of EQ, I want to help alleviate suffering, and my own and that of other people. And that is basically both of the systems are, that's at their core, right? So Western medicine wants to alleviate suffering. Buddhism wants to alleviate suffering, Eastern medicine wants to alleviate suffering. And so again, like for me, it's like, whatever does that does the trick. But for me, it was really, so Western medicine was just the only only thing available might Eastern medicine just was not on my radar, like at all. When I was training, and it was training, like in Berlin and the University Hospital, like very conservative, very western oriented for though a little bit of acupuncture, but it was really like, Ooh, that was already like pretty fringe.
Zack Arnold: I believe the word you're looking for is woowoo. Right? Whoo, whoo. Yeah. Accupuncture. That sounds very woowoo.
Christiane Wolf: Yes. So I did a little bit of that. And again, like felt like, oh, very daring at that point. But what was the interesting thing is so like, so at that point, I was already a practicing Buddhist, and never taught that to my patients, because that would not have been appropriate. Yeah, because that would have been a religion, then back then, like secular mindfulness didn't exist, or at least not in Berlin, it was not a thing like it is today. And so what I really noticed that I used my own meditation practice, to show up differently for my patients. So I actually never trained in Eastern medicine. So for me, it was really like, How can I be more available and more human and more connected with the people that I'm working with. And I worked in a gynecological oncology. So there's a lot of pain and a lot of suffering there. And I really noticed that I was able to be with some of my patients and their families in ways that my colleagues couldn't. Right. So there's like, unfortunately, at times in oncology, the place where it's just like, There's nothing else we can do here, right? And we can do comfort care, and we can help you like not be in so much pain, basically. Right? But basically, you'll die of this, right? You will not survive this, this illness. And a lot of physicians don't do well with that, because they almost feel like it's their personal failure that they couldn't make that cancer go away. So that was that was just interesting. And notice that really like oh, like I'm training and something here, that allows me to actually stay connected in a more humane way with with people. Yeah.
Zack Arnold: And that's one of the things I really admire about this more holistic functional medicine is that it's not just about what are you dealing with? What are your symptoms? How can I alleviate your suffering, or how can I alleviate or eliminate the symptoms? And I feel that a lot of the eastern side brings in how can I bring you wellness? There's not there's not nearly enough wellness in the Western medical system, at least in my opinion, and I'm not coming at it from the Inside, I've never trained, I haven't taken any formal classes, I had no degrees, but I'm surrounded by a lot of people that have. And they all say one of the reasons they feel disenchanted is the lack of wellness. And it's always about the illness.
Christiane Wolf: But you know, wellness is actually it gives people the agency to do something for themselves. Right? So Western medicine is like, I'm the expert on the human body, you have a human body. So let me fix you. That's the model, right? It's almost like a car dealer, right? So there's something wrong with your car, you bring it in, I fix it, you get it back. And this is really the split of the mind and body and our culture, unfortunately, right. So what we're doing here, what mindfulness is, like, the amazing thing of mindfulness and compassion training for physicians, for anybody really is is like, I am here for myself, I feel more connected. And I can teach you how you can actually take care of yourself. So you say so Jon Kabat Zinn, who was the founder of the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction class, so like, what he really did is, so he went into 1979, went into Western medical school, university hospital, and he's told, like, all the department heads sent me all your patients that you basically, were you at your wit's end, like, all the patients were you like you, they come in, and you go, like, I don't really know what to do with them, like, I can't help them anymore. And all the patients that you have to tell like all you have to learn how to live with that. And the I mean, I'm sure you know, like, how many people in our society have been told by their physicians or the system? Well, you have to learn how to live with that. And but nobody taught them how to live with that before. And that is really like so and this is really why this is like really so important that they came out of the monastic setting, by a very, like exclusive exclusive in a monastery training to just to be available for anybody who says, like, actually want to take a little bit more control back over my life, and bring in exactly what you say the wellness, right, so that is something that I'm doing for myself. And actually, only you can do that for yourself anyways, because I can do this as a physician. Yeah. So like this, like the the mind training, the heart training. And then of course, like all that, the whole thing, what your whole podcast is about, right? So to really, those are all a tools that we can use, and only we can use, we can't tell somebody else to do that for us.
Zack Arnold: Yeah, I love all of that. And I think what, what I really want to point out next is this idea of agency and feeling like you can take control of whatever's going on. There's a phrase thrown around a lot nowadays, where you know, you should be your own doctor or be your own advocate, which I agree with, but don't always use Dr. Google and WebMD to diagnose your symptoms, because there are experts like you, but at the same time, like you said, on the flip side, well, I'm you're wearing the white coat, so you know everything, and I know nothing. So just fix me, that doesn't work either. There has to be a blend of this, right? So when it comes to that idea, and we move into this idea, specifically of managing pain and chronic pain, which is obviously something that you're very well versed in, what I want to do is something that it's funny, I was listening to you do another podcast with Dan Harris of 10%, happier. And is this idea of kind of unpackaging something from this one single idea and all of its component parts. And I had this realization, I'm like, oh, that's kind of what I've done with everything. Since I was literally an infant. My parents would say, even before I was speaking, I would just look at things. And I would move the pieces and take them apart. And I've spent my entire life looking at something saying, how does that work. And then I take the pieces apart. And at first it was actual machines and gears and whatever. And then it was stories and movies, which I've been working on for years and years. But now for me it's psychological concepts. And there are a few concepts that I think are harder to break into component parts and explain through logic rather than emotion than pain. So before we get into how to manage pain, using mindfulness and the techniques that you talked about, I really want people to understand what pain is both on the psychological level, but also on the physiological level. So where do we start on packaging something as complex as pain?
Christiane Wolf: Yeah. And it's again, like, oh, like how much time you have, like you said, like,
Zack Arnold: Would you like to do a nine part podcast? Should I schedule the next day parts? Yeah,
Christiane Wolf: Yeah, that sounds about right. Yeah, it's it's so like, but this is really the core point. It's like pain is very complex. And the thing is that we usually like of course, like so we have, we only have one pain system. And the pain system was like built off, like through evolution in order to protect us from damage makes total sense, right? If you can feel pain, you're in big trouble. If your body can tell you like you just stepped on something sharp and you pull your foot away like you're in trouble because you won't feel it your foot gets infected. Uh, you might die of that, right? So it was like, amazing. And so we have, we have a saying that we say like acute pain is protective. And then the thing is, so we think, right, and then also, there's a direct correlation with the amount of pain that I have was a tissue damage. So if I hurt myself a little bit, it hurts a little bit if I hurt myself a lot, right? If there's a lot of damage, then there will be a lot of pain. That, unfortunately, is not true for chronic pain. Because there are all these different layers that now come in. Because first of all, all pain is real. So that is really important. Right? So I often have people come to me, they say, like, Well, the doctor said they couldn't find anything. And then I should see a pain psychologist. And what the patient hears is like, I'm making that up the pain all in my head, right? It's all in my head. Here's the thing, actually, all pain is in our head. Because what produces the pain is the brain, not the body. And people really get that confused, because they think, Oh, don't we have like pain receptors, we have what we call pain receptors. They're called nociceptors. And no C actually means danger, not pain. So it is the role of your body to give information to your brain saying like, there might be danger, pay attention, pay attention, right? Mindfulness is paying attention. So I just love that correlation. So the body tells the brain, there might be something going on here. But then it's through the filter of the brain to say like, Okay, this is relevant, or this is not. The problem with chronic pain is because right, so like, I think everybody has heard of neuroplasticity at this point.
Zack Arnold: If they have it very quickly, because this is an area where I am absolutely obsessed. As soon as I discovered this idea that my brain isn't fixed. I have a certain IQ, I can't change I am who I am once the science started coming out, and I realized, I have a lot more control over this than I think and I learned this idea of neuroplasticity, my life change. So let's pause for two minutes. Let's assume nobody has ever heard the term because this could be life changing for the right people.
Christiane Wolf: Yeah. So neuroplasticity basically means that just like your muscles change when you work them, or you don't work them, this is the thing. They're like neuroplasticity is going on all the time. Right? So it means that your brain keeps changing. And your brain keeps changing until the day you die. Right? So when I went to medical school, it was still like same, that thing is just like, oh, yeah, basically just goes downhill, like by your mid 20s. Like, good luck. That's what it is, like, we're just declining. And this is just not true. So like part of this is like why we're also like doing all these mind trainings. Because it's like weightlifting for our brain, right. So like memory, and like all these functions, they actually we can train them and when we can keep it up and train it like through our like really like old age. And this is really important. And so but the thing is, this is about neuroplasticity, T is about repetition, right? So whatever you do a lot, you get really good at here, we come back to chronic pain, or, like, if you're angry a lot, you get really good at being angry, if you're anxious unless you get really good at being anxious. Of course, it's more complex than that. But there's like a lot like it's like, we're having a safety net, we say the neurons that fire together wire together. So like we're building like these, like from like a cow path in our brain like this very small. We're building like a highway that over time, as we like doing it over and over and over and over. So the brain gets better and better and stronger and stronger at certain things. And that is true for pain. So the brain because the brain's role is to protect you and what it tries to say like, I want to be proactive in protecting. So I'm creating pain out of something that previous I would not have registered as pain. Yeah. So and this is why we say like chronic pain is over protective. It's almost like a car alarm that goes off way too easily. Right? We're all annoyed by those cars that are just down the street. And they're just like going off all the time. Right? Because like a bicycle drove by or something, right. So it's a little bit with our brains in that way. So but the problem is like we're on the receiving end, we feel we're in pain. And we feel very helpless and overwhelmed. And we think because there's pain and must be damaged in a tissue. The problem is really that again, like your brain is adapting, adapting, adapting, neuroplasticity, learning better and better and better to protect you from something and actually creates the opposite. Yeah, that's not its intention if we want to talk about that, but that is unfortunately the outcome. Good news is that you neuroplasticity works both ways. And so this is really like where also the training so like what my book is about or what the mindfulness training is, right. So in unwatched, mind world, do you, whatever evolution right has pointed it to you, which is in big, big pieces, what we call the negativity bias. Yeah. So people probably heard of that, that they were way more likely to focus notice and make something bigger that was negative compared to something that was positive for pleasant.
Zack Arnold: So given all of that, what I'd like to do next is actually break this down into even smaller component parts, which thankfully, you've already done that work for us. Right. So this is the essentially the three components that you talk about. And there's all three of them are important. There's one that I think is the most important for my audience. Today, I want to talk a little bit about all three. And then I want to get deeper into this idea of neuroplasticity, the idea of developing awareness and this idea of kind of flipping the negativity bias on his head. But you have these three components that you break it down, or you have the physical component of pain, the emotional component of pain and the cognitive component of pain. Talk a little bit about the physical and emotional because I think a lot of us are pretty familiar with both. The third one the cognitive side of it, which is the story of our pain. I think this is one of those that people don't see consciously. And when it hits him, it hits him like a ton of bricks. But let's break down all three of these a little bit.
Christiane Wolf: Yeah, so it's really like I call this like, we have this box we call pain. And then we're don't want to get near nobody wants to be in pain, like very obvious. So there's nothing wrong with us. But we stop actually looking closely, what is there. So basically, we have stopped looking in to that box. So we're just like, try to like shove it out of the way, like try and get away from it. Because we don't want it. We write deny, we distract, we do all these things. And the pain is still there. So the mindfulness practice, what it does is it's asked us like look inside, and what we find inside are these three components. So the physical sensations in this moment. So this is really important. So mindfulness is always about how about right now, this moment, this moment, this moment, and where the mind usually is, it's either in the past or in the future. And that's right. We are always in the present moment, but we feel so if we're thinking about the past, makes us feel a certain way, when and where do we feel this in this body in this moment? Same for the future, right? If I worry about the future? Where do I feel the worry in this body in this moment? And then it's what we don't realize that we actually have power over? Do we let the mind to that? That's the mind training. Yeah. So we look into that box. And so physical components, sensations, sensations are different than thoughts. And they're different than emotion. So people get a little bit confused about that, because we also feel our feelings. So they are sensations, right? When I feel anxious, I feel that. So how I separate those two is like a physical sensation is what comes in through the senses, the outside senses, but also what we call our interoception. How I feel inside, right? And then I have emotions. And this is like the angry, sad, happy, like those are like what we typically call feelings. And then we have the cognitive component, or what we call thoughts or story. And what is very interesting is again, like so we're looking into that box. And then we say in this moment out of these three components, which one is the heaviest right now? Which one is the biggest? Yeah. So which one is when I work with it in this moment, I get the most benefit from. And then this is really and because that actually what it asks us to do. So we're bringing mindfulness. So mindfulness is this and turning towards the experience, even though it's unpleasant versus pain, I don't want that. But the whole, like, turning in the other direction is not helping or let's say it's not helping right now. We're turning towards that. And then we bring openness and curiosity and said, What is actually here? So and I need to do that in order to say, oh, right now actually, the story is the hardest. Or maybe I'm sad. I am really upset about it right now. And then there are practices, how I can work with these three components, how I work with tracking sensations in the body, how I deal with challenging emotions, and then also what do I do with the story? And then first of all, just recognizing right? Oh, I'm telling myself right, because very often what happens so just give a typical example. So you're sitting at your office desk and you notice like you like lower back pain, like one of the most common pains that we know, you notice like your back is cramping up and then first you try to deny it is not working at some point, you just feel it. And then you start to become aware. You go like, Oh, so the past pain shorts like, oh, last time they happen I missed three days of work like oh my back really spasms I couldn't sit like I couldn't do I had to go to the hospital. They give me medication outside effect that that medication, all of that that's the past pain story that is not happening in this moment. But again, like your brain saying, like, wait, wait, wait, there was something we need to re remember this. Yeah. And then how do you feel? You start to feel like really anxious. When you start to feel deflated, you start to get fearful because you have a deadline in two days, will you be able to make that deadline? Now the future pain story comes in? And then right, so we feel anxious? And when do we feel all of that we feel that on top of whatever sensations are here in this moment. And while we're unpacking that, often people say Okay, so here's the past pain story with its emotion. Here's the future pain story with its emotion. But if I just allow this to just just say okay, so but what is actually here this moment? Yeah, in my office sitting here on my computer, and then people go, Oh, that's actually not that bad. typical, typical, of course, sometimes it is really bad. But very often people notice like, oh, that bike and I could be what's that? Yeah, so that makes a whole again, like the brain like doing this big hurricane around, basically, like that's the car alarm that says remember last time big thing, right? And when it's like this big at this time. And that can be a big insight just right there.
Zack Arnold: Yeah. And what I want to get into very quickly, I don't want to get into it right yet, because I want to dig into the storytelling a little bit more, because you're talking to some high level a list professional storytellers, where they're not only great at telling other people's stories, they tell a lot of stories about themselves, and their chronic pain and their situation and all the challenges in their lives. And when it comes to this idea of awareness, awareness for me, no matter what it is that you're learning about what whatever it is that you want to change, or make better. Awareness is always the first step. I've noticed that as a pattern with everything that I've learned not about chronic pain, I've learned about time management, or about whatever the thing could be, it's always about awareness of the present situation. And what one of the challenges that I give myself whenever I read a book, and I don't always succeed, but a lot of times I try to think to myself, I read this whole book, hundreds and hundreds of pages, I have to find one sentence, that sums it up. That's the biggest takeaway. And I'm going to tell you what mine was from your block. That was just, it wasn't an aha moment. But the way you put it in where you put it, it still hit me really hard. But I think for a lot of people can be an aha moment, which is that you can only change what you're aware of. This, to me is just, this is the key to everything. And I want to apply that to the idea of storytelling. Because one thing you talk about is we have the story of the past and the future of our pain, whether it's lower back pain. I know another one that several of my clients and students in my program, and I don't treat them for this, but they talk about it is dealing with migraines, spending all day long and you know, highly air conditioned spaces with really crappy air, no windows, sitting in horrible posture, staring in a super bright light for 16 hours now like, Why do I keep getting migraines, I'm like, seems kind of obvious to me, right? But there's a difference between I have a migraine or I'm in pain, versus I'm just a person that gets migraines. So I want to dig even deeper into the storytelling, where it's not just about the past or the future or what I'm feeling, it's where it becomes part of our identity.
Christiane Wolf: Mm hmm. Yeah, that is a crucial part. And this is coming back actually, to the Buddhist teaching. So one of the core teachings of the Buddha was, or he said, like, if we're starting to pay attention to reality, what we're noticing is that there is stress in life, right? Or there's pain, there's just no way around it. Like we have bodies that are susceptible to pain and like, he called it like old age, sickness and death, which of course people don't want to hear. But like, as a physician, I'm allowed to say that right? So and we have to learn how to deal how to deal with that. And so there is pain in life. Yes, and we have to learn how to deal with this things are impermanent. And then the last one is and they're not personal. And this is a really hard one to get. Right because they on one level things are deeply personal. This is my back pain. And as I have the back pain because XYZ or I might not know this, but it's like my very individual personal history. But then on the other hand is just like yeah, I have a body that is of a certain gender of a certain age or for certain right this conditions that I grew up and how I treated it, like the injuries that I had. So on that level, it's not personal at all. There happens to body in that way. My aging is not personal. It just happens. Yeah. So and then what we start to look at is like, where does it create suffering when I identify with something. And this is like where the rub is, right? Because pain in itself. And this is really crucial is like we think like, pain is always suffering. And I have like a very or like, in this tradition, we have a very nifty teaching where we say like, or an equation, I should say, where we say like suffering equals pain times resistance, or worry. I love that. I love that. Because that breaks like down like a really core teaching. So first of all, like here, we say, like pain and suffering are not the same thing. And then they very common sensical. So I can ask you that. So your experience, if there's a pain, and you either resist it a lot, you react against it, or you worry about it. Like what happens to suffering?
Zack Arnold: Just starts to extend, I mean, it never ends, right? Yeah. Embedded in who you are.
Christiane Wolf: Yeah. And then so same pain and or same stressor doesn't have to be like a pain, but even like stressor, right? So if you worry about it, if you react against it, right? If you're resisting it, what are you resist it less? I mean, sorry, right. So if like, there's for whatever reasons, just like, This is how it is right? Now what happens to suffering, it starts to alleviate, it starts to go down, like very, like a duck. Like we all know this. So the thing is, the great news about this is like Okay, so if I can do something about the pain or the stressor, please go ahead and do this. But if you can't, you're not it's not just all toast, right? Because you can work with that what the mind does, the resistance, the words, every activity. And to start with saying like, this is not personal. Yeah. And the more right, so we have, for example, when we work with challenging emotions can be very helpful for people to sell, instead of saying, I am anxious, right, or I am depressed. That's a big statement. And it usually doesn't say I'm anxious in this moment, or I'm depressed in this moment. But what it basically says is like, I'm an anxious person, I'm a depressed person. And that is that in this case, I have learned over time to identify with it, just as if it was like my eye color. I have blue eyes like Sorry, right? That's what I'm born with. But if I'm saying instead, again, like coming back to like, mindfulness is always just this moment. And I'm just saying, like, there's anxiety here right now. Or this is what anxiety feels like. Okay? Very different, isn't it? Because then it's just like, it's here right now. First, it's not personal. There's anxiety of this is what anxiety feels like, I don't like it. But pay, right. I don't like it, that it's whatever, overcast or something. But it's, that's what it is, not who I am. And when I say it's here, right now, it also implies like the truth of impermanence, it will change, which it doesn't write when I'm saying, I'm anxious again. Like all the other times, I've been anxious before, and I will always be that way. Because that is very different to be with in this moment.
Zack Arnold: It just it speaks to the immense power of language, not just how we communicate with each other, but how we communicate with ourselves. Yeah, right. It's all about how we communicate with ourselves. Yes. And it's scary how powerful the mind can be when you're not aware of those thoughts. And I have to stop by students often. When they say things like, Oh, well, I suffer from ADHD, I suffer from depression, I suffer from diabetes, or I am diabetic, or I am depressed, or I'm an anxious person, right? You feel anxious, you feel depressed, I catch myself doing this as well as anybody else. You can have diabetes, it doesn't mean that you have to suffer from diabetes. It's like you said, diabetes is not something maybe if it's type two, there are nuances. But let's just talk about type one diabetes is about changing. Yes, that is a part of your genetic makeup and a part of your identity on the physical level, but you don't have to say I suffer from diabetes. I have it knowing that I have what are the systems that I can put around it one of them potentially being mindfulness to help me get through something like that, but that language is so powerful and understanding how can I manage it?
Christiane Wolf: Yes, and then what we're really also noticing because sometimes people say like, well this like the whole thing of like, things are changing all the time. It's just like, like my type one diabetes won't change period. So where's the where's like your your change truth here? Say no, no, no, it's not about that. But It is like how we're relating to it. Yes. So because of it, how our perception, exactly our attitude towards it. And this is really what it comes back to over and over. It is like in this practice, it is not really so much about the experience, but how are we relating to it? Am I fighting this? Right? So to come back, I suffer from diabetes. So if we're looking at like the language that we have created around pain, yes. So we use painkillers, right? Like when you're in pain and ask you, are you you might say, like, the pain is killing me today. I don't want to live with something inside of me. That's killing me. Yeah. So there is like we have like, unfortunately, like, like, adapted, like the warfare language around this. Right. And so that has an effect on how we feel there's something in me that is killing me. That is not a safe place within me anymore. Yeah. And then we have such a difficult relationship in our culture with our bodies, right? It has, they have to look perfect and functioning perfectly in order, right. So like, there's like, all these ideals that we're trying to look like it be like, and then if it's not, then the pain that comes from that, and chronic pain, right. So that gives pain on top of that as my body is not functioning the way it should be functioning. And the whole the whole emotional pain around that. And that is so difficult to hold that. So if we're starting to look at like, and this is so like, one part of the teachings that are what I'm teaching is, so is awareness, or mindfulness. The other one is actually kindness and compassion. Because if there's pain, and it can do something about it, and I can use all these practices, but there will be periods where there's nothing I could do about it. It's just here, and it's hard. And then to remember that how good it feels. If you're struggling, Are you in pain? And then somebody gets that and sees you, right? Might be a partner or a friend or a colleague, right? So you're saying, like, my back is so hard right now, in a person's eye, that you're having a really hard day. Yeah, and not from this, like top down like, Oh, poor you. So that's not what I'm talking about. But really, I hear you, I see you. Right. And that is such a precious quality. And we're usually really good giving that other people, most of us have a hard time giving that to ourselves. And yet, we all have been on the receiving end of that relief that can happen when we're really receiving compassion. And there are practices how we can learn to be kinder, more compassionate with ourselves, which scares the shit out of a lot of people. Because they think, Oh, this will make me weak, right? This will make me complacent. This is like, I'll never get off the couch ever again, if I'm too kind to myself, I kind of need the whip in order to perform. And then to come back to what we were talking about, like, what are the beliefs that are working here?
Zack Arnold: So I don't know how exactly you were able to crawl inside my brain in my thoughts. But I was like, Wait a second, what's your face? How is she doing that. But I am just as guilty if not more guilty as anyone else. One of the lessons that I've really learned the hard way over the last several years of making the transition from a craftsperson to now being a coach and a teacher. This one hit me like a ton of bricks is when I don't remember where I read it or where I heard it. I consume so much information. I forget a lot of times where it comes from, I want to attribute everybody I have no idea where actually heard this. But somebody said, you often teach or coach, what you need to hear yourself the most. And I was like, Oh, that one hit deep. Because I talked so much about burnout and people being more compassionate with themselves and what they're capable of. But also realizing that sometimes you have to give yourself a break. You don't always have to push hard 100% of the time. And then I look at myself in the mirror. And I'm like, Yeah, but that doesn't apply to you. Like, you just you just keep pushing forward, right? I mean, I grew up. It's funny, because you brought up much earlier in the conversation, the idea of a cow path. And I'm like, not a whole lot of people talk about cow paths. But I grew up on a farm so I knew exactly what you were talking about. So I don't know if you grew up on a farm too. But I know that vision of these very clear paths that they take. And as a as a farmer in a very rural, very conservative community. You had to be as masculine as masculine can be like there, there was no room for compassion or self compassion or mindfulness. Like, are you kidding? Like it just makes you weak? Like you just toughed it out. You suck it up. How many times did I hear that was whatever I might have been dealing with. And living in that environment. It's a very, very sensitive, very empathetic individual. I mean, that that causes some pretty long term damage that I'm still unwinding to this day. But this idea of mindfulness and compassion, these two things, you almost never hear about one exclusively without the other. I find that if you if you're going to learn about compassion, you're going to learn about mindfulness. And if you're going to learn about mindfulness, you're going to learn about compassion, it's really hard to, to unpackage the two and have them separate from each other. What I would like to do now is I want to dig in a little bit deeper into the how I love to talk about the why we've talked a lot about the what, but I want somebody to walk away from this call actually having action steps. And the challenge of that, with this specific conversation, and I think the Debbie, who's my Podcast Producer, and has also been a student of yours would attest to, there's this idea of being versus doing Yin versus Young, I'm guessing you probably know which spectrum I probably land on, I have no idea, right, I'm very much on the doing young energy spectrum, she is the balance of the yin and the Bing. So it's very difficult for me to want to turn this immediately into an action step oriented podcast, because it's almost antithetical to what we're talking about. So I want you to help me find the blend of making the rest of this conversation, understanding pain and being with it, versus Yeah, but actually want to walk away feeling like I can do something about what I'm I'm dealing with. So given all of that, one of the things I love about the structure of your book, I love when authors do this, where it's not just here's all the information, let me get my fire hose and open it up. And here's all the research in the information. It's let me explain this one simple concept and tell you a story about a patient that dealt with it. So I want to break down some practical action steps for how we can use mindfulness as a technique to manage chronic pain using an example. Either an amalgam of people that you feel are similar to maybe the audience listening today, or very one, one very specific person that you can think of, where we can just kind of break them down piece by piece. Here's what they were dealing with. And here were some of the steps that I took them through to use mindfulness as a practice to either alleviate or even eliminate to their chronic pain.
Christiane Wolf: I would like actually, if that is okay to pause for a moment and come back to your first part of the doing versus, yeah, let's do it. That is and then I can, I'm happy to share, like a story or a couple of stories. But so the thing is, really, so we're so used to doing that we have like many of us, we have forgotten how to be the thing is we were all beings when we were born babies are not doers. Yeah. So as children are important, so we have it all in here we have forgotten or it has been drained out of it, or it has been gotten a bad reputation. The thing is, just like you talked about the yin and yang, the yin and yang, they need each other. And they actually have the core of the other, like, if you look at the yin and yang symbol, they have the core of the other in the in the other, right? So we need both. And my theory really is, in my experience, and working with people is like when we're able to be more our doing becomes much more effective. And that is really scary for people because they we have been trained that only like the doing. And I'm German, right so I'm not didn't grow up like and raw, like masculine like conservative America, then German. So for me, it shows like we're doing we're working work ethic doesn't matter, like suck it up, like so very similar to right. So being was not part of my growing up. So, but the thing really is, it's there's like, right, and those so a lot of the Eastern teachings, they're saying, like if you can write if you can be in the right way, then the doing will happen by itself. And we don't believe that, because like Mike and like our culture is really against this. But if we can just entertain that thought that in the being mode, there might be something really important that supports our doing that supports that what we really want to accomplish. And we might be able to do that actually, with less effort and less time. How would that be? And we would actually have time where we can rest where we can receive where we can just be? Because right if we're thinking about our nervous system, our nervous system needs that. Yes. So we have one part of the nervous system the sympathetic nervous system, right the fight flight freeze activation or would like Yaya, we love that we many of us are addicted to that, right? Like, here's my coffee cup, right? So
Zack Arnold: I'm a member of that club. I'm addicted to the sympathetic nervous system right there with you.
Christiane Wolf: But what about the other one? Right, the other one that parasympathetic is like the rest and digest, do you need to sleep do you need sleep? Do you need digestion? Do you need an immune system, right? All of these things? Yes, we do. How about libido? How about creativity? i All these are actually like they are The bound in the parasympathetic is, so parasympathetic is, as it says, like rest and digest. So that is actually like doing more than being mowed if you want it in that way. So I want to just give you an example about that. So like, don't do this, if you listen to this while driving, then please don't do this or do that, like at a traffic light. But so just just for a brief moment, close your eyes, and then open your eyes, and then close them again. And then as you open again, what do you notice? You notice seeing is happening? Do you make seeing happen? Now seeing is happening, right? You're not we're not making seeing happen? You can do the same thing with your ears, right? So you can just pay attention to the sounds around you. Are you making hearing happening? No, that's just happened. Right? So and it's like actually the same with so this is how we want to practice mindfulness. So mindfulness is not like what we learn in school, right? So there are like all these there's a bandwidth of how we can pay attention, there can be this very focused attention on one thing, but when we're meditating, or when we're actually learning and training to be instead of doing, it's a very relaxed, like, it's kind of like you could just saw me, like, if you're like, watching this video, I just like rested back a little bit. Right? And you can invite in right? Awareness. So that awareness is happening. I don't have to make or do awareness. And often what happens when we do this is the body goes like, Awesome, thank you, thank you. And like we can literally feel how our the parasympathetic gets activated. And meaning like, we feel like, Oh, this is nice. Yeah. So it's like almost like a relaxation response. But what we're training in this practice, actually to be is to not be like to relax. So a lot of people think it's a relaxation training, it's really not, it is what we're aiming for overall, is actually to be very at ease and very awake at the same time. And that is an amazing feeling. Yeah, so we're not aiming. So the goal is not to feel amazing. But the thing is, the more we practice this, the more we have moments where we actually feel at ease. Yeah, where we don't feel stressed, where we can kind of step out from under this. Like, we often use this image of a waterfall of like salts and to do lists and stress. And we're just like we're bombarded. And we really feel it literally feels like we're under a waterfall, right? This just can't be here anymore. So how do we do this? Look, here's an how to is we step back? Right? Literally, it was a waterfall, how does a waterfall work? It falls over a cliff. And when it does that, there is actually a space right behind the water. That is not hit by water. So get wet. Yeah, but there and it's so loud, but you don't get you don't get hit by the water. And this is what we can do with this practice, we can just step back and become the observer of saying like, Wow, lots of water here. Lots of very loud sounds here. And you can say, Wow, lots of like tightness in my body right now. Lots of racing thoughts about the deadline? And then we're back at like, Oh, this is not who I am. This is the experience of this moment. Yeah. And so those are like, just some ways, and hopefully useful images. And we can step back every moment. And that's the training. And this is really the mind power, right? This is not powerful, if you're bombarded if you can't get out of your own thinking. I mean, most of us know like, what I'm doing my brain is actually not helpful by to replay the same over and over and over and over and over and over. And it was just like, so tired of myself thinking that way. But I don't know how not to do this. And I don't do a great we can stop our thoughts just like we can't stop the waterfall. But what we can train ourselves to do is to step back and then let the start just do its thing and but we don't have to be our thoughts. That's where we get in trouble.
Zack Arnold: As the side trivia No, do you know what the name of that space is? No looking at a waterfall. If you're a fan of Disneyland or Disney World, it's called the backside of water. It says you go on the Jungle Cruise and they take you through that little space and they say ladies and gentlemen the backside of water and I could not stop thinking about that and applying such a dumb joke to such a profound visuals visualization. Yeah, because you're right the what you don't want is Oh, the meditation makes me sleepy. But that's good because I get to rest. You're not developing the skill of awareness. But I love this vision of you've got This rushing waterfall you're in this very tight space, but you're not in it. You're right beside it, observing it. And that, to me is what the sweet spot of meditation feels like where it's not quiet and silent and all of a sudden, oh, you hear birds chirping amongst the chaos. It's more, I actually hear what's going on around me. Right? And I feel what's going on around me. But it's not me. When you're in the waterfall. It's just it's all coming down on top of you. You don't have the space to be mindful of it. Right but when you're right next to it you can be this is actually one of the reasons that one of my I would say hobbies, but I don't really have hobbies. I have obsessions, which again, young energy probably doesn't surprise you. But I love running Spartan Races tough. Mudders I know that you're a marathoner. I know that you're a triathlete. And the it seems crazy from the outside, like, why would you pay good money to crawl through the mud and under barbed wire and get sprayed in the face of the firehose. But what it does more than anything better in my entire life is it teaches me about the present moment. It's the weirdest form of mindfulness training, where when you're crawling under the barbed wire, and it's 45 degrees out and you're covered in mud, and they're spraying you with a fire hose, you're not thinking about the email that you have to respond to on Monday, you are in it. And you just realize, there's nothing that I can do about this moment. I am in this moment, I can't change this moment, I need to get through this moment. And you just it's this weirdest feeling where you start to develop acceptance. And I didn't understand it for years. And all of a sudden, I realized that it wasn't just at the race. When I was going through this, I was starting to feel this everywhere else, something would happen. I remember somebody hit I bought a car in the same week, I bought a brand new car, the first car I've ever bought brand new in my whole life. I'm parked at the pharmacy, boom, somebody in the parking lot hits me, I'm like, come on, I've had the car for a week. But then immediately the thought was, well, this is now my new presents, I now have a car that's brand new that has a dent in it. I can't and dented I mean, I could get the dent fixed, but I can't undo the situation. And I find that that level of awareness is just permeated into everything. And now I want to take that idea of just being more present with the sensations, being able to step back with a mindfulness and Now dig into specifically somebody that has the chronic pain that's listening to this that deals with the migraines, the lower back pain, I'm sure there are a few other things you could explain or express that you see in your clinic all the time. Well, let's talk a little bit more about how we take everything we talked about and apply it to. Yeah, but what about me? How do I take all these ideas and use them practically?
Christiane Wolf: Yeah. So um, I'll give you an example of from like, a person with lower back pain that was slight was like a bunch of years ago came like lower back pain was just like, I can't work My life is over like, men in his, I would say in his 40s. Right. So like, live kids like full time more than a full time job. And and what we did is really, we started to practice several different things. And we started with so when we have chronic pain, and we want to work with the sensations, right, so we talked earlier about so here's a way how you work with thinking and this is I will steal this like the backside of water. I will call it backside
Zack Arnold: It's all yours. I stole it from Disneyland. So take it just left Disney sue you.
Christiane Wolf: the backside, I will call it the backside of thoughts. We're stepping out of our thoughts and just like their thinking is happening, I can't do anything about it. But I can stop giving energy into it. Because we don't realize that by our weight, just like when you're training a dog and the dog is jumping on you and you say stop that stop that stop that the dog feels like, Hey, I'm getting attention this month is good. So we're reinforcing that we're similar to thinking. So person came to me lower back pain. And so what we're training is body awareness. Because when we're in pain, the mind collapses around the pain, right? And it feels like there's just a pain, everything else is gone. So the practices that we work with that so for example, doing body scan practice, so body scan is where we feel into different parts of the body without asking anything for it. And what we're doing when we're in chronic pain is we're reclaiming the areas that are not in pain. Because right so again, the mind collapses around it and it feels like I'm just pain. When we start to do this, we go out my feet are not in pain, my lower legs are not in pain and so on and so on. And in this case with this man, what happened was so at that point, at some point, we got to the area where there was the pain, and then I said like Okay, so let's just explore this a little bit instead of making assumptions of the pen. What is it like in this moment? Because it's like, oh, it's always there. Like a lot of people say it's always there. And then so going into it they said Okay, so what's the size whereas Actually, is it located? Like, is there a texture to it? Is it dense? Does it feel more liquid? Is it hot? Is it cold? Right? Because those are all actually sensations, not like the pain is killing me. That's an interpretation. So which I can make from over here and I can make from memory. Now I'm asking you, what is it in this moment? And I went into it, say, like, what's the size? And he says, well, it's about the size of a quarter. And in that moment, he realized for him, that was a really big insight, he realized this, like, what is stopping his life is the size of a quarter. And the rest of his body is just fine. And he learned through this practice to say like, yes, there is the pain. And right 99.9% of my body is actually fine. And this is like, Wait, we're like, touched on the negativity bias earlier. But that's part of the negativity bias, again, makes total sense. If there's pain in the body, we want to know we want to fix it. But there's in this moment, actually nothing to fix. And so I have to like very gently let my mind now like, yes, sonny, I get it. Like you want to focus on this. And like, this is not dangerous right now. Yeah, because we're afraid of it, we have resistance against it. So this is almost like a next door sound. That is annoying, right? So you know, those moments like when the neighbor has like, the, whatever the the television on, and there's just nothing you can do right now. And you can sit here be upset as you want. Or you can say, okay, it's like, that's just the way it is right now. Right? So if we can deal with this in that way, that can make a huge difference. And then really this, like reclaiming of everything that works. Because so what we do is so first of all, we change our perception, we change the this idea, how am I relating to this, and then if I stop being so worried about it, or so reactive against it, and if I then notice, like, Oh, here's the story wants to go, and again, I just go to the backside of the thoughts or the story, then things can start to come down. Because I'm not aware usually how much like what my mind does, is actually keeping that whole ball up in the air.
Zack Arnold: Where I want to go next is this idea that you call the paradox of doing nothing. We're we're developing this awareness of the pain. And we're being but immediately because this is the way I'm trained, and all of us are trained to condition their entire lives. Yeah, but what why am I doing this? Right? I'm being but I'm supposed to be doing something. So I have an agenda. So I guess the agenda or the goal is that, well, I'm meditating to make the pain go away, right? I want to meditate to eliminate your pain, right? So he talked to me about this idea of the paradox of nothing, because as soon as you have an agenda and meditation, and it has a desired outcome, aren't you now attached to an outcome, which is the non attachment that you're supposed to be seeking? It's, it's this idea is endless. It's the chicken in the egg, but with meditation and pain management, so talk to me more about this idea of now the agenda is there, which destroys the whole point of this.
Christiane Wolf: Yes. So of course, you come to the meditation because you want the pain to go away, which is like basically why most people come to meditation, maybe it's not physical pain, maybe it's emotional pain. Maybe they call it stress, maybe they call it habits that they want to change. Yes, but so in our under this umbrella, we still all call that like pain or stress, or dukkha, the Buddha called it Dukkha. Right? So that is like the just the stress of being alive. So this is why why people come. So of course, because that is actually good motivator. So this gets you in the room in starting to practice. And then what we need to do is like, this is really the paradoxical thing is, so I know, basically, I want to be over here. And then we have the saying The fastest way in this practice is, in order to get from A to B, is to be fully at a. And that actually works, right? Because whenever I noticed, like, Oh, I'm not over there. And this is like, that's life, right? I'm like, most of the time people say like, Oh, if life would only be like this, then I would be happy. If it was like this, then it would be happy. And so we're missing our lives, which is tragic. And how many people have had that experience when something changed or was over like a relationship or a job or something? I realized, in retrospect, that was amazing. And I wasn't aware while it was happening, because I was always like future future future future.
Zack Arnold: Or Past, past, past, past
Speaker 1
or past past past. Right. Exactly. Exactly. Right. And so this is like a very profound training. So can I be fully here so even if the moment is not perfect, But I will only know what this moment is like if I actually check in if I'm actually present with that moment. And not already making the assumption is like, I don't want to have this moment. I want to have that moment. Because then again, I'm not not here again. Yeah. So and this is this is the paradox is can I trust, and this is in the beginning, like you actually, when people come and want to learn mindfulness, they already come with a little bit of trust, because they have read about it. They have read the data, right? So they know there's a lot of research on it. They maybe they know people, like who have really changed through practicing mindfulness, like I often have that people in my classes they come, especially men, I have to say they say like, my wife took this class, and I think it was really good for her. And now I am here, right?
I'll give it a try. Lot of cynicism. Yeah.
Christiane Wolf: You convinced me, right? So the people that are sitting in the room like this, it's like, so like,
Oh, they're all welcome, right? And so as long as this is like, we never know where where things land, but this is really the core of the practice. Can I be here with this moment? And then what really often happens is people start to see like, either that moment isn't this bad? Or they they realize this moment is actually amazing. Yeah. And so in this is like, we also want to really bring in practices that really look for the good. Or look for what is working because we want to like you know, rebalance the negativity bias. Yeah, instead of saying like, well, this room is like, the AC is too cold in here. And this is all that I focus on, I go, Oh, actually, I like my chairs. Very comfortable, right. I like the light that comes in through the window. And then when we do this, then it kind of waters down the intensity of like, what's wrong, and that is true for the pain as well.
Zack Arnold: Yeah, and what I want to point out even further, because this is another one of those, I think, huge lightbulb moments for me that you you've said it in a different way that I've never heard before. And just like you're gonna steal backside of water, I'm going to steal this one from you, which is that in order to go from point A to point B, you have to fully be at point A. That, to me is such a profound realization, not just for managing chronic pain, but for life. And I won't go too deep into this. But I've had this conversation now many, many times with a lot of experts authors about the term work life balance. And if I were to really summarize it down to the problem in a single sentence, it's the saying that I hear so many people say over and over again, when I'm at work, all I want to do is be at home, when I'm at home, all I want to do is be at work. And if you're at home for 40 hours, and you're at work for 40 hours, technically that's balanced, that is work life balance mathematically. But there's 0% balance, if when you're at point A, you really want to be at point B but now you're at point B and you're thinking about point A that to me if you can rewire that perception, where I just need to be at point A and when I have a point a b at point B when I hit point B that's where mindfulness to me in every facet of life becomes so much more powerful. And I think specific to chronic pain of point A is I feel this now and I hate and I want to get rid of it. And point B is I no longer want pain. You got to be with it before it goes away.
Christiane Wolf: Yeah, and the thing honestly, really so there's some really interesting research that shows that when we have chronic pain, we actually stop sensing the body in general, which is very important it's really important information so of course with pain, we don't want to feel it makes total sense. So but we cannot or our brain has a hard time saying I was just stopped feeling the pain. So what it does, like a brain stops feeling the body and then also stops feeling what feels good and what feels joyful and what feels meaningful. Yeah, and this is really important because a lot of people have chronic pain and say like, everything feels kind of numb. Yeah, well we know that like like with chronic pain like there's a high correlation with depression makes a lot of sense. Yeah. And to know like oh this is like this is kind of like brain tries to help in it's not with what is going on right here and so we kind of have to just with all those love and knowledge in our heart and mind to step in and change that and to do like these like gratitude practice right or just like being aware of like they call this yes and practice to say yes there is pain and what is good right now or what might feel pleasant or what is not in pain in this moment. So that will widen our container again in to also really goes like what is the pain like right now? Yeah, because what one thing that we know that really blew my mind is that, like, our brain can create pain from memory. So when there doesn't need to be actually, like some injury in the body, the brain can create pain from memory. Very clearly example is like phantom limb pain, very real, extremely painful. What does the brain do? It creates pain from memory. And so how can we counterbalance that? So that is like, of course, we do everything to make the pain go away. And I hope it will. Often it does, that even if it's not, it doesn't mean like, we're doomed, or life is over, or life can be like really fulfilling and joyful and connected.
Zack Arnold: And it goes back to this idea that you mentioned earlier, where all pain is in the brain, right? Essentially, everything that we experience is perception. Right, then we can get very existential and philosophy, philosophical, and we don't need to go there. But essentially, other than I think, therefore I am. So in some way, shape, or form, I exist, everything around us is our perception. I don't know 100%, that I'm actually physically standing here. And I'm talking to you via zoom call, right, my brain could be feeding me that information. And I can be some battery that's hooked up to a power system, I could be in the matrix, there's no way to prove that I'm writing, there's no way to prove that I'm wrong. But it just brings up this idea that all of the pain is coming from the brain. And it's all about perception. And the more you develop awareness and connection with a part of your system, where you recognize it, and like we keep talking about, you're kind of in that space behind the waterfall, that to me is such an important place to be. But then it kind of begs the question, that if the brain is creating all of our pain, well, does that mean that there just isn't actually chronic pain? Like is the brain just saying, I want to feel this, this is here and you are perceiving it actually exist? I get it. That's again, kind of goes back to this fear of being psychosomatic. It's all in my head.
Christiane Wolf: Yeah, no, I mean, of course, it's like this is like where, like more complexity comes in. Right? So because for a lot of people, so people might have had an injury in the lower back, or they might have had and this is really the problem that was chronic pain, there's a very high likelihood that people have had an injury at some point that they had some surgery at some point that they had some invasive procedure, which of course does something to the body, where there was an accident before. Yes, and then it gets like very, like multi layered, but then, like, if we would look at the same person who has exactly the same like, whatever we call physical manifestation, the pain levels can be completely different. And so like, this is like my personal the personal way that my brain given like my personal history, but it is doing this to these what comes in from the periphery, what comes in, like through my system. And that is what I need to work with. I can lament it right but this is what I need to work with. And really end for this is like just coming back to just starting with like, it's really hard to live with chronic pain. Yeah. And it's hard. It's isolating people don't understand it, especially like I often hear especially like younger people, they say, say they constantly get like, You're too young to be in chronic pain. And you're like, like, what do I have to justify myself that I'm in pain? Yeah. And so there are like all these like, implication societal implications and how much time it takes for me and I? Yeah, it's just it's just very complex.
Zack Arnold: When we talk about this idea, then of at some point, the pain probably was acute whether it was an injury, whether it's, you've been sitting with horrible posture, and a terrible chair designed by a company called Enron, I don't care if they sue me. Aeron chairs were designed by Satan himself to look really good in an office space in photos horrible for the human body. I say all this because in my mid 20s, chronic lower back pain could not even stand up straight. 25 years old. I had spent my entire younger life as an athlete, practicing martial arts, teaching martial arts, and I'm 25 years old, and I couldn't stand up straight. Because I was in this chair all day long in the wrong position in front of a computer wasn't taking care of myself. So that was very acute caused by something. But now something that's a lot more nuanced, is you're talking all about physical pain, but you've also talked about talked about depression and talked about anxiety. would you classify anxiety and or depression is pain?
Christiane Wolf: It is emotionally painful. Yes.
Zack Arnold: And in this case, it might not be I got into a car accident and I just placed one of my lower discs and I'll have chronic pain from it. So how do we reconcile this perception of anxiety or depression is a form of emotional pain? When we're thinking about well, is this my fault? Like do I deserve that it's your versus Well, yeah, the guy rear ended me so I know why the disc slipped. And I know I hurt myself. I still have to deal with a chronic pain but there's less the sense of I am broken or I deserve this or, you know, I'm wrong. So how do we deal with that more nuanced form of pain and our perception.
Christiane Wolf: You know, actually, so the case is like, I know exactly where my pain comes from. This is actually the more the exception. There way more people were going like, Why do I feel this pain, I don't know
Zack Arnold: Which is why I wanted to bring it up. Because I would guess it's a lot more common.
Christiane Wolf: It's that is a lot more common, which again, like then it's very similar to like, coming back to what's wrong with me. And this is like something that is in for a very sad reason. I'm not upset reasons. Like, I don't know even why that is there. But this is very ingrained in our society, or in our culture, that we get the impression that there is something wrong with us, if we're not looking a certain way, performing a certain way our certain way, the way that makes society expects us to be. Yeah, so we're internalizing that and that is painful. And that is like, and again, like, there are many reasons why people can feel anxious or where people can feel depressed. I think just being alive in this day. And age is like plenty of reason to be anxious, plenty of reason to be depressed. And then what we also know, and then just want to point to that is like, we are also great, so because so in the field of wellness, in the field of mindfulness in medicine, more and more, we're becoming more aware of the impact of trauma, and in particular, like early childhood trauma, on our health throughout life. And one thing that we know, so there's like this really important study that, like actually, I think Kaiser Permanente did with the CDC, like, I don't know, if like 3040 years ago, I think in the 80s. And they did like with their, their clients they were looking at, so what they call adverse childhood events. So like they had like a list of 10 adverse childhood events. And of course, there are plenty more but something like do you have like a in an alcoholic parent? was a parent absent? Did your parents get divorced? Did you like experience like, like sexual abuse, emotional abuse? Is it was a parent in prison like, so list of this? And then they looked at, like, what were the health complaints of people later different ages. And what they found very clearly makes so much sense, right? Because this is our sensitized nervous system, our highly activated the traumatized nervous system, the more events adverse childhood events people have, the more likely they are to to get a chronic illness later, and to get chronic pain. Yeah, talking which, and then of course, we seem like so I might have been more susceptible through the way I was raised, which again, is not my fault, but I'm more susceptible to actually about chronic pain. And so for that, even more, it's so important to look at so and what is helping what is helping, like a nervous system that has experienced trauma. And so these practices in there, like lots of therapy forms that and more and more than we're finding really helpful, because that can be balanced, right? Coming back to like, what what we're balancing, and mindfulness and compassion can be very helpful on on that journey. So again, I think what were my point is like, again, the more I know, the more self aware I am, the more I can adjust. Right? So that's what we want to do we want to adjust that starts with like, I'm sitting on the wrong chair, I need a different chair. How do I know? Because I'm checking in, in the moment, right? And not denying or like kind of avoiding or blocking out how I'm feeling. Yeah,
Zack Arnold: So all of the mindfulness compassion, sounds fantastic. Also sounds like a lot of work. You know what, I'm just gonna get some Advil. I'm gonna get a prescription from my doctor, get some you know, get some pain medication, because they're handing it out like Pez. Super easy to get, or, you know, maybe I'm gonna get chiropractic adjustment. I'm going to stick with staying in the body. I'm going to stick with the Western medical system. Appreciate it. It sounds like a lot of work. How do you respond to that?
Christiane Wolf: Yeah, I mean, like, everything that you learn takes some work. And so I mean, that's just like people can do with their lives what they want to do, but I am basically I'm telling people, you can take really agency in your life in a way that nobody else can, you can really change things you can really change the way how you are in your body, how you are in your life, you can actually become happier. Like, right so that is that is actually quite a big promise. So it's like not that you can experience less pain, but you can actually become happier and more content. overall in your life through these practices, are you you need to put in some time? Yes, just that was everything right? If you want to, if you want to have like big guns, you have to go to the gym and practice. So you can wish all that you want. But in the end is like, if you want to, and we say if you put in a little bit of time, you get out a little bit. If you put in more time you get more out of it. And I know that like right now like there's this big trend of like, oh, like one minute mindfulness or five minute mindfulness. And I think it's all good. It's just like, right, if you're if you're very sedentary and you walk five minutes a day, instead of not working at all. Great. That's a great start. Yeah, well, that get you to run like a 5k or 10k, it won't.
Zack Arnold: I think that's a really good point, especially when it comes to how I frame the idea of optimization. This is a speech that I have to kind of give us a preamble a lot is people think, oh, optimization is all about reaching this point of perfection. It's about finding the biohack finding the cheat code, that's really kind of what the word optimized denotes in our 21st century, technologically driven age. And I always have to tell people that No, it's not about the relentless pursuit of perfection. It's about the relentless pursuit of progression, right, and the way that you encapsulate it, it is so important, what you're going to put into it is what you're going to get out of it. So I think a lot of people are thinking, Oh, well, meditation I hear that gives all these benefits, but I'm not going to do it an hour a day. But now there's one minute meditation, and I'm gonna get all the benefits of 60 minutes of meditation, because somebody cracked the code in this one app. It's like, one minute of meditation is better than zero minutes. But it's not a quick life hack to get you the same results as 60 minutes. Yeah, exactly. So on that note, I want to be very conscious of your time. But as I am aware, you have some resources that are going to help us go deeper into the house. So talk to me a little bit more about for somebody that's listening today, they obviously have the book, we're gonna have a link to the book in the show notes. So they can find that I'm clearly a supporter of it. That's why I have you here. But I don't just like to rehash the book on the podcast, I'd like to go into a lot of the deeper ideas, and allow you to talk about things that aren't just regurgitation of what you've already written. But if somebody actually wants to get started, as I understand you have resources that are available for people to dive in right away.
Christiane Wolf: Yeah. So one thing that people are really interested in just really learning more about like working with pain. So I have an on demand class for chronic pain through mindful blood work. And like that is on my website. So like in you can find other resources. So I'm teaching like, classes, and I teach retreats. So if you're interested in that, that's like how you can find me. You can also find me on Instagram. That's like the my main social media. It's as much social media as I can, as I can muster.
Zack Arnold: Yeah, I'm right there. Mustering is a good word for my feeling about social media. It's like, okay, I'm gonna check in now, right? Like, I'm very averse to it. But I find it the necessary evil, to be able to communicate with people and find them where they are. So I'm right there with you. But I think what I want to do for anybody to make it super easy if they're driving or they're hopefully taking a walk, doing something active at the moment, and they don't want to write down mindful.org backslash P backslash working dash with Dash pain question mark. I'm going to send them to zackarnold.com/wolf WOLF, so zackarnold.com/wolf. And that's going to take them to your on demand class on chronic pain. Help them learn more about you and the services that you offer. Is there anything important to you that you'd like to discuss and leave us with that? I have not asked you yet.
Christiane Wolf: Yeah, I mean, one thing, and again, I don't want this to sound too woowoo. But often people think is like, I don't have time for this, this is not worth it. And for me, honestly, like our world, like needs these tools desperately to be more aware, and to be kind. And we need to train in this because like, this is something that we're born with. But just like with all our gifts, we actually need to develop them, we need to train them. And if I think really, if we want to turn around what is going down in the world right now, we need these desperately, these practices.
Zack Arnold: I cannot agree with any of that more I endorse that 178% I think the world would be a much better place. If we replaced some of our basic curriculum in school with things like mindfulness meditation, yoga, both will make us physically stronger. But like you said mentally stronger. It's like mental weightlifting, right. So I can't thank you enough for taking the time out of your very busy schedule, helping people and making their lives better and doing the same for myself and my audience today. So thanks so much for being here. I appreciate it.
Christiane Wolf: Thank you. Thank you so much for having me
This episode was edited by Curtis Fritsch, and the show notes were prepared by Debby Germino and published by Glen McNiel.
The original music in the opening and closing of the show is courtesy of Joe Trapanese (who is quite possibly one of the most talented composers on the face of the planet).
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