Easing Chronic Pain the Holistic Way with Sherry Zak Morris and James Knight

Hello, I'm James Knight, founder of Gentle Somatic Yoga, and I'm also a certified HANA Somatic Educator. And I'm Charizac Morris, and I'm a certified yoga therapist, and we are here to talk about chronic pain. We both work with the same demographic, which is usually people over the age of 50, but we know everybody can have chronic pain. Chronic pain can be caused by injuries, surgeries, accidents, but when it becomes chronic, that's when we know that we have to do something about it. So this talk today is just going to be talking about ideas of how we can help you get out of chronic pain. And guess what? It's possible. It's doable. Absolutely. And also, let's not forget emotional and mental, because all of us react to stress. And stressors can be physical, and those are the obvious ones, right? Through injuries, overuse by specific patterns that we hold ourselves in while we're working, sports, but also emotionally. So anytime that we experience stress, our body tends to want to protect itself. And that's the beginning of a pain cycle is when the body goes. Luckily, we have this system. You know, we must, I think, first demystify that is that we have these reflexes in our somas that help us protect from pain. Now, the challenge with that is that if the patterns go unconscious, which is very easy to do, then that's what stays in our body as memory. And that's where we get stuck, right? Exactly. So you feel every single day that you're just tight and you're tense and you're in pain and you're stuck. So how can we get you unstuck? That's really kind of what we want to talk about today is the first and foremost thing is you have to be willing to do the work. What I like to share with my students that pain and the sensation that goes with it is actually a gift because it's showing, it's telling your soma that there's a misalignment. There's something that's keeping us out of balance. So I like to share with you that pain can actually become your friend because it's reaching out and knocking on your door saying, hey, pay attention. There's something going on that our bodies are telling us something. So if we pay attention closer to the cause of a stress point, then the sooner we can unwind from that. Now, that's not the case. We're not always so lucky. Those of us that have been in this health care profession for a while, we have a little more education. But for the layperson, we know that it can be really frustrating and there's all kinds of emotions that go with chronic pain. There could be depression. There can be anxiety. There can be fear. What happens if? And then there's the mental loop as well. So just to have, I wanted to share that I have a lot of empathy for those viewers that are watching right now that have experienced chronic pain. So please know that what we're sharing today, this discussion is to really open it up and to give it a little bit of space and maybe help us shift our perspective and our relationship to pain. So that's an important part of it. Exactly. And we were talking offline. We are saying that physical pain goes hand in hand with emotional pain, spiritual pain, relationship pain. Right. If you're holding somewhere, you're probably holding in other planes of your life, like your emotions and your spiritual as well. So it's all integrated. Right. And what we know these days is we are an organic living being with many, many facets to us, not just the physical. So let's talk a little bit about pain, common pain. Let's say back pain. Okay. Back pain, right? What can we tell people right now that are experiencing back pain? Like they can't move. They can't bend. Every time they lean or pick up something, they have this searing pain. What can we do for them? What can we encourage them? Well, the first thing is that 90, I would say between 80 and 90% of muscular pain can be undone, which is very exciting. So a lot of people don't know that the Western medical model doesn't always support the reeducation and the things that we teach in our classes. But that's the first thing. If it's muscular-related pain, then it can most likely be undone. So that's the first thing. Yeah. And let's talk a little bit about muscular pain because I think that's very common in the low back situation. Yes. Okay. There could be some damage in your spine. Maybe one of your discs is bulging. Maybe you have osteoarthritis in there. So when those damage areas occur in your body, basically, the surrounding muscles, ligaments, whatever, are going to try to protect that area, right? So it starts to get tighter, right? It makes sense, doesn't it? If they're feeling, like, stability, then they're like, oh, send in the troops. Let's get everything really strong. Well, you can't hold muscular tension for too long without really feeling the searing pain of muscular tension. So how can we tell the difference between muscular tension and maybe that arthritis feeling of, you know, bending and maybe actually just pinching in a nerve, maybe on that little arthritis area? How can we tell the difference between those two? You know, I don't know if it's important to know how to tell the difference, to be honest. I think it's good to open up to talk about different conditions and how they affect the body. But the way that I view it is, back to what we were saying, the body wants to protect itself. It's almost like we resist it. And then the muscles go on automatic pilot. They're contracted without us even thinking about it, even when we're sleeping. So I don't know if it's so important to label where the pain is coming from, if it's beyond the muscle, just muscle system, just to know that that's what the muscles do, is the muscles go and grip and hold. So I think that's more helpful to understand is that those muscles can be repatterned through the movements that we teach and other teachers that are joining us in our tribe. Exactly. And muscle relaxers, think of that word. They relax the muscles, right? They do that through pharmaceuticals, right? We're trying to get you to relax the muscles through movement and breath. They're going to do the same thing. Let's try to do the natural way before we get into the pharmaceutical way, right? Absolutely. I think this is a great time for James to describe what he does in his gentle somatic yoga and how it affects those tight muscles. Okay, great. I'm going to demonstrate with my bicep, okay? So here's a muscle group. Muscular pain, contracted muscle, is when the muscle gets closer in towards the insertion and the origin of the muscle. So it gets bunched and this becomes stuck temporarily. So as much as my mind can say, release, release, release, it still won't bunch. So somebody might get a massage, one might do some acupuncture, and still we get into a stress pattern and the muscle just goes back to that memory. Okay, so we call this sensory motor amnesia. It's a reflex. The muscles are on automatic pilot. They're contracting even though we don't wish them to be, okay? So through the movements, through gentle somatic yoga, we help turn on the part of the brain that helps us regain voluntary control over the muscles. So that's what the somatic movement flows in gentle somatic yoga. The somatic movement flows are the corrective and therapeutic sequences that activate the memory back into the part of the brain where we can regain function. And that's what we want. We want to be able to turn muscles on and turn muscles off. And when we're in a resting position, the muscles are in a longer length, in their most optimal length in a resting position. So this would be a painful muscle. This is not going to be a painful muscle. And that's what happens all over our body. And now you can understand why people have sleeping problems who have pain, right? They're in this contracted state, anywhere in their body, wherever that pain might be, they're in that contracted state. You can't really relax and sleep well if you're fighting that internal contraction. Yeah, you know, I just worked with a client the other day, two days ago. And she was saying that she just felt like her spine was compressed. That even when she was sleeping, she felt like there was something pushing down on her head, compressing the discs in her neck. And we dream at night. And we have pillows. And so we're turning and we're tossing. And so definitely what I was talking about when the muscles go on automatic pilot, the term that we use is sensory motor amnesia. But what's great about it is it's temporary amnesia. But yeah, when we're sleeping, we're also resisting, but we're just not aware of it. Yeah, exactly. So if we can release those muscles, right, in a very methodical way, then we're going to have less pain and we're going to have better sleep. How about that? That's something that you'd be interested in? Yeah, I think we all would, right? So the gentle somatic flows or somatic movement flows that you do are targeted at some of the more popular chronically tight muscles. Which are those? Well, I was just mentioning the neck, the shoulders, the upper back. Yeah. Definitely a lot of people complain of lower back pain. Obviously, right? Tight hips. Yeah. I think those are the main ones. Glutes also, the psoas muscle, to name a few. So the approach in yoga, which is I teach chair yoga, gentle yoga, right, to the 50 plus population, is to get into those muscle areas as well. There's no doubt we do that through our breaths, through our movements, through our flows, through our holds, through our bends. But James' movement is a little bit more, I'm going to say, prescriptive. Because you really do target. You target specific areas and there's a repetition that goes with that. So talk a little bit about that repetition process. Okay, yeah, sure. In gentle somatic yoga, we use, the main technique is called pendiculation. And this is not stretching. So sometimes it confuses people when they hear gentle somatic yoga. But the way that I use the term yoga is for union and union of the whole self. You were describing all the different parts of pieces that make us a whole person. So I call it the whole self. And what we want is to allow information to be moving through our systems freely where everything's communicating properly, right? So in pendiculation, actually, if right now as the viewer, and we can do it too, is let's come into a yawn, okay? So it's like, ah. Okay, so what's happening? That was a good one. That was good. That felt good, actually. Did it, actually? So what's happening is we're contracting the muscles. The muscles are engaged when we open the mouth. And then they slowly disengage until they come back to a neutral position. So we actually pendiculate a lot, but we're just not aware of it. So when we are in bed and we're waking up, it's very often, I don't know about you, but it's very often that I'm just starting to just kind of like bring my muscles in and extend, you know, or like, ah, right? Oh, that feels good. So what happens first is we hug in, then we extend. And animals do this too. If you have cats or dogs, when they're waking up from a sleep, they're like, they're lifting their shoulders, they're extending their legs. And horses, all animals do this, actually. So pendiculation is a very natural thing that all animals do, which I find interesting. When they hear the word, they're like, what's that? What makes it different in general somatic yoga is that we bring mindfulness to engaging the muscle, slowly disengaging a muscle, and then release. That's a pendiculation with mindfulness. And as far as I know, in the 30 years that I've been in this profession, as an integrative therapist and educator yoga teacher, is this is the most effective way to erase chronic pain and stress holding patterns permanently, because we're engaging the part of the brain that brings us voluntary control back. So that's my biggest passion to share through the work that I do is to rewire the computer called the brain to bring the muscle back into the fullest length. And also, so the more choice we have in our body, where we can say muscles turn on and off, then we're freer in our body to enjoy our lives the way that we love. It's a myth that as we age, we're supposed to accept the aches and pains and the postural and balances. It's not true. It's just the sensory motor amnesia. We've temporarily forgotten through reacting to stress over our life. And the good news is you can change it. So that's part of general somatic yoga is to reprogram the brain to muscle connection. And what I like about it is that it's something that can happen. And you tell me this through one practice. Oh, my gosh. Oh, yes. You can increase your range of motion. He calls them miracle moments. And I've seen them because I've had them myself. Right. They are miracle moments. And together. Yeah. It's surprising. In one movement, you can increase your range of motion 15, 20%. So the question is, will that stay? Well, if you have to practice the movement flows, like I say, three or four times a week for a month, so that those new neuropathways or those reactivated neuropathways are reprogrammed to be the default. If you just practice them occasionally, it'll return back to the stress default that's unconscious. So you do have to practice. Right. But not a lot. Right. Just enough to keep the mind active. And so, Sherry, I want to, because we've been working, we've been peers and friends for a long time, like over a decade. Yeah. And I enjoy so much working with you and playing because the work that you do is movement, is really important, conscious movement. We're meant to move our bodies. So would you like to share this aspect of your work? Because I just love. I think with my work, I've seen as people get older, they do get stiff. They get stiff. And why is that? Probably, number one, they probably got pain. Right. Their fascia has gotten tighter. Right. They're not moving their joints, you know, fluidly every single day. So they tend to get into that stiff modality. Right. So what I see in my class is I want to make sure that I get into every single joint. And we get all those muscles engaging in a free-flowing kind of movement as well as a structural movement. So for me, my approach is I definitely do yoga because I believe in the structure and the strengthening that comes with yoga. There's no doubt about it. I feel like we've got to get that muscle, you know, strength, especially as we age. We don't want to be frail. We want to be strong and sturdy. Right. So there's those kind of components. But then the fluidity of the dancing that we do and all the qigong, tai chi, gentle yoga, somatic yoga that I bring into my classes, I bring those movements in, too, because all of that is going to help. I think we've talked about it before. We are not dogmatic about our practice. Absolutely not. There's not one right way. There's not one right religion in terms of movement. No. If this little bit helps and this little bit helps and that little dance in there and that helps with the memory, then it's good. It's a combination of so many different modalities that help. And so in my practice, that's what I do. I also add a lot of fun and a lot of laughing and a lot of joy, too. And that boosts our spirit. So that's one thing I want to talk about, James, because we had a really good conversation about, and this is where I want you to give a few examples. If somebody has chronic pain, how is that going to affect their emotional state? I'm also a certified core energetic psychotherapist, so I am retired from my practice right now, but I have seen a lot of people that live in that chronic pain cycle. And it's distracting. To live with that nagging pain, it just becomes a distraction. And then there's this fear of like, oh, don't do this, don't do that. It takes us from being really present to the now moment because of that constant nagging vicious cycle. I call it a vicious cycle because even our thoughts can make the contraction stronger. If we're afraid or we're angry or our emotions, well, those are emotions. But the emotions, the mental body, sometimes also people have different various spiritual beliefs. Some people don't, but there's this feeling of like, why me? You know, why is this happening to me? So that's why you mentioned the word spiritual before at the beginning of this talk. That's what I think. It's kind of like, why is this happening to me? There's almost this meta awareness of self, and it brings us insecurity and lack of confidence and anger. So all of those things can create more contraction in the body. Right. I agree. And so we were discussing what emotions look like from the outside. Right. Fear. Yeah. Anger. Right. Frustration. Stress. All of those. Gritting your teeth. Yeah, you can just see all that. Right. So how we can release that, how we can unwind that is something that we have the power to do. Absolutely. And Sherry, I don't know about you, but I think mindfulness, like being aware of our choices in our body. We're here at Anza Borrego Desert in Southern California, and I've really enjoyed watching some of your new things coming out. Yeah. And I love it because when I'm watching you, it's like you're fueling the Soma through these movements. We're accessing tissues that aren't normally always used, and you invite us into an intuitive movement that's going to look different for every single person. Right. And I'm stealing his saying energy flowing. That happens to be his corporation name, right? I'm stealing that because that's what we're doing. You have to steal it. We're getting the energy to flow through you again. Yeah. That's why acupuncture is really good, right? At times to open up the energy channels, right? Absolutely. Think about when you're constricted, things are tight. There's nothing moving. It's like a stream that just got blocked by a big log or a big stone or boulder. So we want to open up those things. Absolutely. So movement, of course, can do that. Breath can do that. Acupressure, acupuncture can do it. So all of those modalities, again, they help you. Yeah. And back to what we were talking about, breaking patterns, becoming aware of patterns. How are you sitting? How are you standing? I think that the brain is designed to learn new things, and we get into habits as we age. We sit a certain way. We eat with a certain hand. We brush our teeth. There's just things that we do. So I like to encourage my students and clients to change it up, to do something every day in a new way. That's going to keep us youthful as we age. Yeah. So can I tell them about how you helped me with my shoulder? Oh, absolutely. Oh, yeah. So I had this shoulder issue where I was always leaning forward with my shoulder, basically kind of stuck in an internal rotation. And I really didn't really notice it much until I tried to do Gamukasana, which is a yoga pose where you kind of wrap your arms, and you can touch in the back, and you do the other side, and you touch in the back. And I realized, oh, my gosh, one side is so different than the other. So I went to James, and he did his magical things with his somatic movement flows, which was the Celtic Cross. Celtic Cross, that's right. Which takes the shoulder and slowly and very mindfully and very gently starts to move it around internally within the socket. And that's what I needed. So all the little stretches that I were doing like this and that, that wasn't helping it. I needed to go deep into the socket and start that little gentle movement in all different directions. So that really helped. But what he noticed, and this is what was really the most important part I want to share because we had mentioned, your everyday patterns is probably what got you into maybe a mess. If it wasn't a surgery or an injury, it maybe is just your everyday patterns. He noticed that when I was getting excited and talking about things, I'd always roll my shoulder forward. I'd roll my shoulder forward. That's right, as a habit. Yeah, it was a habit. Uh-huh. And then I caught myself throughout the day, you know, just doing that. Just for what reason, I don't know what it is. It's like a tick, I would say, right? So then I started going like this, backwards. I got really excited going backwards, right? So I just knew I had to break that pattern. But I only could do that with the help of James because he got me out of the amnesia state, right? I was stuck. Yeah. I was stuck in that state. I call it the muscles were on automatic pilot or your pattern was an automatic pilot. Yeah. And I have to tell you that now I'm more mindful of that. Yes. If I ever see myself doing that, because I want to say it's a release valve for me because that feels good. The other shoulder is fine. It stays in the same place, right? But sometimes this one is going to run a roll forward. So I have to always be mindful of that. But the education really helped me. Yeah, absolutely. It's a fond memory. Yeah, it was. It was a good one. And I made a lot of progress in my Gamu Kasana pose, right? Yeah. Can I share a little dig with our audience? Yes. Oh, no. I have no idea what you're going to say. We're like brother and soul sister. So we're having fun. When I taught you the somatic movement flows, we would have these huge breakthroughs on the table in a clinical setting. And then I would give you the somatic movement flows to do at home. And you would come back and the shoulder would be back in its place. And it took me a while because I have to investigate when I'm working with people because the patterns are unconscious. And I remember saying, how is this possible? You have so much range of motion. You go back and then you come back and the muscles are stuck. Right. And it was because you were doing the movements in front of the TV. I know. Because you're a go-getter. You want to multitask. You want to get things done. I was. I'm teasing you, but I'm also sharing it with you, the viewer, is that it's the mindfulness of how we are in relationship with ourself and with least amount of distractions. I know. I think that's such a good point. Thank you for that dig, actually. Because it's very important. Well, it's human nature. This is what we do. I mean, how many of us multitask? Yeah. There's nothing wrong with that. It's just that when we're talking about chronic pain, these are the situations that we want to go. We want to learn. We want to discover. We want to explore. Take it. I won't use the word seriously because that sounds like ugh. Yeah. But just take it. Be committed. Be devoted to your own inner discovery. That's more. That's the word I like to use is devotion. It's self-love. Yeah. To give ourself that much attention through love and compassion and acceptance, I think that is a huge key with coming out of chronic pain as well. And if you're in chronic pain, it's almost like you don't want to go into that space. That's true. You don't even want to get close to it. That's a good point. You want to avoid it almost. That's true. It's that loving nudge, that loving nudge. Like, oh, wait. Oh, what was that? Whoa. That was kind of interesting. But, you know, let it go. Breathe into that. Try it again. So this is not a prescription. Like, do this exercise 10 times. You don't know how many times I've seen people give me their sheet from the physical therapist, right? True. Do this five times. Do this 10 times. True. It's not like that. No. Right? These are exploratory movements. Maybe just a couple is all you need. Maybe it is going to be 10 rounds one day and three rounds another day, right? It's sensing in your body where you feel the release. Yeah. And you actually, in the work that I share with people, you actually move in towards the discomfort. Instead of moving away, which is almost instinctive, especially with popular yoga, is we stretch away from the pain. Actually, in gentle semantic yoga, we move into it mindfully, not to strain or to be hurt, but to discover where is that spot. That's what we were doing with your shoulder. It's like, what is that place where you can start to feel like, oh, yeah, that's where the click is. That's where the catch is. Or that's where the numbness is. It can be infinite register of sensation, but there is this feeling of moving in towards ourself, and then moving away is really the magic. Yeah. It's coming out of it. It's like kissing the edges of the discomfort, moving away from it. That's one of the unique signatures of the GSY, for sure. I like that. That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. I like that analogy, definitely. Now, tell them about the lady that came to you within the walker, all bent over like that. Yeah. This is actually... I have chills all over my body thinking about this, and I hope I don't get emotional in front of the camera because it is deeply... Forget it. It's already happening. I had a client come to me... Oh, yes. Yeah. Here we go. I can feel it happening. It was just such a major emotional experience for everybody. Somebody... A son came in with her aged mother. I think she was 80-ish, and she came in with a dowager hump, with a walker, leaning over like this, and her head... The senior shuffle. Yeah. I just thought, wow. This was definitely one of my bigger cases, working with people. Western science would just say, that's just what happened. This is what can happen as you age. Right. Oftentimes, that's what seniors hear, and a lot of people hear. Yeah. Well, you're just stuck with that. Yeah. Anything ends with itis. Yeah. Tendonitis? Oh, well, just deal with it. Tennis elbow is something you just have to deal with. Right. Anyway, she comes in, and I'm thinking, wow, what am I going to do with her? Some people might say, you want to stretch her, move away from the pain. That's what we were just talking about. That would kind of make sense. You'd want to help her open up. Right? It's exact opposite. I was, as I just suggested, what I had her do was lying on her side. She couldn't lie down on her back. It was too painful. Yeah. I had her lie on her side with pillows, and actually had her come into the position that her body was already showing that it wanted to do. So, it was going into a deeper contraction at first, and then an opening. And this is what we did. For three months, I had her do these movements of just hugging in towards the midline, and then coming away. And I would offer, when I'm working one-on-one with people, I can do assisted pendiculation, which I'm not going to go into with this video. But I would have her push into me so that she can feel the muscles engaging, and then slowly disengaging. And in about three months, and I'm not kidding, slowly but surely, she would start to regain her posture. And eventually, in the end, she didn't need her walker. And her son and me, it was just incredible to watch her walk in and out of the house. Before, she couldn't even get in the car without being assisted. So, to see the freedom that came back to her, the quality of life, it was a really beautiful moment. And I do see this often in varying degrees. So, that's our wish for you, to the viewer, is if you've been living with chronic pain, there is hope. And it's through these tips and guidelines that we just explore. We have the attitude of discovery and exploration. And each summit expresses differently. And so, if you're one of those people that are living in chronic pain, maybe it's just a small effort at the beginning. But it's something. You know what I mean? It's something. It could just be that if you're bedridden, that you just start exploring moving your body in different ways for two minutes one day. The next time, it's five minutes. The next minute, it's 15 minutes. I think of sensorimotor amnesia as like a corkscrew. We get so tightly wound, like a corkscrew. And now, what we're doing through these movements that we share with people is we're unwinding that and reprogramming the brain. And the result is freedom on every level, physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. And this can happen for you. This is how we live our lives. We see it all the time with our students. So, yeah. So, I hope what we shared today is a little bit of encouragement. That's all we want to do. Just give you that little spark of hope and encouragement. Because you know what? When you're in chronic pain, you don't see the hope. You don't see the light at the end of the tunnel. And there can be. And that's why I wanted him to share the story about the lady and the walker. Because it was not a miracle moment at one moment in time. It was a process. But guess what? It was a process for her to get to that state. It was a process for her to unwind out of that state, basically. And you know, I have compassion for all of us as human beings. Because as we experience fear and stress, our bodies, this is what we do. We want to protect ourselves. And in core energetics, we call it armoring. Emotional armoring. You know, it serves a purpose. But now, as we age, a lot of us don't have those conditions anymore. So, you know, it's just time to... Be free. Yeah, exactly. Right. Let's not hold on to anything anymore. No, no. Remember, that means not holding on to things emotionally. Yeah. Right? Just the whole self. Psychologically, yeah. All of that. Because it all winds together. And when people ask me, when I use the word Soma, that's what I use. Soma. If you look in the dictionary, Soma comes from the Greek word somaticos, which is body. But now, with this new movement, as movement educators and yoga teachers, the Soma is the whole self. All of it together. Yes, exactly. Well, thanks for joining us today. I hope what we shared today gave you a little bit of hope and inspiration. And see you the next time. Yeah. Namaste.