There is no real substitute for proper medical attention, but you can alleviate pain and manage it with the following simple technique. It’s based on the work of Richard Bandler and John Grinder, founders of NLP. It works by acknowledging how you are experiencing the pain then re-coding the experience such that it dissolves the discomfort. You can use this technique on other forms of pain and discomfort such as headaches, hangovers, muscular aches etc. You can also adapt it to work on troublesome feelings like anger, hate etc.


Steps

1. Rate the pain on a scale of 0 – 10, 0 being low/no pain and 10 being high. Decide what number you want to be, or what you will settle for.
2. See the pain as a picture or film in your head. If the picture has movement alter the movement to one that is more pleasing. For example, if you’re seeing the pain as a hammer banging against the area of discomfort, place a soft cushion in its path. If the picture has sound, change it to suit you or turn down the volume.
3. Change the colour of the pain to one that suits you and reduces the pain from number ---- to number -------.
4. Project the picture of the pain onto a screen in front of you and reduce the size of the picture.
5. Reduce the picture further to the size of a small bubble. Watch the bubble rise into the air and float up to the clouds. As the bubble reaches the clouds, the pain reads number 1.
6. Watch as the bubble fades away into the clouds. As it fades, so does the pain leaving only a faint memory.

Tips

• Try this out at every opportunity, on yourself and

Warnings

• Seek medical attention if the same pain persists.