Military - P.O.W. Survival Guide
by
Dennis Gersten, M.D.
Cope with Pain
Believe it or not, how we perceive and respond to pain has a lot to do with our
minds. You know that a short running back football player who gets creamed by a
300 pound tackle, may not feel the pain at all until the game is over. People
who have had a leg amputated often continue to have pain in the leg that is
"no longer there." And there is a story about an African tribesman who
had an entire arm torn off by a lion. Facing the lion was an heroic ritual that
he took on himself. The lost arm was a great sign of honor. And when he went to
the doctor right after the injury, he complained of little or no pain. He was
smiling.
The point isn't that the tribesman just toughed it out. The point is that the mind
can help you overcome any pain. The technique I will teach you is a distillation
of years of study and treatment in the field of Mind over Matter . . . Mind over
Pain.
When you convert your pain into an image, the pain itself undergoes change...in your
favor. But don't tell Saddam that! And the more you play with and change the image
of the pain, the more you change the pain. Here's how it goes:
Focus on whatever pain you feel . . . and picture that pain as a ball of mercury.
Mercury is that silvery substance in thermometers that is both liquid and solid.
Imagine that this mercury ball is the size of your pain. Maybe the pain is the
size of a golf ball...a baseball...a soccer ball...a basketball...or a beach ball.
Now imagine that this mercury is a magnet that pulls all the pain into it...pain from
everywhere in your body is pulled into the mercury magnet. You got it?
Practice this now. If you have no pain, then remember a time when you did and
picture that pain as a ball of mercury.
Now roll that mercury down to the nearest arm or leg and throw it away. Kick it or
throw it out into space and watch it as it disappears into the distance.
Does that sound like magic? Well, it can work like magic. I wish you could talk
to the twenty year old girl I treated who was in a head-on collision with a
combined impact of 140 miles per hour. Her three broken vertebrae in her neck
caused her great pain. But with this type of imagery, she was able to drop her
pain to ZERO in three minutes. You can too . . . if you need to.
But what about the pain one might suffer while Saddam's thugs are doing their
thing. I can't suggest how you should respond to them. But again, I can suggest
what you can be doing with your mind. If you know you are about to receive some
physical punishment, "set up that imaginary mercury ball" beforehand.
When the physical punishment arrives, let the mercury ball receive the blow...and
let the mercury run down out of your body . . . through your feet into the floor.
Let it run out of your body just as fast as the punishment comes in.
But set up this mercury ball somewhere in the center of your body so that no matter
where pain comes from, it will immediately go into that central mercury ball...and
from there, you can let it flow out of your body. This will help. It may not
overcome pain 100% but it will give you some control at a time when the enemy is
doing everything he can to take away your control.
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