The Power of Positive Thinking & Natural Pain Relief
Feb 07, 2024
Managing Chronic Pain with Mindfulness
For people with living with chronic pain or illness, staying positive can be hard when your body constantly works against you. However, several studies and pain management coaches have found that a positive mindset can help you overcome your symptoms and relearn what it means to live with pain.
Learn how cognitive and natural pain relief remedies like positive thinking, mindfulness, and Doctor Hoy’s® pain relief topicals can help you manage your pain more effectively.
Can positive thinking reduce pain?
Changing your perspective about your pain can help you overcome challenges and stress more easily. Positive thinking encourages the release of feel-good hormones, called endorphins. Endorphins are the body’s natural pain reliever. When released, they help decrease stress and anxiety, boost immune response, and improve mood.
Being in pain is stressful, and too much stress can increase inflammation in the body, making your pain worse. Thinking more positively about ourselves, our abilities, and our environment is one of the most natural ways to relieve stress and reduce pain.
The Benefits of Positive Thinking
Living with pain everyday can make it easy to fall into the trap of negative thinking. You might ruminate on how your discomfort stops you from living your best life. When you stop using words that suggest negative outcomes and choose to be kinder to yourself, you can better cope with your pain and start living with it.
People who have a more positive mindset tend to:
- Have less anxiety and depression
- Be in better physical health
- Build stronger relationships
- Feel more satisfied with life
- Have a lower risk of chronic illness
- Recover from injuries or sickness faster
Our mental and physical health share a strong connection. Positive thinking may not cure chronic pain, but it can help you manage your symptoms and live a fuller life.
A Natural Remedy for Pain Relief
Positive thinking and mindfulness can help relieve ongoing pain or occasional flareups without making you rely on medication. With natural pain relief remedies, you can also reduce your risk of side effects from NSAIDs or other prescription pain relievers.
Positive thinking alone won’t get rid of your pain. When used alongside positive thinking techniques, Doctor Hoy’s natural pain relief creams and gels offer a more complete way to manage your pain.
Our Natural Pain Relief Gel and Arnica Boost Recovery Cream use natural ingredients to provide fast, and long-lasting pain relief for arthritis, joint and back pain, muscle aches, and more. These clean, safe, and effective topicals help ease your pain so you can feel better and less distracted.
Talk to your healthcare provider about how you can incorporate more natural ways to relieve pain, like Doctor Hoy’s topical analgesics, into your pain management plan.
Positive Thinking Techniques & Exercises
Having a “mind over matter” approach towards life might sound easier said than done. Mindfulness, or the practice of being fully present, is about recognizing your pain’s existence and that you can relieve it. The following techniques help teach you how to think more positively so you can manage your pain:
- Body Scan Meditation: This type of mindfulness meditation calls you to pay attention to individual parts of your body so you can recognize where the physical tension or discomfort is and release it from within.
- Breathing Exercises: Spend 10 minutes about 2 to 3 times a day taking slow, deep breaths. Breathing exercises reduce your heart rate and blood pressure while relaxing your muscles, letting you slow down, tune out distractions, and focus.
- Practicing Awareness: You know your pain best, and when you can predict it, you can also be proactive against it. Morning pain or stiffness can be transformed into a positive experience with a relaxing daily yoga routine, for example.
- Gratitude Journaling: Journaling is a great way to reflect on the positive things in your life and look at what you have instead of what you do not. It builds mental clarity, and you can look back at your entries when you need a positive reminder.
- Visualization: When you see yourself in a state of happiness, your brain reacts similarly to if you were physically experiencing the same state. Visualization is one of the most effective positive thinking techniques for reducing pain.
- Seeing Pain as Opportunity: Difficult situations are opportunities for growth, not failures. Instead of being afraid of your pain, view it as an opportunity to achieve more on your best days and enough on the not-so-good days.
- Celebrate Small Successes: Every small achievement is a big one when you have chronic pain. Celebrating these helps foster feelings of accomplishment, boosting your motivation, and promoting a happy, healthy mindset.
- Surround Yourself with Support: Surrounding yourself with positive people who understand and support your goals can help you take on an optimistic attitude and keep you accountable on the days you don’t feel so great.
Manage Pain Naturally with Doctor Hoy’s
A healthy, positive mindset plays a significant role in managing your pain. By using positive thinking techniques like mindfulness for pain and relieving symptoms with Doctor Hoy’s natural topical pain relievers, you can feel better and stop pain from controlling your life.
Doctor Hoy’s does not diagnose or prescribe treatment for medical conditions. Our natural pain relief gel and cream help mitigate physical pain symptoms. Always seek professional help for feelings of depression, anxiety, or pain. Talk to your physician or healthcare provider before changing your pain management plan.
References:
Growth Mindset | Psychology Today. (2023). Psychology Today.
Parks, E. (2020, October 30) Six Steps to Rewire Your Brain and Master Pain. Psychology Today.
Take a mental break from pain. (2021, April 1). Harvard Health.
