Dr David McGrath

Spine Physician

MB BS (Hons) FAFOM, RACP, FAFMM
Master of Pain Medicine

Conscious Control of life is one of our most prized possessions.
In the musculosketal pain area, we can also obtain some conscious control. For those of us, who have had significant pain the idea is alluring. If could "will " our pain away ,this would indeed be marvellous. Alas,like most aspects of life, it is not that easy.
First we need to appreciate how and what consciousness is,before we try and utilize this faculty. Without going into this enormous subject in detail, we could state that consciousness is a disturbance control mechanism, whereby one movement (perception or thought ) directly influences the next set of possible movements. If the set to be controlled is the sought after, coherent ,non painful group of movements then the preceeding set of perceptions are the contolling facilitators. Creating such a group of perceptions would then allow conscious control.
To take a non physiological example.
Knowing that a certain social encounter has been awkward in the past, there may be spin off perceptions which can preceed a future uncomfortable meeting. Its like the old saying. We will meet again,unless "I see you first". Evasive action can ocur with the perception of the unliked person.
Here's the maths.

ConsciousnessActions	Non Painful Actions	Painful Actions
Conscious Control	a	b
Non Conscious Control	c	d

Cell "a" indicates "there's David" followed by evasive action
Cell "b" indicates "there's David" but can't avoid and uncomfortable conversation follows
Cell "c" indicates No perception of David, but I find I am crossing the street anyway
Cell "d" indicates No perception of David, and an awkward conversation follows

In this example, we would like a+c to be maximum and b+d to be zero. It might even be better if a=0, that is the whole action of evasion occurs sub-consciously.

This situation is similar to physiological examples. We would like no painful events in life, with or without conscious control.
The challenge, is to reconfigure our functioning to reduce b+d.
Here's an interesting theory.
If we practice "a" the following might occur.
1. Some of "a" will drift to become "c" That is,our well practiced conscious routines can become non -conscious
2. The combined set "a+c" may have an exclusive effect on both "b" and "d". This is not unreasonable. By the practice of "a" we are excluding "b" and the increased "c" excludes "d".

The Bottom Line:
Conscious Practice of Non Painful Movements Leads to Non Painful Movements, Period.