Pain - for example from sports' injury, muscle and back pain, post-operative pain - is a subjective experience and so it is not surprising that there is strong empirical evidence for the use of cognitive behavioural hypnotherapeutic techniques for managing chronic and even acute pain.  We interpret pain in similar ways to the way we experience other events, through our beliefs and assumptions built up over time, hence different people will experience the same stimulus differently, some able to tolerate a level of pain that others find unbearable. Our thoughts, feelings and behaviour that accompany the experience of pain influence our ability to cope with it and the significance we afford it.  Muscle tension, for example, exacerbates the experience of pain - typically when we are in pain we tense our muscles, but this in turn enhances anxious thoughts and fears about what the pain means.  See blog post on Tension and anxiety.

The cause of pain should always be checked out first by a doctor, but some pain cannot be adequately controlled with pain killers or residual pain may remain. Mindfulness, relaxation and self-hypnosis can help you gain control and manage chronic residual pain, reducing the importance it assumes in your life.