How We Hold Pain - TNW

Throughout my career, I’ve worked in environments defined by mental health — settings where trauma, crisis, and the human psyche sit in the same room. I’ve studied pain through many lenses: physical, medical, psychological, and energetic. And across all of those frameworks, one truth keeps rising:

There are endless ways to understand pain, but only one way to heal it —

we must release it.

Understanding is not the same as liberation.

Intellectualizing trauma is not the same as healing trauma.

Naming pain does not loosen its grip; releasing pain does.

We can talk about pain scientifically—how neurons fire, how inflammation spikes, how the nervous system searches for safety. We can explore the psyche and divide it into the conscious mind, subconscious mind, and unconscious mind. These are helpful maps…

But maps are not the destination.

Healing requires movement.

And not just physical movement — but emotional, energetic, and spiritual movement. We release pain through acceptance, forgiveness, writing, breath, vulnerability, and becoming new versions of ourselves.

Pain leaves when it has space to leave.

The Body Always Shows What the Mind Tries to Hide

Pain expresses itself through the body long before the mind catches up.

We can clench muscles, guard vulnerable joints, hide exhaustion, or put on a face that says “I’m fine.” But the truth always rises through the physical body. Facial tension, posture, skin tone, and breath patterns reveal the emotional weather inside us long before we speak it.

Energetically, the body whispers before it screams.

Western medicine is excellent at emergencies and lifesaving intervention. But in the long-term healing journey, many become lost in a maze of specialists, tests, and referrals. The system often treats symptoms without exploring the story beneath the symptom.

When the inner landscape remains unaddressed, the body continues to communicate through tension, inflammation, stagnation — and sometimes, yes, through chronic pain that eventually screams.

We can try to fix our outward appearance:

Botox. Skincare rituals. Posture tricks. No matter the concealment, the truth returns every time:

What is unresolved internally will show itself externally.

Healing begins when we soften the emotional armor and allow the nervous system to breathe again. When we let the system unlearn the pain pathways it developed during chronic stress, trauma, or survival-mode conditioning.

Joint Pain and the Ego’s Resistance

As someone who navigates autoimmune flares, rigid joints, and shifting waves of inflammation, I’ve learned to look deeper than the diagnosis.

Western medicine labels the condition.

But the body reveals the story.

Joint pain often carries a message of psychological inflexibility — the ego refusing to bend. Different joints are affected by different inflexibilities. We can overburden ourselves in many ways. Those burdens tend to find their way to different locations in the body.

Remember, the ego isn’t “bad.” It’s the protector. The part of us shaped by identity, safety, and old beliefs. It lives within the solar plexus chakra and whispers:

• “Stay the same.”

• “Don’t risk anything.”

• “Comfort is safer than growth.”

When we step into real growth — the kind that reshapes identity — the ego tightens its grip. It resists. It doubts. It bends the body into patterns that eventually turn into physical pain.

And fear?

Fear undercuts any structure rooted in the root chakra.

Outside of injury or aging, joint pain often appears when we are transitioning from one version of ourselves into another.

It shows up when:

• We’re avoiding a decision.

• We feel the nudge to change but keep postponing it.

• Old beliefs clash with new inner truths.

The internal dialogue becomes a tug-of-war:

“Let’s begin again.”

“Not now.”

“I’m scared.”

“Just one more day.”

With each day of hesitation, the spark dims. Creativity quiets. Purpose drifts. Fear becomes the narrator.

Ignore it long enough, and the body speaks louder:

Arthritis flares.

Inflammation rises.

(And yes — even inflammation can sound like an egomaniac.)

The body delivers the message:

“You’re not listening.”

Why I Turned Toward the Tao

People often ask why I’m so connected to the Tao — especially those who don’t fully understand the philosophy.

My answer is simple:

I didn’t find the Tao. My pain led me to it.

Autoimmune patterns, old injuries, chronic stress, and accumulated trauma from years in mental health and crisis work shaped my path.

The Tao doesn’t demand belief.

It invites softness. It simply invites.

It teaches ease, spontaneity, and the wisdom of not forcing. Start small. Take that first step. Pivot if needed. Be grateful for opportunities. Practice my mentor’s message in the office: “Live by Grace, not by perfection.”Do your best. Treat others with love and respect. Be. You.

The Tao Te Ching says:

“Whatever is rigid and stiff will be broken.

Whatever is soft and yielding will overcome.”

This wasn’t always easy for me to accept. I came from a long-established male-athlete, “warrior mentality” framework — where force, grit, and toughness were badges of honor.

But wisdom isn’t found in tension.

Healing isn’t found in resistance.

The body echoes the same truth:

Pain arises where the ego clings.

Healing arises where we soften.

The Path Forward: Courage, Not Perfection

Growth demands change.

Fear demands safety.

The soul asks for truth.

The ego asks for comfort.

Every meaningful path — purpose, passion, creativity, service — requires courage.

Not loud courage.

Not heroic courage.

Quiet, consistent courage.

The courage to get up.

To breathe into discomfort.

To move through joint pain or emotional pain.

To face internal resistance — because resistance is guaranteed.

To step back into your story even when you tremble.

Comparison is the most dangerous trap.

It convinces us that we don’t measure up.

It freezes potential.

It pulls us to the sidelines.

But every time we retreat, the soul contracts.

Pain is often the soul’s final attempt to get our attention.

Releasing Pain: The Real Work

True healing isn’t found in perfection.

It’s found in presence.

When we clear old beliefs, outdated identities, and emotional clutter, we create room:

• For the body to move again

• For the nervous system to rest

• For the psyche to breathe

• For the spirit to speak

The message is always the same:

Let go.

So you can grow.

As I re- remember:

You are safe.

You are protected.

You are guided.

You are exactly where you need to be.

Pain asks us to release — it just has an annoying way of telling us.

The soul asks us to listen.

The body asks us to soften.

The path asks us to begin — again and again — without shutting down.

This is how we heal.

This is how we untangle old stories.

This is how we step into who we truly are.

And remember — you are worth it.