site banner
PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   1858 thread views

Wellness Wednesday for August 2, 2023

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

  • Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.

  • Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.

  • Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.

  • Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).

2
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Are stiffness/body pains different from flexibility?

I carry a lot of stiffness around with me to the point I think it worsens my quality of life. I assume it's mostly from prior manual labor plus current weight lifting and running (which unfortunately I'm not willing to stop), so I've always tried to address it with yoga. I spend a chunk of time each day on deep stretches, especially in the points that bother me...and it maybe kinda works? Objectively I've gotten a lot more flexible but honestly my body feels to me just as borked as ever, my neck uncomfortably stiff and aching most times, my lower back hurting noticeably if I stand too long (but not while walking or running for whatever reason). Am I just doing something that doesn't really have any impact on what I'm actually trying to fix? If so, is there something other people have done that's helped with body aches/stiffness? (I've also tried switching up pillows a few times for my neck but not much luck).

Yeah I agree with @TowardsPanna, there’s a lot of stuff with chronic tension/muscular pain we just don’t understand at all.

Some people say it’s emotions, some people say there are trigger points, there are literally a million explanations. Painscience.org is a good starting place if you’re curious.

Basically chronic pain and tension usually aren’t a purely mechanical phenomenon, and treating them as such won’t get you far.

Thanks for the link, I appreciate it

Sarno's Healing Back Pain could help, or also see https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/06/26/book-review-unlearn-your-pain/

both are along the same lines as the other comment

Thanks, that was an interesting read to look through.

Well yes, they can be.

Neck and lower back pain are often associated with psychosomatic tensions. You may be carrying old stressors and anxieties in the body. They tend to get stuck there in humans, while animals tend to just shake them off after each event. Or, you may be on a day to day basis in your current life be tensing up your neck and back every time something evokes aversion, irritation, fear, etc in you. When the mind doesn't know exactly how to deal with a stressor, it will use the body to reflect the unresolved emotion and store it. If you had averse childhood events and/or insecure attachment to one or both of your parents, you're far more likely to get all sorts of stress related bodily issues as an adult. In that case, even light insults to the bodymind may, on a subconscious level, be treated as being quite similar to a much more serious thing in your life history and trigger old patterns.

I may be missing the mark completely here, but I thought I'd mention it anyway, just in case. There are ways to deal with it, let me know if you want info.

There are ways to deal with it, let me know if you want info.

I would definitely appreciate that, thanks

I tried to PM you but got a 405 error. :/

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats