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Mindfulness for Pain & Illness | Part 1 with Vidyamala Burch

2025/4/18

Mindfulness Exercises

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Vidyamala Burch

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Vidyamala Burch: 我在16岁时脊椎受伤，此后近50年都饱受慢性疼痛的折磨。起初，我采用逃避策略，但25岁时病情恶化，一次痛苦的经历让我顿悟到：活在当下才是最重要的。我开始学习冥想和瑜伽，并逐渐领悟到注意力和觉知是可以训练的技能，它们能改变我的主观体验。经过多年的实践和探索，我创立了Breathworks项目，致力于帮助他人运用正念来管理疼痛和疾病。我的方法注重实用性和体验性，帮助人们区分主要痛苦（身体感觉）和次要痛苦（对疼痛的抗拒和反应），并通过呼吸练习、坐垫练习等方法来减少次要痛苦，最终达到从抗拒到韧性的转变。我的经验表明，正念并非消极被动，而是勇敢而强大的。它帮助我们接纳痛苦，而非抗拒它。在应对痛苦的过程中，我们会经历两种极端：要么被痛苦压垮，要么否认和压抑痛苦。正念练习帮助我们在这两种状态间找到平衡，并始终保持慈悲之心。通过正念，我们可以将疼痛视为流动的河流，而不是固定的岩石，从而缓解痛苦。 Sean Fargo: 作为Mindfulness Exercises播客的主持人，我长期关注正念在疼痛管理中的应用。Vidyamala Burch的经验和见解对我以及众多受慢性疼痛困扰的人们都具有启发意义。本期节目中，Vidyamala Burch分享了她与慢性疼痛抗争的个人经历，以及她如何通过正念练习来应对痛苦，并帮助他人减轻痛苦。她强调了区分主要痛苦和次要痛苦的重要性，并介绍了多种实用的正念练习方法，例如呼吸练习和坐垫练习，这些方法能够帮助人们减少对疼痛的抗拒和反应，从而提升韧性，最终过上积极而富足的人生。

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This chapter introduces Vidyamala Burch and the topic of using mindfulness to alleviate chronic pain. It emphasizes reducing pain intensity and softening resistance to pain, and introduces the concepts of primary and secondary suffering.

Mindfulness can alleviate chronic pain intensity.
Softening resistance to pain is key.
Navigating primary and secondary suffering is important for pain management.

Shownotes Transcript

In this episode, Vidyamala Burch, co-founder of Breathworks and a leading voice in mindfulness-based pain management, shares her personal story of living with chronic pain for nearly 50 years and how it led her to develop powerful mindfulness practices for pain and illness.

She describes her early struggles, moments of insight, and the journey from resistance to resilience. Vidyamala outlines the key distinction between primary and secondary suffering, and how mindfulness helps reduce the emotional and cognitive layers of pain.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

✔ The difference between primary and secondary suffering

✔ Vidyamala’s personal story of chronic pain and transformation

✔ The parable of the two arrows and how it applies to pain

✔ Practical metaphors like the cushion exercise and resistance loop

✔ Strategies for noticing and softening reactivity around pain

✔ The importance of recognizing your own resistance patterns

This episode offers deep insights for anyone working with chronic pain—personally or professionally—and provides mindfulness teachers with grounded, compassionate tools to support others through discomfort.