Free Resources

“Make your life bigger than the pain.” - Lara

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  • My Other Free or Low-Cost Offerings

  • Terminology

  • Educational Videos

  • Lara’s Somatic Tracking Recordings (Personalized Recordings also available)

  • Other Audio Recordings

  • Free Online Resources & Relevant Apps

  • Podcasts (Pain-related)

  • Podcasts (on other relevant topics)

  • Research Articles on Pain Science

  • Articles on Related Topics

  • Recommended Books

  • Poems & Graphics

  • A New Definition of Pain

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My Other Free or Low-Cost Offerings

Terminology

A Quick Note on Terminology — There are many terms for the kind of pain & physical symptoms we are talking about here, and there are also several that overlap with one other but are not identical:

  • Neuroplastic Pain - the terminology now preferred by Alan Gordon, the Curable community, etc.

  • Neural Pathway Pain - a synonym for neuroplastic pain

  • MBS (Mind-Body Syndrome) - developed by Dr. Howard Schubiner, often used interchangeably with TMS

  • Neural Circuit Disorder - now preferred by Dr. Howard Schubiner, often over MBS or TMS

  • PPD (Psychophysiological Disorder) - developed by Dr. David Clarke (Dr. Clarke also calls this “Stress Illness”) - in September 2024, Dr. Clarke renamed his organization PPDA to ATNS (Association for the Treatment of Neuroplastic Disorders)

  • Nociplastic Pain - coming out of recent neuroscience research, seen as a synonym for neuroplastic pain

  • Primary Pain, and some aspects of Secondary Pain - the new classifications of chronic pain coming out of the WHO in the upcoming ICD-11, seen as a synonym for neuroplastic pain

  • CSS (Central Sensitization Syndrome) - a diagnosis given by some medical doctors for a nervous system that has become hypersensitive (can overlap with CRPS)

  • CRPS (Complex Regional Pain Syndrome) - a diagnosis given by some medical doctors. CRPS is thought to be different from but overlapping with neuroplastic pain. CRPS Type 2 is following an injury to the nerve and is the new term for Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy (RSD), whereas CRPS Type 1 is for those without an originating injury to the nerve and is therefore thought by many in the field to be the same as neuroplastic pain

  • AMPS (Amplified Musculoskeletal Pain Syndrome) or Myofascial Pain Syndrome- diagnoses given by some medical doctors for chronic pain in the muscles, joints, or other parts of the body, without any originating injury or underlying inflammation

  • Psychosomatic Illness or Somatoform Disorder - terminology stemming from the work of Sigmund Freud (and Charcot and others) on “hysteria” in women in the late 19th & early 20th centuries

  • TMS (Tension Myositis Syndrome) - “TMS” is neuroplastic pain’s original name, coined by John Sarno, M.D. in 1999.   But please note that while the new neuroscience research on chronic pain has taken us well beyond Dr. Sarno’s original ideas in this realm, people still widely use the term “TMS” to refer to a wide range of mind-body symptomatology, sometimes calling it “Tension Myoneural Syndrome” attempting to bring the TMS term more up to date

Educational Videos

Lara’s Somatic Tracking Recordings

Other Audio Recordings

Free Online Resources & Relevant Apps

*Recommended by Clients (but that I have not yet tried myself):

Podcasts (Pain-Related)

Podcasts (on Related Topics)

Research in Pain Science

Articles organized in chronological order, with most recent first:

Articles on Pain-Relevant Topics

Recommended Books

Organized in somewhat random order, somewhat according to which I think are most important listed first:

  • The Pain-Free M.I.N.D.S.E.T. (2021) by Deepak Ravindran, M.D.

  • Explain Pain (2003) by David Butler, Ph.D. and G. Lorimer Moseley, Ph.D.

  • The Expectation Effect: How Your Mindset Can Transform Your Life (2022) by David Robson

  • The Way Out (2021) by Alan Gordon

  • The Pain Management Workbook (2020) by Rachel Zoffness

  • The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in Healing Trauma (2014) by Dr. Bessel van der Kolk

  • Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma (1997) by Peter A. Levine

  • Burnout: The Key to Unlocking the Stress Cycle (2019) by Amelia Nagoski

  • Radical Compassion (2019) by Tara Brach, Ph.D.

  • Unlearn Your Pain (2010) by Howard Schubiner, M.D.

  • Unlearn Your Anxiety and Depression (2016) by Howard Schubiner, M.D.

  • Self-Compassion (2013) by Kristin Neff, Ph.D.

  • Hardwiring Happiness (2013) by Rick Hanson, Ph.D.

  • When Things Fall Apart (2006) by Pema Chödrön

  • Radical Acceptance (2003) by Tara Brach, Ph.D.

  • Heart Minded: How to Hold Yourself and Others in Love (2020) by Sarah Blondin

  • Freedom from Nervous Suffering (1973) by Dr. Claire Weekes

  • You are the Placebo (2014) by Dr. Joe Dispenza

  • Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness (2022) by Meghan O’Rourke

  • The Last Best Cure (2013) by Donna Jackson Nakazawa

  • The Myth of Normal (2021) by Gabor Mate

  • When the Body Says No (2003) by Gabor Mate 

  • The Mindbody Prescription (1998) by John Sarno, M.D.

  • The Divided Mind (2006) by Dr. John Sarno, M.D.

  • Back Sense (2001) by Ronald Siegel, Ph.D.

  • Writing to Heal (2004) by James Pennebaker, Ph.D.

  • Back in Control (2012) by David Hanscom, M.D.

Poems & Graphics

A New Definition of Pain

For the first time in over 50 years, the IASP (International Association for the Study of Pain) updated its definition of pain to include the notion that pain can come from the brain without any tissue damage and that this kind of pain is just as real as pain which stems from tissue damage.  As of July 2020, IASP’s new definition of pain is:  

  • “An unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with, or resembling that associated with, actual or potential tissue damage.

    • Pain is always a personal experience that is influenced to varying degrees by biological, psychological, and social factors.

    • Pain and nociception are different phenomena. Pain cannot be inferred solely from activity in sensory neurons.

    • Through their life experiences, individuals learn the concept of pain.

    • A person’s report of an experience as pain should be respected.

    • Although pain usually serves an adaptive role, it may have adverse effects on function and social and psychological well-being.

    • Verbal description is only one of several behaviors to express pain; inability to communicate does not negate the possibility that a human or a nonhuman animal experiences pain.”

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