Releasing emotional pain from the physical body

If someone had told me 3 years ago that I would be dealing with physical pain through meditation I probably would have thought that they were crazy.  Today I know without a doubt that a lot of the emotional pain I've experience in my life is stored in my body and through meditation and conscious awareness I am able to release that pain.

This is an ongoing process I have pain in my lower back that seems like a never ending fountain of pain that get's released.

Last night I listened to a 10 minute mindfulness of change meditation which got me focused on my breath and noticing the changes in the sensation of breathing.  Earlier in the evening I had been reading Burning Desire a 12 step and Buddhism book. The section of the book I was reading talked about observing pain instead of trying to push it away.

So with my mindfulness of change and aware of pushing away my pain I looked to my lower back. After first I could feel my instinctual feeling to pull away or push away the pain and run away from it. After noticing the habitual pattern of recoiling from the pain I breathed into it and the pain no longer felt painful and so for a few moments I just observed the sensation.

As is normally the case when I am able to observe pain without resistance it started to move.  The pain moved it's way up my back at times it would pause and the strong instinct to push it away would kick in and then it would get painful again.  After relaxing into the pain again it would move.

When the sensation reached my shoulders it started to feel extremely uncomfortable.  It wasn't painful but it was the sensation that I needed to move.  The agitated feeling in body almost felt overwhelming and I really wanted to move.  But with patience and gentleness I reminded myself of impermanence and this too shall pass and I attempted to relax into the sensation.

Eventually the agitation passed and the feeling moved into my face.  When the sensation moves into my face I've noticed that part of me has a tendency to get impatient and want to rush the process because it knows what's coming.  But when I rush the feeling dissipates and the opportunity to release is let go.

When the release finally came it was tears and silence screams.  This might sound awful but the reality is that it is very cathartic.  Only one word came into my head as I cried and silently screamed and let my feelings be that word was 'Mommy'. I don't know what that means but I know now that I get to be mommy to the various little scared parts of me.

Getting to the point of being able to process emotional pain in my physical body did not happen overnight.  This is a process that has taken time and it takes a lot of patience and self-love.  I wish anyone who finds this blessings on their journey and feel free to contact me if you have questions.  I may or may not be able to answer them but I will try.