Episode 422
How This Man Overcame Chronic Pain And Illness with Jonah Primo
Chronic pain can be an exhausting challenege, often leaving you feeling helpless and isolated. But what if there's a way to reclaim your life and find hope within the struggle? In this episode, I sit down with Jonah Primo, who shares his inspiring journey of overcoming debilitating chronic pain and chosing to live his life to the fullest even in the face of the pain Jonah was an active guy running 100km each week and playing soccer regularly, yet he found himself bedridden, unable to climb a small hill to his place without collapsing to his hands and knees. His world became consumed with the pain and he retreated from life, relationships and even called off his engagement.
But Jonah's journey doesn't end there. Through a combination of mindfulness, gratitude and a shift in his perspective, he found a path back to health - both physically and mentally. His story offers valuable insights for anyone grappling with chronic pain or life altering health challenges. Jonah's experience reminds us that even in our darkest moments, there's hope just waiting to be rediscovered. His story isn't just about overcoming pain - it's about joy, purpose and the thoughts which fill our thoughts. Remember, your current situation doesn't define you. There's always potential for positive change, no matter how dire things may seem. Let Jonah's journey inspire you to take that first step towards reclaiming your life.
In this episode, you will be able to:
- Discover the power of mindfulness for overcoming chronic pain and finding inner peace.
- Learn to harness the mind-body connection to effectively manage and reduce pain.
- Uncover the transformative benefits of practicing gratitude in your journey to pain recovery.
- Explore effective strategies for coping with long Covid symptoms and regaining control of your health.
- Understand the impact of chronic pain on personal relationships and discover ways to navigate these challenges with resilience.
The key moments in this episode are:
00:05:27 - Unexpected Health Challenges
00:15:04 - Fighting Back and Finding Hope
00:20:50 - Celebrating Incremental Progress and the Small Wins
00:27:59 - Practicing Gratitude and Mindfulness
00:33:25 - Impact of Chronic Pain on relationships
00:42:42 - Embracing life with pain
00:45:55 - Being Grateful and Taking Intentional Steps
00:47:42 - Seeking Hope and Inspiration
Connect with Jonah Primo
Website
https://www.instagram.com/jonahprimo/
YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/@TheOverexaminedLife
Connect with Mike Forrester
Podcast Website
https://LivingFearlessTodayPodcast.com
Coaching Website
https://www.linkedin.com/in/hicoachmike/
Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/@hicoachmike
https://www.facebook.com/hicoachmike
https://www.instagram.com/hicoachmike
Transcript
Well, hello and welcome back, my friend, uh, this week, Jonah Primo's joining me.
Speaker:And Jonah's got an amazing story of being able to find the resilience,
Speaker:finding, you know, when you're in that place of chronic pain, right?
Speaker:That long-term pain, you may or may not have like a way to deal with it,
Speaker:but it's going to be something that is going to impact us, and Jonah has.
Speaker:Found a path back to being healthy physically and mentally.
Speaker:Um, you know, not looking and going, Hey, I'm, you know, I'm the victim here.
Speaker:Wo is me.
Speaker:Jonah has taken things into his own hands, and I really want you to see the hope that
Speaker:can come from those unexpected situations.
Speaker:You know, and, and you're not just left alone, nor are you left helpless.
Speaker:So Jonah's got a very inspiring story, very relatable story where
Speaker:it's kind of one of those of like, oh my gosh, Jonah, come on.
Speaker:Like, are you reading my mail?
Speaker:So, super excited to get in with Jonah.
Speaker:Jonah, how are you doing today, my friend?
Speaker:I'm doing really well, Mike.
Speaker:Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker:It's great to be here.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:Happy to, to jump in here and, and talk about this because you and I have
Speaker:done a little chatting beforehand and it's like, man, there is so much that
Speaker:just I. Resonates and I can connect with in your story because it's like we
Speaker:all have challenges that we face, man.
Speaker:But um, you know, when we're not talking, when we're not sharing what we've gone
Speaker:through and what, you know, where we're at, um, we can kind of feel isolated and
Speaker:just, uh, you know, one against the world.
Speaker:So it's lonely.
Speaker:Being
Speaker:sick is lonely.
Speaker:Oh, totally, dude.
Speaker:Especially when it's like you're in your head all day and you're facing.
Speaker:Those thoughts, man.
Speaker:And sometimes they are super challenging and just, you know, worst case scenario
Speaker:I would say, you know, like, um, it just, yeah, lonely is a great way to put it.
Speaker:Joan.
Speaker:Well, let's jump off and, and start in with what does life
Speaker:look like for you today on the professional side of things, man?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Well, I have the.
Speaker:Incredible privilege of being able to PO podcast full time professionally.
Speaker:And, you know, I write and I, I write music and these were all things that
Speaker:I, I always wanted to do and always wanted to make work, and they're
Speaker:working, which means that I get to, you know, wake up excited for the day.
Speaker:And, uh, that's awesome.
Speaker:Yeah, and I, I, uh, I play a whole bunch of sport.
Speaker:I train all the time.
Speaker:You know, I'm living my, I'm living my best life, but I had to, you know, enter
Speaker:into the abyss to, to come out of it.
Speaker:So,
Speaker:yeah, I can understand that.
Speaker:Well, what about on the personal side of things?
Speaker:What does that look like for you?
Speaker:Yeah, well again, it's just, uh, things are good, but they're good
Speaker:because of a lot of work and a lot of practice, um, in the philosophy space.
Speaker:I've been studying and reading for nearly 10 years in the mindfulness
Speaker:space, about six or seven.
Speaker:And there's been a lot of meditation.
Speaker:There's been a lot of interviews.
Speaker:I've talked to a lot of great, uh, neuroscientists and, uh, you know,
Speaker:gurus, monks, Sam Harris, uh, RIA, like some fantastic people have had
Speaker:the privilege of interviewing and, uh.
Speaker:It's every time I do, I learn something.
Speaker:I learn something about the human condition, and I learn something
Speaker:about, uh, how, how to live a good life, how to live a moral life, and
Speaker:how to live a life where I limit my pain only to the unavoidable suffering.
Speaker:And I don't lump in.
Speaker:That unnecessary suffering on top of it.
Speaker:You know, we're very good at adding in a whole bunch of unnecessary
Speaker:suffering because something bad happens.
Speaker:Okay?
Speaker:So we all go through bad things.
Speaker:Life throws us punches, but then we ruminate.
Speaker:We're anxious, we're fearful.
Speaker:We think about the past.
Speaker:We think about what's gonna happen in the future, and there's a whole extra
Speaker:pile of suffering that we don't need.
Speaker:And so I guess.
Speaker:Things personally are good because more and more I'm able to limit things
Speaker:at just the unavoidable suffering
Speaker:man.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And that's very different, like the path that you had gotten to Jonah.
Speaker:I, I mean, there's a big transition there.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, let's, let's start out from like where things were because it's like, dude, you
Speaker:were playing soccer, you were running.
Speaker:Life was on course, you know, kind of as planned and then healthwise.
Speaker:Things kind of just unexpectedly took a hiccup and that really
Speaker:derailed things quickly.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Can you kind of take us back and, and share what happened and.
Speaker:Like how disruptive life got for you.
Speaker:Of course, Mike.
Speaker:Yeah, sure.
Speaker:So basically, you know, as you said, I was a very active person.
Speaker:I was extremely fit.
Speaker:I have never been good at sitting still.
Speaker:I, you know, would run four times a week, rack up, you know, a hundred Ks.
Speaker:I'd play soccer three times a week.
Speaker:I was just moving all the time.
Speaker:Um, and I assumed that that meant that I was a healthy person, but.
Speaker:I was actually quite wrong about that, as I, I I've seen in hindsight, I
Speaker:was healthy physically, but not, not mentally at all, not mentally at all.
Speaker:Um, and basically a combination of a few things happened.
Speaker:I, I got, COVID wasn't the biggest deal.
Speaker:Um, this was, this was like five years ago.
Speaker:I got COVID.
Speaker:And then, um, right after COVID maybe about.
Speaker:Two weeks after I first got it, I went on 130 kilometer hike with
Speaker:packs, which is about 80 miles.
Speaker:Just a long walk, five nights.
Speaker:And then right after that, I got the worst flu I've ever had in my life.
Speaker:And between those three things, you know, it, it, it just took a lot outta me.
Speaker:It took a lot outta me.
Speaker:I assumed that was normal.
Speaker:It sounds normal when you do a lot of activity and you get sick
Speaker:twice in a short amount of time.
Speaker:So I was like, okay, what I'll do is I'll do what any sort of active
Speaker:health conscious person does.
Speaker:Quit alcohol for a month, drink vegetables, smoothies, rest, take a few
Speaker:weeks off, um, you know, running, but.
Speaker:Nothing got better.
Speaker:So I, I was having these sort of daily headaches, I was getting dizzy.
Speaker:Uh, I had no energy.
Speaker:And no matter what I did in the health world, I wasn't improving.
Speaker:If anything, I was, I was getting sicker.
Speaker:And, you know, I, it got to the point where I was just like, you know, I
Speaker:kept trying to start my life up again without dealing with my sickness.
Speaker:So I'd go, okay guys, I'm fine.
Speaker:I'll come on in game day.
Speaker:But then like 15 minutes in I'd, I'd have to substitute myself.
Speaker:And, um, you know, I kept trying to run and I'd just be wheezing and
Speaker:coughing and trying to push through it and being like, no, you can do this.
Speaker:You can do this.
Speaker:But it, but I couldn't.
Speaker:I couldn't.
Speaker:So I went to, uh, some gps, you know, uh, doctors, and they couldn't figure out.
Speaker:What was up, they sent me to some neurologists, some cardiologists.
Speaker:I did blood tests, scans, MRIs.
Speaker:Didn't have a brain tumor, didn't have a problem with my heart.
Speaker:Uh, but I had, you know, very low white blood cell count.
Speaker:And this was around the time where doctors and stuff were starting to talk about
Speaker:long COVID or COVID long hauling, but they didn't really know what that meant.
Speaker:Uh, so they said, look.
Speaker:We don't know what's wrong with you.
Speaker:We don't know how to treat you, and we don't know how
Speaker:long you're gonna be sick for.
Speaker:We think you have long COVID, but we don't really know what that means.
Speaker:So I got diagnosed with essentially a disease that nobody understood, and I'd
Speaker:say that was the worst thing that could ever happen because I was essentially
Speaker:left, left thinking I had a vague.
Speaker:Serious disease that could encompass any symptom and had no
Speaker:clear or tested route to recovery.
Speaker:So my unconscious mind had this blank canvas to paint whatever dark
Speaker:picture of suffering it wanted to.
Speaker:I started
Speaker:seeing everything as evidence that I was getting sicker because my mind was
Speaker:playing tricks on me, and I was sick, like I was having migraines every single day.
Speaker:I was dizzy.
Speaker:I had no idea what to look for.
Speaker:I had nothing to hope because no one could give me any hope.
Speaker:And so I looked for everything.
Speaker:Everything was evidence that things were getting worse.
Speaker:I had nothing to clinging onto.
Speaker:So in order to try and recover, my doctors were saying, rest more, rest, more, rest.
Speaker:More drugs, benzos, strong stuff, migraine stuff, and.
Speaker:What happens when you get into these dark sort of cycles of thinking
Speaker:you're sick, believing you're sick and believing you're getting sicker,
Speaker:is that your world contracts?
Speaker:It gets smaller and smaller and smaller.
Speaker:So, you know, gave up alcohol, fine, gave up caffeine, then I gave up
Speaker:sport, then I stopped gonna parties, then I stopped working and this was
Speaker:all in an attempt to recover, but.
Speaker:Eventually you just become someone who barely exists.
Speaker:You're a ghost.
Speaker:You're just a ghost in your room.
Speaker:And I mean, I'm contracting this story, but this, this is obviously
Speaker:over the course of a year.
Speaker:This is a long, steady decline.
Speaker:And I'd say my, uh, my rock bottom was when I, you know, I
Speaker:got up one day feeling inspired.
Speaker:I got up one day feeling inspired and I was like, you know what?
Speaker:I'm a fit guy.
Speaker:I don't care what anyone says.
Speaker:I'm a fit young person.
Speaker:I am going to at least walk around the block to prove that
Speaker:I can do something of value.
Speaker:And my, my house has, uh, this big slope.
Speaker:So I walked down the hill and I turned around and I looked back up
Speaker:and it looked like Mount Everest.
Speaker:This was a tiny hill.
Speaker:Now, like I realized in that point, you know, I'm running like sub 40.
Speaker:10 Ks and I can't go up a hill like, what's going on?
Speaker:This is, this is how far I've fallen.
Speaker:No, I'm gonna climb this hill.
Speaker:So I started walking up this hill and the dizziness, the migraines kicked in
Speaker:and I felt, and I realized I couldn't get up and I didn't know what to do.
Speaker:I was in broad daylight and I couldn't get up.
Speaker:A tiny little hill.
Speaker:And so I crawled, I crawled up this hill on my hands and knees.
Speaker:People like people must have thought I was on some crazy drugs or whatever,
Speaker:but this was just me trying to do the most basic human thing just to walk.
Speaker:And I crawled through the gate, up the stairs into my bed, and I decided that
Speaker:there, I'm gonna stay in bed forever.
Speaker:I'm gonna call off my engagement.
Speaker:I am too pathetic.
Speaker:I'm a burden, I'm a waste of space.
Speaker:I've had enough.
Speaker:I'm gonna sit here and read and watch TV for the rest of my life.
Speaker:I don't care.
Speaker:I'll just get disability checks.
Speaker:I don't care.
Speaker:I'm like, I'm over it.
Speaker:So that's basically the, you know, the bottom of the parabola.
Speaker:That's where the, the arc goes.
Speaker:But that's, that's how bad it got.
Speaker:Um, and my life became nothing.
Speaker:I can relate with the, the frustration in there, Jonah, and I know on my
Speaker:side, like I'm not running a hundred Ks, haven't gotten there yet.
Speaker:But, but it's like, there is that frustration when, you
Speaker:know, I'm running a 5K, right?
Speaker:Mm. And my knee pain comes and it's.
Speaker:Give me a break.
Speaker:Like, I know I've been able to do this.
Speaker:What's wrong?
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Pull it together, Mike, so you're frustrated at yourself, but there's
Speaker:also, I know for me, there's like this almost expected performance, like
Speaker:mm-hmm.
Speaker:I feel like others are looking at me and expecting me to perform
Speaker:at a certain level and I can't.
Speaker:So there's that shame.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:What kind of emotions we're, we're going through that 'cause I mean, you're
Speaker:retracting Jonah, like you're pulling away from not just society, but you're looking
Speaker:at saying, I'm done with my engagement.
Speaker:What kind of emotions were like taking hold of you at that time?
Speaker:I think you've put it really well, Mike.
Speaker:I mean, shame is a big one.
Speaker:It's, you know, if, if you care about sport and you can't perform for your team.
Speaker:You feel shame.
Speaker:And then as things get worse when you are not able to drive yourself
Speaker:to an appointment, like when we, we moved houses and I wasn't able to help
Speaker:carry the couch, I wasn't able to do anything and I just was like looking
Speaker:at my fiance who just spent who.
Speaker:Days doing all the housework, doing on top of her job, like doing everything.
Speaker:And I'm just like sitting there watching TV while the world happens
Speaker:around me and people are caring for me.
Speaker:I was lucky that I had a good network, but it doesn't matter.
Speaker:You've, I don't, I didn't want the network.
Speaker:I just wanted to be left to kind of rot away like it is.
Speaker:The shame is so strong that.
Speaker:You have to sense that you are pathetic.
Speaker:You are, you are pathetic.
Speaker:And there's, uh, I think you summed it up well.
Speaker:Well, and so in, in going from there, Jonah, like that can feel
Speaker:like your identity, you know, like when you lose a job, right?
Speaker:You're kind of at the crossroad of now, who am I?
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:When that chronic pain comes along.
Speaker:How do you determine who you are?
Speaker:I mean, did it, did it almost become one of those of this is just who I am
Speaker:and I'm as you said, like I'm pathetic or was there something beyond that?
Speaker:It's a great question because it was when I started associating myself in this
Speaker:with people in the chronic pain world.
Speaker:I realized I needed to fight back.
Speaker:I remember I went on, uh, some discord forum and it was for people with
Speaker:chronic pain and like, you know, there's nothing, there's nothing
Speaker:wrong with people who, uh, you know, find support, work support networks.
Speaker:That's great.
Speaker:But I went on to this and everyone was just talking about their pain all
Speaker:the time, and I realized that it had become their entire personalities.
Speaker:And it was just about like, you know, finding a way to drink this
Speaker:random herbal tea that maybe you feel a bit of relief or whatever.
Speaker:It, like, their whole lives became this and they were just
Speaker:sitting on the internet what?
Speaker:Smoking weed and chatting about, you know, obscure health remedies.
Speaker:And, and I, and I realized like, I don't think that.
Speaker:I wanna be one of these people just yet.
Speaker:I'm not ready.
Speaker:I'm not ready to say my life is chronic pain and I'm not
Speaker:ready to completely give up.
Speaker:Even though there were days where I gave up, there was something in me that just
Speaker:said, no, you know, you are, you're 27.
Speaker:There's more to life than this.
Speaker:There has to be, you need to find a way.
Speaker:It's too early to call it.
Speaker:So, yeah.
Speaker:And was that, 'cause I'm, I'm sitting here thinking, Jonah, that's a long
Speaker:time to kind of be like looking at, Hey, I'm gonna be bedridden.
Speaker:How do you stand up and fight when it's like you've been fighting and you
Speaker:feel like you've been knocked down?
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And it's like, I'm not gonna be identified by this, this challenge that I'm facing.
Speaker:I. I'm not gonna just sit here and relinquish my life, but instead I'm gonna
Speaker:fight and I'm gonna figure this out.
Speaker:Like how did you find the strength to start that fight and not like you were
Speaker:talking about holding onto the identity like other people you saw online doing?
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So the first step was, I will, I'm gonna change my medical team.
Speaker:I'm gonna change all of them.
Speaker:I'm gonna get a new neurologist.
Speaker:I'm gonna get a new cardiologist and just see if there are
Speaker:different opinions out there.
Speaker:And I did get a new neurologist.
Speaker:She was really, uh, a dizziness specialist and I'd seen all this
Speaker:cool stuff about her online.
Speaker:She seemed to have a slightly different vibe and.
Speaker:I went and chatted to her and I was like, look, this is the situation.
Speaker:And I told her my story about crawling up this hill.
Speaker:And I was like, it's the worst thing that ever happened to me to be, to
Speaker:be publicly humiliated like that, to crawl up a hill in broad daylight.
Speaker:It's the worst thing that ever happened to me.
Speaker:And she said, then, and there, look at me in the eyes.
Speaker:She said, okay, you're gonna try again tomorrow.
Speaker:I said, what?
Speaker:What?
Speaker:Are you insane?
Speaker:Are you, are you completely insane?
Speaker:I just told you this was the worst thing that ever happened to me.
Speaker:And she said.
Speaker:Did it kill you?
Speaker:And I said, well, I guess it didn't literally die.
Speaker:It killed me emotionally.
Speaker:And she said, so it didn't kill you, so try again.
Speaker:And if you fall over, you fall over.
Speaker:And if you have to crawl again, you have to crawl again.
Speaker:And if you have a terrible migraine because of it, you
Speaker:have a terrible migraine.
Speaker:It's the worst day of your life.
Speaker:It's the worst day of your life.
Speaker:You've survived the worst day of your life before you'll survive it again.
Speaker:So go, go out there.
Speaker:And she said.
Speaker:I don't want you to live in fear of pain.
Speaker:I want you to accept the pain and live the way you want to.
Speaker:She said, I'm cutting you off on all the benzos, the anti
Speaker:anxieties, the migraine medication.
Speaker:She said, I'm cutting you off.
Speaker:You're too younger.
Speaker:you're already addicted.
Speaker:Um, enough's enough and we need to.
Speaker:Draw back.
Speaker:You need to start being a strong, young person again.
Speaker:And you have pain, you have chronic pain, you have migraines every day.
Speaker:It's crippling.
Speaker:I know it's crippling, but go out there and have a party.
Speaker:Go out there, drink.
Speaker:Drink a beer.
Speaker:You know, have a coffee, like try and live your life a little bit.
Speaker:And if you need to lie down in the middle of a party, lie down in the middle of
Speaker:a party, just stop avoiding everything and start living with the suffering.
Speaker:So that was a huge turning point for me because I was like, okay, I'm gonna go
Speaker:to this dinner party, I'm gonna go to this wedding, and I'll just take an hour
Speaker:or two out when I, when the pain gets too bad, as opposed to not going at all.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:That is a full 180 degree different perspective on things.
Speaker:So the next day comes.
Speaker:She has told you go out and do exactly what happened on your worst day.
Speaker:How did, how did it go coming back up the hill?
Speaker:What didn't go well?
Speaker:I mean, I couldn't do it.
Speaker:I couldn't do it, and I was back on my hands and knees.
Speaker:But the difference was I had made some small degree of progress and I knew that.
Speaker:I knew that.
Speaker:I knew that I was gonna just keep trying.
Speaker:Until I could get up it and I was gonna try and walk around
Speaker:my garden, and then every time I tried it, it triggered a migraine.
Speaker:I ended up in bed for four hours, but I'd got a couple of steps further and I walked
Speaker:a couple more times around my garden.
Speaker:Like I slowly was aggregating these.
Speaker:Achievements these they had become, because I'd been, this is
Speaker:now like, again, like I've been doing nothing for six months.
Speaker:So walking around the garden is suddenly exciting and walking
Speaker:around twice is incredibly exciting.
Speaker:And I was like, okay, so there's progress.
Speaker:And I'd go to a party and I'd have to go lie down after a couple of hours.
Speaker:But hey, I was at a party for a couple of hours.
Speaker:The old me never turned up in the first place.
Speaker:Every time I did this, I made some degree of progress.
Speaker:And you know, there's a couple of other things that I hope we talk
Speaker:about, but you scale up incremental progress over a year and a half.
Speaker:All of a sudden, you're a normal person again.
Speaker:That's the one thing.
Speaker:It's like, you know, I don't want to be normal.
Speaker:We fight so hard not to be normal, and now we're wanting to be normal.
Speaker:I
Speaker:know, I know.
Speaker:When that becomes the goal, you're, you know, you've,
Speaker:you've been in the dark place.
Speaker:before you went to see her, sounds like, you know, the beginning of
Speaker:the journey, it was almost like this decline as far as physical ability.
Speaker:Then you're starting kind of from like bottom Jonah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Where it's like, I haven't done anything.
Speaker:So it sounds like almost on the physical side, you had more of a challenge, like
Speaker:after you saw her and she put that, you know, kind of, uh, just gave it
Speaker:to you, to you straight to your face.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Of go do it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's not gonna kill you.
Speaker:It doesn't sound like it was a physical thing that really changed, and in
Speaker:fact, you probably had more adversity or more of a challenge to overcome.
Speaker:Was it a, a change in like your perspective, your mindset?
Speaker:Hope?
Speaker:Like what helped you to see things that I'm going to see this incremental progress
Speaker:as a good thing instead of like what I can't do, I'm seeing what I can do.
Speaker:What changed?
Speaker:Well, Mike.
Speaker:You've, you've summed it up perfectly with the word hope.
Speaker:She gave me hope.
Speaker:She said, we are gonna build you back up.
Speaker:She didn't say rest.
Speaker:She didn't say, try this different drug.
Speaker:She said, we're going to, we're gonna pull this off.
Speaker:So there was suddenly this degree of belief that I could come full circle to,
Speaker:to who I wanted to be without necessarily knowing what the actual disease I had was.
Speaker:It's it.
Speaker:She wasn't concerned with what I actually had.
Speaker:She just accepted I had what I had.
Speaker:She didn't know how to fix it, but we're gonna try and give me a life worth living.
Speaker:And so there was hope.
Speaker:And again, I changed all these sort of.
Speaker:Things about my medical team, like I went to a dizziness therapist.
Speaker:I'd never heard of that.
Speaker:In fact, I just wasn't interested in therapy.
Speaker:I just didn't think I needed it, a classic line.
Speaker:Um, but I went to a, a dizziness therapist who started explaining the science of
Speaker:these dizziness attacks that I was having, and she sort of showed me this diagram
Speaker:of my brain and said, you're living in a state of constant fight or flight.
Speaker:You're constantly looking.
Speaker:For signs that a migraine starting everything to you is a threat, and
Speaker:you're actually living in your amygdala, which is the, the part of your brain
Speaker:that's responsible for fight or flight, and it's sending these shock waves
Speaker:through your sympathetic nervous system.
Speaker:And the way that the sympathetic nervous system works is it draws energy from the
Speaker:parasympathetic nervous system, which is responsible for things like balance.
Speaker:Digestion.
Speaker:And so when you don't have energy in the parasympathetic nervous system
Speaker:and you have it in the sympathetic nervous system, of course you feel sick.
Speaker:Of course, you can't balance, there's no energy there for your body's basic
Speaker:functions for just the regular faculties.
Speaker:And as I found, as I started to learn this, it helped me understand
Speaker:that when I was having a vertigo attack, like a dizziness attack, I.
Speaker:If I just recognized that I was panicking instead of thinking
Speaker:about all these things, oh, this is gonna be the rest of my life.
Speaker:I'm never gonna be able to stand up.
Speaker:Look how far I've fallen from grace, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker:If I just go, okay, you're panicking, you're dizzy, then you stop panicking
Speaker:and you become a little less dizzy.
Speaker:And so the energy sort of goes back to those basic functions like
Speaker:balance, and then you can balance.
Speaker:So it actually started to reduce my symptoms, and that's
Speaker:an entire mental journey.
Speaker:That's not a, there's no drug there.
Speaker:That's just a mental journey.
Speaker:So between that and the fact that I'm realizing I can have
Speaker:some kind of semblance of a life through my neurologist.
Speaker:I'm starting to have, again, these improvements each day and I'll,
Speaker:I'll talk about one more thing, which was really important to me.
Speaker:The thing that maybe triggered searching for a new team and, and
Speaker:looking for this, this new way of life, and that was gratitude.
Speaker:Gratitude and philosophy.
Speaker:I studied a lot of philosophy in this time and I realized that.
Speaker:Despite where I was and despite the fact that I felt like my life wasn't worth
Speaker:living in a relative sense, I still had an incredibly privileged and great life.
Speaker:I mean, there's people with chronic pain in the middle of war zones.
Speaker:What the hell do they do?
Speaker:I am in a rich country with, you know.
Speaker:Almost all my healthcare was free.
Speaker:I have this network of people who care about me, who want me to feel
Speaker:better, so I have friends, I have family, I have access to specialists.
Speaker:I have all this stuff to be thankful for.
Speaker:And hey, even when I can't walk around the garden, I could sit in the garden and
Speaker:look at a beautiful blue Australian sky.
Speaker:Listen to the birds chirping.
Speaker:There is so much to be thankful for.
Speaker:There is so much life to be lived.
Speaker:Even if it's not the life I planned for myself, it could be a hell of a lot worse.
Speaker:And when I stopped having this endless pity party and started being really
Speaker:grateful, all of a sudden, again, the symptoms come down a little bit.
Speaker:They just do.
Speaker:They just do.
Speaker:It's like magic.
Speaker:I find it really interesting.
Speaker:It's not like you're.
Speaker:Negating or saying this, this health challenge isn't here.
Speaker:You're doing it in spite of it, and you're looking for the things
Speaker:that you can do, to celebrate.
Speaker:I know gratitude is, is there, but I, I guess in my mind, I'm like looking
Speaker:at, Hey, this week I took three more steps than I would've before.
Speaker:Dude, when you couldn't take those three steps before, that
Speaker:that is a reason to celebrate.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:what are you doing that is helping you from like the, the gratitude
Speaker:and the philosophical side?
Speaker:Um, I know you've also, you know, mindfulness was a big thing for you.
Speaker:What are you doing that's.
Speaker:Kind of suppressing or turning away from the fight or flight and being,
Speaker:you know, like, oh my God, there's a tiger, you know, to, Hey, I'm at peace.
Speaker:I'm calm.
Speaker:I'm not worrying about the fact of I'm gonna have a migraine.
Speaker:I'm gonna feel all these things.
Speaker:Um, like what are you doing to set yourself up for success?
Speaker:In the knowing that yes, this is gonna be a challenge, you're still, you're
Speaker:still betting on yourself, Jonah.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Well, it's funny you say mindfulness, because mindfulness
Speaker:is the top of the umbrella.
Speaker:Mindfulness is what allows you to fight back against your thoughts.
Speaker:So if I'm having a pity party, I can't access the gratitude unless I'm mindful
Speaker:that I'm feeling sorry for myself.
Speaker:So mindfulness is how you go.
Speaker:I'm having this thought that I'm a failure.
Speaker:I'm having this thought that I'm pathetic.
Speaker:I'm having this thought that I'll never be able to live a proper
Speaker:life any thought that I have.
Speaker:The faster you can recognize that you're having a negative thought,
Speaker:the faster you can use something from your toolkit to combat that thought.
Speaker:And now the power of that is from philosophical to attitude.
Speaker:Too physical.
Speaker:So if you're having a panic attack, that's a physical experience.
Speaker:But mindfulness allows you to notice you're having a panic attack and
Speaker:say, I'm having a panic attack.
Speaker:Instead of what you do when you're having a panic attack,
Speaker:which is thinking, I'm dying.
Speaker:I'm gonna die right now.
Speaker:And it doesn't matter what anyone else says, you know?
Speaker:I mean, people who've had panic attacks, I'm sure there's lots listening.
Speaker:You can have a panic attack when you've had one.
Speaker:When you, when you have your first one, it really does feel like a problem.
Speaker:When you have your 200th one in front of your wife, she just says you're having a
Speaker:panic attack, and you go, no, I'm dying.
Speaker:This time's real.
Speaker:Call an ambulance this time.
Speaker:It's real.
Speaker:But you need to be able to get to a point where you can be your own
Speaker:wife in that sense and just say you are having a panic attack.
Speaker:Take a step back.
Speaker:It's going to pass.
Speaker:If you, if you're in a situation where you go, I'll never be
Speaker:able to live a good life.
Speaker:If you're mindful, you can go.
Speaker:That's a, that's a negative thought.
Speaker:That's something passing through me.
Speaker:I'll just wait till it goes.
Speaker:It's not helping me.
Speaker:I'm thinking about the future.
Speaker:I could be enjoying the clouds passing over me.
Speaker:I could be enjoying my kids, you know, wanting to play with me.
Speaker:I could be enjoying all these things that are happening right now.
Speaker:All these beautiful, wonderful things that happening right now.
Speaker:You need to be able to recognize that.
Speaker:You're thinking about the past or the future, or you're being
Speaker:negative or you're angry or anxious.
Speaker:If you can't recognize that, then you have no hope.
Speaker:Then you are the thought.
Speaker:So yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's a powerful thing, but unfortunately it takes a little
Speaker:bit of work to get good at.
Speaker:You know, as I said, I've been meditating for a long time, so I had a predisposition
Speaker:to being able to tap into this.
Speaker:I lost a lot of that meditation.
Speaker:Like in fact, the time I've meditated the least was when I was in this dark
Speaker:place, but I was meditating before that.
Speaker:When I got back into it.
Speaker:I had some of this muscle memory already, and meditating helps you
Speaker:get better and faster at recognizing that you are having a thought.
Speaker:We spend most of our life in a thought as opposed to experiencing the present.
Speaker:We're just walking around.
Speaker:We're going in the shops.
Speaker:You can go to the shops, you can see nothing.
Speaker:You can just be in your head the entire time and you come back, you can drive.
Speaker:I've driven to another city and just realized I'm in another city
Speaker:and I'm like, I don't remember any of the experience of driving here.
Speaker:I was just thinking about work the whole time.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You're just grateful.
Speaker:That's, that's one of those gratitude practices of, thank you.
Speaker:That I stayed on the road, I didn't hit anybody.
Speaker:You know, it's like I zombie drove to where I'm
Speaker:at.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:But if you, if you, if you meditate a little bit and you don't have to
Speaker:meditate for a long time, but if you just start to practice recognizing your own
Speaker:conscious experience, you'll be able to turn off this endless tap of negativity.
Speaker:and I want to kind of plug into that meditation aspect here in just a moment.
Speaker:I want to ask one question first, and I know Jonah, like when I'm
Speaker:in pain, it's like I almost forget about the world and how I am, my
Speaker:experiences are impacting it, right?
Speaker:My wife, my children, coworkers, friends.
Speaker:Everybody around me is, is being impacted by what I'm going through.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Great insight.
Speaker:You shared
Speaker:at one point that Izzy, who's your wife now, when she was your fiance,
Speaker:like, Hey, I'm gonna go lay on the bed.
Speaker:I'm just done.
Speaker:I'm calling it off.
Speaker:She doesn't need to go through this.
Speaker:You know, she, she stuck it out, man.
Speaker:Like when you look at your relationship along the path.
Speaker:When you were kind of going through it and hit that low spot to where you're at now,
Speaker:like how do you see the differences in how your struggles then impacted Izzy and
Speaker:the relationship between the two of you?
Speaker:Yeah, I mean, I'm incredibly lucky that I had someone who was willing
Speaker:to support me through all of this.
Speaker:I mean, again, like the generosity.
Speaker:To just drive me to the appointments and more than the actual work,
Speaker:to just listen to me all the time talking about how much I'm suffering.
Speaker:That that's actually, you know, we used to have great conversations.
Speaker:We used to talk about philosophy.
Speaker:We used to watch movies.
Speaker:We used to, people watch and laugh about stuff, and the only thing that I
Speaker:could talk about was the pain I was in.
Speaker:It was my only, it was my only level.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So, you know, again, that's something to recognize.
Speaker:You are not that nice to be around when you are just your thoughts and our,
Speaker:something that that's, that's important to me is like the concept of identity,
Speaker:but the fact that our identity is flowing so you know, we can become people.
Speaker:Who we don't wanna be, who don't resemble anything that we've
Speaker:ever imagined ourselves to being.
Speaker:We can just float into these personalities.
Speaker:But the same is true on the other side.
Speaker:You can float right out of them.
Speaker:You don't have to be the person who's always negative.
Speaker:You don't have to be the person who's always complaining.
Speaker:All of that is malleable.
Speaker:The human brain is incredibly elastic and you can flow with.
Speaker:The reality of who you are and just be present with who you are.
Speaker:You can aspire to new things and truly believe you can become
Speaker:those new things, it's possible.
Speaker:So now we do have a great relationship and we we're back to doing all
Speaker:the things that we love doing.
Speaker:But, but I was a different person and I really mean that.
Speaker:Like I was not the same person around my family, around Izzy, around my friends.
Speaker:I was no fun, fun at all.
Speaker:And I, and I get it, like it's impossible to be, it's, it's hard.
Speaker:Be fun when you're in pain because pain is a very.
Speaker:Very unpleasant sensation.
Speaker:It's very difficult to be in pain.
Speaker:Well, and you know, people take that differently.
Speaker:Like I was a fairly outgoing person, so my friends really struggled with this new
Speaker:version of Jonah, this version of Jonah, who is, is so, is so negative and so
Speaker:dark and who doesn't turn up to things.
Speaker:I used to host things.
Speaker:I don't now.
Speaker:I don't even go to them.
Speaker:And so it's, you know, there's a degree to which.
Speaker:You want them to understand, and if they don't understand, which they might not,
Speaker:are you gonna be bitter and resentful or are you gonna go, they don't understand.
Speaker:That's okay.
Speaker:I'm gonna just keep trying to be the person that aligns with my values.
Speaker:I'm gonna be friendly, I'm gonna be energetic, I'm gonna
Speaker:be as energetic as I can be.
Speaker:I'm gonna make a joke now or that now and then, even though.
Speaker:What's happening in my head is a huge amount of pain.
Speaker:I'm gonna go li lie down, but laugh at myself for it.
Speaker:I'm not gonna go, I can't believe I'm here.
Speaker:Everybody turn off the sound.
Speaker:I'm gonna go, ah, migraine hit again.
Speaker:I'm gonna bed.
Speaker:Catch you in an hour.
Speaker:That kind of thing.
Speaker:You know, there's so many different ways you can have the exact same
Speaker:situation and just react a little differently, but you have to practice it.
Speaker:It's like anything.
Speaker:You have to practice it.
Speaker:You have to practice being who you want to be or you won't.
Speaker:It doesn't happen automatically.
Speaker:And I'm gonna kind of go back and overlay the fact of celebrating what
Speaker:you're able to do because it's like, that I imagine was what kept you going
Speaker:to have this different relationship with Jonah or with, uh, Izzy.
Speaker:Well, it's, it's, it's a different, well, you do have a different relationship.
Speaker:Yeah, I was like, well, actually you do have a different relationship with Jonah.
Speaker:It's like, because when you're in the midst of it and that pain is front and
Speaker:center, very different relationship than where you are now where you
Speaker:have hope and you're persevering.
Speaker:we talked about meditation for a moment there.
Speaker:How has the meditation helped you, or rather, let me ask you this, Jonah.
Speaker:If you've got somebody that's out there that's in that spot of like,
Speaker:I can't see beyond my pain, Jonah.
Speaker:It's overwhelming.
Speaker:This is what feels like my identity.
Speaker:How would meditation, you know, be able to help them?
Speaker:You said that was kind of the one thing you overlooked in using at that time.
Speaker:If somebody's new to it, how can they jump in and.
Speaker:Practice it and start finding that hope and that gratitude and being able
Speaker:to identify themselves differently.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And not stay there.
Speaker:There's, there's a few different ways.
Speaker:I'll start with one, this concept of impermanence.
Speaker:So if you are in constant pain like I was, so you wake up, you've got a
Speaker:headache, you go to sleep, you've got a headache, it never, ever dissipates.
Speaker:What you can start to do.
Speaker:Is notice that it's not always the same level of pain.
Speaker:once you notice that and you're having a really extreme flare up, you can go at
Speaker:some point this won't be quite as bad.
Speaker:You know that the extremeness of your pain will pass because nobody
Speaker:is outta 10 out of 10 all day.
Speaker:So you just start to notice little things like that.
Speaker:Then you start to believe the fact that, okay, there is nuance to this.
Speaker:So I don't have to be thinking of myself as someone who's
Speaker:always in constant terrible pain.
Speaker:I can think of myself as someone who's sometimes in constant terrible
Speaker:pain and sometimes in bearable pain.
Speaker:Then when you're in bearable pain, you can meditate on that too.
Speaker:You can be curious about it.
Speaker:You can go.
Speaker:What is this pain like?
Speaker:Where am I feeling it?
Speaker:What are its characteristics?
Speaker:Does it make me hot or cold?
Speaker:Is it piercing or throbbing?
Speaker:So you just explore it with curiosity.
Speaker:And curiosity is a neutral or positive emotion.
Speaker:And so you stop connecting pain with negativity.
Speaker:So you don't wanna go, I'm thinking about this pain.
Speaker:It sucks so much, and that's.
Speaker:My lens, it's a negative lens.
Speaker:You go, okay, maybe, maybe this pain is interesting.
Speaker:Maybe I can learn something about where it's coming from.
Speaker:Maybe I can explore this experience.
Speaker:So that's what you can do while you're in pain.
Speaker:I.
Speaker:The other thing you can do while you're in pain is focus on any sensation
Speaker:that's present along with the pain.
Speaker:Maybe there's a fan blowing on you.
Speaker:Maybe there's a sun ray shining on you.
Speaker:Maybe you can hear a dog barking or a bird chirping.
Speaker:Like there's other things to explore.
Speaker:There's other sensations, and the final thing you can do
Speaker:is just watch your thoughts.
Speaker:In fact, this is the most important thing you can do.
Speaker:You can just go, I'm having a terrible day.
Speaker:Oh, I. I just thought that you can watch that.
Speaker:You can just, you can be a third party.
Speaker:You don't have to be you.
Speaker:You can just watch the fact that things are going through your
Speaker:head and you just sit there.
Speaker:I mean, if you are in as much pain as I was, and I'm sure a lot of people
Speaker:are, you've got time on your hands.
Speaker:That's the one thing you've got.
Speaker:You've got a bit of time on your hands.
Speaker:You can just sit there and watch thoughts pass, and every time you say something
Speaker:extremely damaging, extremely negative, extremely pessimistic, just notice it.
Speaker:Doing this is very powerful, but you should also do it when you're not in as
Speaker:much pain because that's how you build the muscle of recognition, of noticing.
Speaker:So that is a big thing you can do.
Speaker:Just believe that it'll pass at some point.
Speaker:Even if it only passes through different magnitudes as opposed to going away
Speaker:altogether and notice everything.
Speaker:Notice the properties of the pain, notice the properties of your thoughts
Speaker:and notice, yeah, the properties of even what you're thinking about your thoughts.
Speaker:You can keep on going up these different levels.
Speaker:Just explore, try and have fun with it.
Speaker:It sounds stupid, but it is possible.
Speaker:Yeah, I think it's matter of believing in.
Speaker:The possibility, you know, that hope that there is something different than what we
Speaker:feel we're re relegated to and is gonna be, you know, stand forever in time.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:You, you identify as less than because of what you're experiencing, and
Speaker:that becomes like, almost like the poster child of your life, right?
Speaker:The limiting factor.
Speaker:But dude, Jonah, I love the fact that it's like you have talked about.
Speaker:Looking for the progress, however minuscule, holding
Speaker:onto it, being grateful for it.
Speaker:Not identifying as you know, what's being held back, but living life
Speaker:in the moment for whatever you can.
Speaker:And again, being grateful and celebrating in that.
Speaker:And then if I could just
Speaker:quickly say, I mean, when you said living, living, living life as much as you can.
Speaker:I mean, that was a huge.
Speaker:Change in attitude because I stopped being like, I need this
Speaker:pain to go away to live my life.
Speaker:I decided to stubbornly live my life in spite of the pain and when
Speaker:you accept that you have pain and that you can live a life with pain.
Speaker:Then you don't have all this unnecessary suffering that comes
Speaker:with wanting it to go away.
Speaker:When you stop wanting it to go away, it frees you up to actually enjoy your life.
Speaker:And I mean, the core part of my story, I don't know if I've made it obvious
Speaker:on this podcast, but I'm in zero pain.
Speaker:I had two years of daily headaches from morning till night.
Speaker:I'm in zero pain now, I don't know if that can happen with
Speaker:every type of chronic pain.
Speaker:I know that there's tons and tons and tons of recovery stories and
Speaker:success stories across thousands of different types of pain.
Speaker:Um, and all of these people have been doing similar things to me.
Speaker:So this is a tried and true method.
Speaker:I didn't invent this.
Speaker:It's called the mind body connection.
Speaker:Um, it can't cure cancer.
Speaker:It can't get rid of a brain tumor.
Speaker:It can completely and utterly change the quality of your life.
Speaker:Um, and my success story is, you know, I've gone from, I've gone down
Speaker:to zero, but a lot of people have gone down to 20% of what they had, or
Speaker:15% of what you had, what they had.
Speaker:And that's, that's incredible, right?
Speaker:Like there is no type of pain that you can't reduce because you're
Speaker:changing the way that your brain.
Speaker:Is responding.
Speaker:You're changing the, the way that the pain signals are interacting.
Speaker:So it doesn't matter what you have, your brain realizes you're not
Speaker:gonna listen to those pain signals and it has this Pavlovian effect.
Speaker:It just learns.
Speaker:It's a habit.
Speaker:It stops sending the pain signals if they don't do anything.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:there's a big, big shift when you change your perspective,
Speaker:your emotions, your just.
Speaker:Everything, your posture, your body, everything changes.
Speaker:And uh, dude, the fact for two years, it's like, it was unexpected and it
Speaker:was all encompassing at one point.
Speaker:To now after intentional steps and celebrating along the way, being
Speaker:grateful for what there is, um, you know, to be at zero, I mean.
Speaker:Dude, Jonah, even to like improve by 20%, like you said,
Speaker:and this is without medication.
Speaker:I only got worse on medication.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You're not supposed to tell us that.
Speaker:That's, that's one of the doctors don't want you to tell 'em without,
Speaker:you know, any prescriptions.
Speaker:It's like, hey, this, this is possible.
Speaker:Is it gonna be your story?
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:But until you take that first step,
Speaker:what have you got to lose?
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:And begin acting.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:A hundred percent.
Speaker:Dude, Jonah, there is so much more that we could talk about and so much like, um,
Speaker:hope that is still wrapped up in, in both.
Speaker:Your journey out and what you're doing today.
Speaker:I mean, the whole thing.
Speaker:Um, if guys are wanting to dig in deeper, how can they connect with
Speaker:you to, you know, see what you're doing to kind of hear more of your
Speaker:story and then to see like, Hey, how, how did you actually do this?
Speaker:What's the step by step, Jonah?
Speaker:How can they connect with you?
Speaker:So I have a podcast called The Over Examined Life, where I have these
Speaker:kind of stories that I tell for 10 minutes twice a week, and every
Speaker:single story has a philosophy.
Speaker:From a great thinker built into it.
Speaker:And the idea is it's an everyday situation.
Speaker:Maybe it's a fight with your spouse, maybe someone hits, you know, rear ends
Speaker:your car, their everyday situations with philosophies of resilience,
Speaker:positivity, um, and joy as tools.
Speaker:To combat the negativity that comes with it.
Speaker:And again, we talk about everything.
Speaker:We talk about financial distress, whatever anyone's going through.
Speaker:There's some great thinker out there who's gone through the same thing and
Speaker:found a way to enjoy their life anyway.
Speaker:And we also do interviews with, you know, really some of the most incredible
Speaker:people like neuroscientists, PhD philosophers, Buddhist monks who have
Speaker:lived on mountains for 30 years, like.
Speaker:Some very, very, some very, very cool people, um, who, who are
Speaker:just thinking about the human condition and how to navigate it.
Speaker:That's awesome.
Speaker:Jonah, thank you so much for sharing your story and giving us hope that you know,
Speaker:when those challenges are in front of us.
Speaker:And it's all we see.
Speaker:That's not all there is.
Speaker:So thank you for giving us the hope to continue pushing on, uh, despite
Speaker:what we've experienced and knowing that there is more available to us.
Speaker:So thank you very much my friend,
Speaker:and thank you, Mike.
Speaker:I mean, I really appreciate what you're doing.
Speaker:You're helping a lot of people and it's, uh.
Speaker:It's a great reason to do something like this.
Speaker:Your project is a very good one.
Speaker:I appreciate it, thank you, my friend.
