Chronic Pain Recovery: 5 Common Mistakes and How to Retrain Your Brain

Simple, powerful shifts to help you retrain your brain, reconnect with your body, and reclaim your life

Photo by Daniel Hering on Unsplash

If you've done the stretches, seen all the specialists, tried all the treatments—yet the pain is still here—you’re not alone. I’ve been there too. I spent years doing all the "right" things, except the ones that actually helped. What I needed wasn’t more pressure or perfection. I needed a different map.

In this article, I’ll walk you through five common mistakes that keep people stuck in chronic pain—and the five powerful mindset and nervous system shifts that helped me (and many of my clients) go from feeling trapped in their bodies to finally feeling free.

1. Mistaking Stretching for Relaxing

You’ve probably been told to stretch for your pain. And maybe it helps - for a while. But when we stretch as a way to "fix" pain—especially with force or held breath—our nervous system might interpret that as a threat.

The result? The body tightens more. The pain increases. And you're stuck in a loop.

What to Do Instead:

Shift from stretching to soothing. Try gentle movement, guided by your breath. Let the intensity stay below 4 out of 10. Visualise the tight area as melting ice or soft clay. Tell your body: "It’s safe to soften."

This isn’t about fixing the body. It’s about creating a felt sense of safety - and that’s what calms the perception of pain.

2. Believing Pain Means Injury

This one is huge: If I feel pain, something must be wrong with my body.

But pain isn't a damage detector - it's a protector. Your brain creates pain when it believes you are in danger. And that belief can be based on past experiences, fear, or stress—not current injury.

What to Do Instead:

Start to reframe pain as protection, not harm. Say to yourself: "Pain equals protection, not damage."

This calms the alarm system in your brain. Over time, your nervous system can unlearn the fear that keeps pain alive.

3. Thinking Pain Comes from the Body, Not the Brain

It’s normal to think chronic pain must come from something "wrong" in your body. But research shows that pain is actually created in the brain, based on signals and context.

Imagine your body as a messenger. It sends sensations to the brain. But it’s your brain that decides what those sensations mean. Is this safe? Or dangerous?

What to Do Instead:

Talk to the control centre. When you feel pain, visualise your brain as a control room receiving messages from the body. Then gently tell it: "Thank you for trying to protect me. But I am safe now."

Practices like somatic tracking and Pain Reprocessing Therapy teach your brain to reinterpret signals with curiosity instead of fear—turning the volume down on pain.

4. Catastrophising

"This will never go away. I’m broken. I’ll always be like this."

These thoughts don’t just feel terrible - they send danger signals to the brain. And when your brain thinks you're in danger, it turns the pain up to protect you.

What to Do Instead: The 4-Step SHIFT Practice

1. Spot the Thought – "I’m thinking this will never get better."

2. Hold it Lightly – "Is that really true? Or just fear talking? Is it beneficial or useful for me to continue to think this?”

3. Invite the Body In – Shift your focus to a comfortable or neutral body sensation.

4. Follow the Joy – Do something small that brings lightness - listen to a song, sing, a sip of tea, a walk outside.

5. Bonus: Tell yourself the truth. "Pain is real, but it doesn’t mean I’m broken."

5. Expecting Healing to Be Linear

One good day, then a flare-up. Your brain panics: "It’s not working. I’m back to square one."

But healing isn’t a straight line. It’s more like a winding hike: hills, valleys, plateaus. Sometimes you revisit old pain with new tools - and that’s not failure. That’s integration.

What to Do Instead:

Redefine success. Don’t measure progress only by pain. Ask:

• Did I respond to discomfort with curiosity?

• Did I support my nervous system, even a little?

• Did I recover more quickly than before?

Every small shift matters. Like tending a seed, progress starts invisibly, below the surface. Keep watering. Keep trusting.

You Are Not Broken

If you’ve seen yourself in any of these five mistakes, you’re not doing it wrong. You’re just missing a few key pieces of the puzzle.

Pain is real. But so is recovery. And it starts not with pushing harder, but with listening more gently. With understanding your brain and your nervous system are doing their best to protect you. And with showing them, one moment at a time, that it's safe to feel something new.

You don’t need to do it perfectly. You just need to begin.

💬 Which of these five shifts speak to you the most? Share in the comments below.

📩 Want more mind-body tools and science-backed practices? Subscribe to my newsletter for weekly support on your healing journey.

If you’d like support on your journey, I’d love to hear from you. Feel free to reach out, and we can have a friendly chat to see if my personalised approach is the right fit for you.