Do Individuals with Injuries Perceive the World Differently?
"Every time I get injured and climb with pain, I remember how wonderful it is to climb without anxiety or fear, and how great it is to move freely." - Miho Nonaka
This article initially started out as a few notes I made as an intern many years ago but has since morphed into an editorial on the importance of pacing and goal setting. It can be said that a clinician’s mind views the world in a detached way, such that it fails to see what the patient sees.
Do injuries affect how we view the world moving around us? Yes! Our visual experiences are not constant, rather they ebb and flow depending on how we internally perceive the readiness of our bodies to move. Evidence from neuroscience reveals that one’s perception of their physical body impacts their physical experience. This initially seems confusing and ambiguous but, simply put, if you have more energy moving from point A to B, it will seem easier. If you feel tired, no amount of reinforcement or persuasion can change the fact that the world looks harder to you to move in. This cognitive inertia may explain why some people have such a difficult time exercising despite understanding all the health consequences of being sedentary or injured.
If we can agree that pain is how one perceives the world based on the interpretation of their physical experiences we can understand why different athletes recover in very different time frames.
Why can’t people just exercise and heal? Because the world looks harder to them.
Looks are indeed deceiving and that’s because it is influenced by our unconscious needs and desires. Vision makes up the majority of our brain’s real estate. It uses more neurons and circuitry than all our other senses. We can do all sorts of weird visual illusions but the guiding principle is that the human species evolved to prioritize vision over anything else. It allowed us to identify venomous snakes, the flicker of fires, things that kept our species alive. Visual illusions are often an emotional and shocking topic because it defies all of our previous expectations. The brain evolved to accept that seeing is believing, we accept that what we see is what reality truly is, until it gets proven wrong. Think of moving in a strobe light, frame by frame, everything feels slower. Or think about how fast everything seems to move when you are stressed.
Why can’t people just exercise and heal? Because the brain is prioritizing pain over function.
An environment where the athlete was injured may increase the visual threat of pain, creating distractions and making recovery difficult. In a state of pain, it is preset to set someone up for failure. So start in a place that doesn’t draw the immediate attention of pain. Create small visual biases and goals that are desirable and set the mind and body free.
References:
1. Balcetis, E., & Dunning, D. (2010). Wishful seeing: More desired objects are seen as closer. Psychological science, 21(1), 147-152.
2. Balcetis, E., & Dunning, D. (2006). See what you want to see: motivational influences on visual perception. Journal of personality and social psychology, 91(4), 612.
3. https://www.hubermanlab.com/episode/dr-emily-balcetis-tools-for-setting-and-achieving-goals