The Missing Link to Lasting Chronic Pain Relief
How We Discovered that Your Body's Brain and Nervous System is the Key to Effectively Eliminating Chronic Pain
The goal of Saint Bartholomew’s is to prove to you that the Central Nervous System is the key to effectively eliminate chronic pain and to provide a clear strategy anyone can use to create lasting pain relief.
“To be honest,” she said to me, “This is a Hail Mary.”
With tears in her eyes, she told me that she was out of options and nearly out of hope.
She had already been to dozens of “specialists,” and agreed to even more procedures and methods that promised to eliminate her pain.
It had been over a decade of this and she was finally taking matters into her own hands to try and find help.
This is how she ended up in my office.
This is how most people end up in my office.
How I Discovered This
I grew up dreaming of playing in the NBA.
Michael Jordan, Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant were my heroes.
I remember sitting at a basketball camp when I was in the sixth grade and one of the high school coaches stood up in front of the camp to tell us the secret of how to make it to the NBA.
I leaned in.
“If you want to make the NBA,” he started, “You can’t go to the beach with your friends. You can’t even go to the movies with them.”
“If you want to make it to the NBA, you have to work longer and harder than anyone else.”
In that hot gymnasium back in 1999, I made the decision to follow that blueprint.
Starting that afternoon and continuing for the next ten years, I did exactly that.
I never went to the beach with my friends. I never went to the movies with them either.
Every day, I would go outside and do my basketball drills with the conviction that I was going to make it to the NBA.
I didn’t make it.
In 2016, I did make it to the NBA as a Strength and Conditioning Coach and what I saw surprised me.
None of the guys who got there had followed the blueprint that I was taught.
In fact, it seemed like they all did the complete opposite.
They didn’t train that hard. Their nutrition was a disaster and yet, here they were performing jaw-dropping feats of athleticism in front of 20,000 people and millions more on national television.
I began to wonder what I had missed.
Getting My Wires Crossed
What fascinated me the most, was how these guys could stand in front of all those cheering fans and calmly sink a free-throw.
When I was in college, standing at the free-throw line in front of a few dozen fans, it felt like the weight of the world was on my shoulders.
I would be so nervous that I would just pray that I didn’t embarrass myself.
But these guys, had real pressure, and millions of dollars on the line, and seemed like they were merely shooting hoops in their backyard with no one watching.
My fear of failure had grown to a point that it prevented me from accessing all the skills I had built in those long hours of training.
While the NBA guys, were loose as a goose and free to use all their talent.
It was clear to me that the wiring in my brain was different than the wiring in theirs. So I began to study neuroscience to figure it out.
My Epiphany
I became obsessed with mastering my own brain.
Selfishly, I was trying to figure out where I went wrong and what could I have done to not get so nervous during games.
I began enrolling in college neuroscience courses.
I started pouring through literal textbooks on neuroanatomy, psychology and even some ancient medicine practices that claimed to be able to manipulate the brain.
It became exceptionally clear to me that the brain held some sort of master key to the rest of the body.
And for athletes, if you couldn’t unlock that door, the brain would stiffen the body and prevent you from tapping into your full athletic potential.
The Biggest Obstacle to Chronic Pain Relief
When I left professional sports, I started my own chronic pain clinic.
The thing I enjoyed most about being a Strength and Conditioning Coach in sports was helping the athletes out of pain.
When a guy would come in twenty minutes before a game with bad shoulder pain and I could wipe it out quickly, that’s what filled my cup the most.
Naturally, I aspired to be able to help others in the same way.
But when I started seeing clients, a familiar problem appeared.
I started seeing the same neurological roadblock. Only this time, it wasn’t preventing them from playing basketball, it was preventing them from getting out of pain.
How it Works
In its optimal setting, your body moves smoothly and loosely. Your skeleton flows beautifully from one side to the to other as you walk down the street.
Until a grizzly bear jumps out in front of you.
Your brain, recognizing the danger, activates the fight-or-flight system, and prepares you to either fight or run away.
Once activated, the fight-or-flight system stiffens the body, shuts down your peripheral vision and even turns off unnecessary processes like digestion to divert all resources to dealing with this emergency.
As complex as the brain might seem, it’s actually quite simple.
For all stressful inputs, the brain reacts in the same way.
That means when you’re stressed about meeting a deadline at work, your body is reacting as if it is fighting a literal grizzly bear.
The threat doesn’t even have to be real.
You can think your way into activating the fight-or-flight response.
Fear, anxiety, stress, low self-confidence and worry will all keep the body in emergency mode.
And as long as that system is running, the body cannot return to it’s optimal function.
If you are in pain, the body can’t get out of it.
See For Yourself
Imagine for a moment, that you decided that this was the missing link for you and you decided to come to my office to get an evaluation.
Once you arrived, the elevator doors opened to a beautiful, well-lit office and a smiling receptionist greeted you by name and offered you a complimentary beverage while you wait for your appointment to begin.
A few moments later, I pop out, well dressed and escort you to our state-of-the-art treatment room where we begin the assessment.
You might be thinking, “Wow, this is the real deal!”
Now imagine that those elevator doors opened to a dimly lit space that had a weird smell to it.
As you stood in the lobby, you didn’t see anyone at all.
“Am I in the right place?” you wonder.
Just then, I pop out from a door in baggy sweatpants, a shirt with a noticeable stain and what appears to be guacamole in the corner of my mouth.
And just to drive my point home, now imagine I say, “We can’t do the assessment here,” so we walk down the stairs, out onto the streets of New York City and I put the treatment table directly in the middle of the busy intersection.
As you lay down on this table, I begin the assessment.
But imagine what would be going through your mind. Imagine how you would be feeling.
Would you be loose or tense?
Would you be calm or anxious?
Would I be able to accurately assess what’s going on with your body?
Absolutely not! Because the brain is activating the fight-or-flight response and preventing access to your loose, fluid and optimal movement ability.
The obvious first step would be to get the brain to relax. Or in this case, to go find another therapist!
The Mission
Conquering the brain is the greatest medical mystery humanity has ever wrestled with.
For thousands of years, researchers have poured billions of dollars into trying to figure this out and the best your doctor can come up with is, "have you tried meditation?”
But at Saint Bartholomew’s we have discovered the secret to unlocking the brain and creating lasting pain relief for even the most intense and stubborn symptoms.
The secret is a framework that we call “Bartholomew’s Garden” and our mission is to teach it to you and give you all the resources necessary to implement for yourself.
Read This Next:
Meet Sean Light: The Founder and President of Saint Bartholomew
Further Reading:
If you want to see how this framework is actually applied, I’ve documented it in my book. I’ll send you a complimentary copy here.