Hypnosis and Pain: How the Brain Can Learn to Reduce Pain

Pain is essential for survival & a healthy body feels pain. The ability to feel pain allows the brain to detect threat, protect the body, and support healing. Without it, injury would go unnoticed.

The difficulty arises when pain continues beyond its usefulness.

Pain is not produced by tissues alone. Research in pain science shows that it is an experience created by the brain after it evaluates information from the body alongside memory, emotion, attention, and perceived threat. This is why pain does not always match the degree of physical damage and why it can persist even after tissues have healed (Moseley & Butler).

The experience of pain involves multiple brain regions working together. Sensory areas register physical input, while other networks add emotional meaning, expectation, and experience. These combined processes determine not only whether pain is felt, but how intense and distressing it becomes.

In chronic pain, the nervous system can become oversensitive. The brain learns to remain on high alert, producing pain even when protection is no longer helpful. This process, often described as central sensitisation, reflects a system doing its job too well for too long.

Hypnosis has science behind it. Brain imaging studies show that hypnosis can influence areas involved in pain perception, emotional regulation, and threat processing (Rainville et al.). In a focused and relaxed state, the brain becomes more receptive to updating its assessment of danger, allowing pain signals to reduce.

This approach does not dismiss pain or suggest it is imagined. Instead, it works with the brain’s natural capacity to adapt. When the nervous system no longer needs to stay on constant alert, pain often becomes less dominant.

Your brain has more power over pain than you might think.

Explore how hypnosis can support persistent pain.