Clean Pain/Dirty Pain
In ACT therapy, we use the concept of clean pain and dirty pain to help differentiate between pain and suffering. Clean pain represents the natural, normal emotional and physical response of pain. These are also known as our primary emotions. This could be the emotional response of anger or sadness or the physical experience of pain. By contrast, dirty pain represents the suffering we experience as a result of our thoughts. It is self-generated and self-perpetuating. The vast majority of our experiences of distress are caused by dirty pain. This could be due to judging our emotions or attempting not to feel them. The next time you are distressed, see if you can identify when you are engaging in dirty pain. What would it mean to let go of the judgment and truly let yourself connect with your feelings?