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This podcast is available on 4 platforms including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and more. You can also use the RSS feed directly.

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Pain Points with Max Shen

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by Max Shen

5.0(3 reviews)

14 episodes

Updated Daily

Accepts GuestsHas SponsorsLocation 🇺🇸

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Podcast Overview

Are you a brain in a body, or a body with a brain? What does the nervous system have to do with chronic pain? How do we 'debug' pain? Join Max as he explores the relationship between pain and insight. Featuring scientists, pioneers in somatic therapy, and those who have recovered from chronic pain. Max Shen is a pain researcher affiliated with MIT. He is also the creator of Debug Your Pain, a platform to teach skills in pain resolution. A production of Debug Your Pain. Read our latest at essays.debugyourpain.com <a href="https://essays.debugyourpain.com?utm_medium=podcast">essays.debugyourpain.com</a>

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🇺🇲

Publishing Since

4/5/2025

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🇺🇸 Charts #3

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Podcast Authority

Beta

PoorBased on show quality, social media presence, reviews, charts, and more

Quality42

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excellent

Episode Length

1h 10m

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Every 27 days

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Recent Episodes

June 13, 2026

Doug Tataryn on a Physiological Basis for Repression

Dr. Douglas J. Tataryn is a psychologist and researcher whose work spans hypnosis, emotion, chronic pain, meditation, and complementary medicine. He received his Ph.D. in clinical psychology in 1991 from the University of Arizona, then spent ten years as a research professor with the University of Manitoba, before entering private practice in 2001 to focus on his Bio-Emotive Framework. In this conversation we talk about a paper he wrote as an undergrad on the physiological basis of repression, why Doug still finds the triune brain model useful, the electrochemical case for meridian systems, how sadness moves through the body and what happens when it’s blocked, and three significant unpublished studies to which he hopes to finally return.Timestamps0:00:00 – Intro and Caveat0:06:00 – Writing the paper on repressed emotions0:09:40 – Muscle tension and cognition0:12:15 – How muscle tension suppresses emotion0:19:05 – Four core emotions and Doug’s triune brain framework0:22:05 – Defining emotion0:26:30 – Defending the usefulness of the triune brain model0:28:30 – Energy and meridians0:34:00 – Taoist ideas about qi, constriction, and emotional flow0:38:00 – Heart math and energetic transmission0:42:35 – Chronic pain from repressed emotion0:45:20 – Jhana as pain relief0:52:00 – The second arrow, pain asymbolia, and the affective component1:00:00 – The relaxation response1:02:55 – Why tension doesn’t always become chronic pain1:05:30 – How sadness moves through the body1:09:55 – Role of culture in expressions of pain1:15:00 – The emotional meaning of typing1:20:10 – Returning to unpublished research1:31:50 – Leaving and returning to academia1:37:00 – An offering on psychological interventions for the reduction of painLinks* <a target="_blank" href="https://bioemotiveframework.com/">Douglas J. Tataryn’s website</a>* <a target="_blank" href="https://bioemotiveframework.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/BEF_dougs_1983_paper_on_emotions_muscles_and_the_cortex_-_ocr.pdf">1983 paper: A Physiological Basis for Repression</a>* <a target="_blank" href="https://deconstructingyourself.com/meditation-emotions-bio-emotive-framework-douglas-tataryn.html">Interview on the Deconstructing Yourself podcast</a>* <a target="_blank" href="https://bioemotiveframework.com/summer-intensives/">Doug Tatryn’s Summer program on emotions</a> This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit <a href="https://essays.debugyourpain.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1">essays.debugyourpain.com</a>

June 11, 2026

Gay Hendricks on somatics, Sarno, and the Yes Breath

Gay Hendricks is a psychologist, somatic practitioner, and author of dozens of books including Conscious Loving and Conscious Breathing. After earning his PhD at Stanford and teaching psychology at the University of Colorado, Gay went on to develop his own approach integrating breathwork, movement, emotional awareness, and conscious relationship practice. In this conversation we talk about his entry into somatics through a painful Rolfing session, his connection to Sarno’s anger-pain model, how fear and sadness require different approaches than anger, and Gay even leads a live demonstration of the “yes breath”. Timestamps0:00:00 – Intro0:01:05 – Tashi Lhunpo Monastery0:03:30 – Buddhism: Tibetan, Theravada, TM0:05:40 – Feldenkrais, Reich, and Rolf0:08:30 – John Sarno and the anger-pain connection0:14:10 – Working with sadness vs fear0:16:00 – Tension in breathwork0:18:35 – Reich vs Feldenkrais, grounded breathwork0:23:05 – Live breathwork demonstration0:29:55 – Thirty years of radiance0:34:55 – Live body language reading0:39:20 – Learning how to see0:42:35 – Tuning your instrument0:46:20 – Research, science, and learning from individual cases0:50:20 – Wonder0:54:20 – Getting into altered states of consciousnessYou can find Gay Hendricks at his <a target="_blank" href="https://hendricks.com/">website </a>and check out his books, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.amazon.com/Conscious-Loving-Co-Commitment-Gay-Hendricks/dp/0553354116">Conscious Loving</a> and <a target="_blank" href="https://www.amazon.com/Big-Leap-Conquer-Hidden-Level/dp/0061735361">The Big Leap</a>. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit <a href="https://essays.debugyourpain.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1">essays.debugyourpain.com</a>

May 21, 2026

Simon Cox on the Subtle Body

Simon Cox is a scholar and practitioner whose work traces the history of the subtle body across Taoist, Tibetan, medical, alchemical, and Western esoteric traditions. He studied history at Oxford, spent six years training in a Taoist context at Wudang Mountain, and later wrote his dissertation at Rice on the genealogy of the subtle body. In this conversation, we talk about internal maps of the body, Taoist and Tibetan somatic cartographies, the challenges of translating contemplative practice across cultures, and how different ways of inhabiting the body may open into different experiences of reality. Toward the end, we touch on the ontology of pain, cultural differences in interoception, and embodied cognition.Timestamps00:00:00 – Intro and Background Context00:03:50 – Development of Internal Maps00:08:00 – The Neijing Tu and Practice-Based Internal Cartography00:11:30 – Porting Taoist Practice to the West00:14:00 – Qigong, Neigong, and Modern Chinese Practice Categories00:17:20 – Taoist Diversity and Tibetan Subtle Body Maps00:21:10 – Medical vs. Spiritual Maps00:25:10 – Paradigms, Tibetan Medicine, and the Three Turnings00:27:30 – Two Unsatisfying Views of the Subtle Body00:32:20 – Novel and Inevitable Syncretisms 00:35:00 – Historicizing and Genealogies00:38:10 – Reality, Truth, and Embodiment00:40:00 – Awareness, Inhabiting the Body, and Taoist Theories of Mind00:43:20 – The Mind Outside the Body00:46:00 – Fate, Ancestors, Purpose, and Lines of Affinity00:49:00 – Polyontology, Political vs. Policing, Frequency Resonance00:54:20 – Esalen, Western Somatics, and Theory vs. Practice00:56:50 – Paradigm Shift, New Materialisms, Distributed Agency/Intelligence01:00:50 – Ontological Pluralism and Eurocentrism01:05:30 – Mutual Vulnerable Knowing and Minds Knowing Minds01:09:30 – How Scientists and Technologists Can Contribute, and The Ontological Turn01:15:10 – Embodied Mathematicians01:20:00 – Technology with Different Ontologies, Tsien Hsue-shen, Cybernetics01:26:30 – A Genealogy of Pain01:31:20 – Ontology of Pain, Christian Suffering vs. Buddhist Suffering01:35:00 – Biocultural Disease and the Social Transmission of Pain01:40:00 – Simon’s Current Projects: Esalen, Harvard, Energy, and Qi01:43:10 – Eugene Gendlin and Therapeutic Process<a target="_blank" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNlty7pppzE">Excellent interview</a> with Simon Cox on The Integral Stage where they actually talk more about the subtle body as a term.<a target="_blank" href="https://www.amazon.com/Subtle-Body-Genealogy-WESTERN-ESOTERICISM/dp/019758103X">The Subtle Body: A Genealogy</a> by Simon Cox This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit <a href="https://essays.debugyourpain.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1">essays.debugyourpain.com</a>

14 total episodes available

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Frequently asked questions

Have a different question and can't find the answer you're looking for? Reach out to our support team by sending us an email and we'll get back to you as soon as we can.

What is Pain Points with Max Shen?: Are you a brain in a body, or a body with a brain? What does the nervous system have to do with chronic pain? How do we 'debug' pain?

Join Max as he explores the relationship between pain and insight. Featuring scientists, pioneers in somatic therapy, and those who have recovered from chronic pain.

Max Shen is a pain researcher affiliated with MIT. He is also the creator of Debug Your Pain, a platform to teach skills in pain resolution.

A production of Debug Your Pain. Read our latest at essays.debugyourpain.com <a href="https://essays.debugyourpain.com?utm_medium=podcast">essays.debugyourpain.com</a>
How often does this podcast release new episodes?: This podcast updates daily.
Where can I listen to this podcast?: This podcast is available on 4 platforms including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and more. You can also use the RSS feed directly.
Does this podcast accept guests?: Yes, this podcast regularly features guests.

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