We feel pain. We say ouch--mentally or verbally. Then what happens? We get wrapped up in ways to resist pain. We start a mental dialogue about how we're going to deal with it (medication, ice, heat, rest, acupuncture, massage, magnetic therapy, etc.). Then, we get caught in thoughts and emotions:

Disappointment ("Now I can't go hiking.") Worry ("I hope it's nothing serious.") Fear ("What if it gets worse?") Anger ("Why is it hurting now? I already had surgery!") Depression ("What if I have to stop playing tennis?") Excitement ("I'm going into labor!")

Our resistance stirs up a lot more tension, resulting in a much more pronounced experience of pain. Worrying about pain really does make it worse.

This is where mindfulness comes in. By paying attention to thoughts and emotions that accompany pain, you can learn to separate these from sensation. Once you've done that, you can actually eliminate tension and see pain for what it is--and no more.

By seeing internal dialogue that comes with pain, you can learn to handle it skillfully and reduce your suffering.

The next time you feel pain, take a moment to focus on it. Watch your thoughts and emotions as they come up. Breathe. And go back to ouch.

Simple pain never felt so good.

Papers numbering in hundreds from eight different symposia have been written and presented on effects of CoQ10 on heart disease. International clinical studies have also been conducted in United States, Japan, Germany, Italy and Sweden. Together these studies and papers that have been derived from them demonstrate significant improvement in heart muscle function while causing no adverse effects.

One particular area of study involves diastolic dysfunction which is one of earliest signs of myocardial failure. Diastole is phase of cardiac cycle when heart is filled with returning blood. Because this phase requires more cellular energy than systolic phase (when blood is pushed out of heart) it is more dependent on CoQ10. Diastolic dysfunction is a stiffening of heart muscle which naturally restricts heart’s ability to pump. This condition is associated with many cardiac disorders. Hypertension is among these disorders. As heart muscles become stiff there is often a corresponding rise in blood pressure. When diastolic dysfunction is reversed, blood pressure tends to lower as well. In one study involving 109 patients with hypertension, CoQ10 supplementation was added to normal hypertension treatments. In an average of 4.4 months 51% of patients were able stop using at least one blood pressure lowering medication. Some were able to stop using up to three medications. Another study produced similar results. In that study 43% of 424 patients were able to stop using between one and three cardiovascular drugs because of CoQ10 supplementation.

These examples are just a drop in bucket. Diastolic dysfunction (and by proxy, hypertension) includes only a small sampling of heart conditions that respond favorably to CoQ10 supplementation. Other areas of research show great promise for CoQ10 treatments. Among these are cancer and AIDS. But such conditions are beyond scope of this essay. CoQ10 is essential to proper functioning of all cell types. It is not surprising, therefore, to find a diverse number of diseases that respond favorably to CoQ10 supplementation. Since all metabolically active tissues are highly sensitive to CoQ10 deficiency, we can expect to see CoQ10 research expand to many other areas of chronic diseases.

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