Novelty is king when it comes to moving with less pain. There’s some pretty cool brain chemistry at play in this. Dopamine is released in the brain when we encounter something novel. It’s like a messenger to the rest of the brain saying “Hey everybody, wake up and pay attention. This is something new.”

Novelty is so useful because it is something you don’t yet have an impression of. In pain, you keep encountering movements that give the impression of danger and thus the response of protection. Novel movements give us a window of opportunity to create a new impression.