Reddit reviews The Chronic Pain Care Workbook: A Self-Treatment Approach to Pain Relief Using the Behavioral Assessment of Pain Questionnaire (A New Harbinger Self-help Workbook)

I am trying it at the moment. Previously I have read about pacing and thought "that's not for me, it sounds stupid, my back actually has something wrong with it so I have to be 'fixed' first". Then in the last few months I have realised that it's time to accept that I have chronic pain that is not going away and that I should start treating it like chronic pain, not acute pain that's been present for 3.5 years.

There are 3 books I have read that I found really helpful : Explain Pain, Living with Chronic Pain and The Pain Care Workbook

Explain Pain probably has the simplest description of pacing. As does the 3rd book, which along with the 2nd has good info on how to cope emotionally with chronic pain.
Another pacing resource is here

Two things I have learnt:

1. Pacing- to start with, see how much of a particular activity you can do before your pain flares. For me I chose walking, and I could do about 15-20 mins before I would get pain. You can try it 3 times and get an average. Then you set up a plan to start doing shorter walks (eg for 10 mins) regularly, and increasing the time slowly (for me it is 5 mins per week but I could do it slower if I got a backlash). This is a big contrast to my previous 'boom and bust' method where I would go out and walk for an hour then be sore for 2-3 days then do no walking for 3 weeks then do an hour again. Pacing up so slowly is boring and I feel stupid, compared to running 12k I used to, walking around the block then resting seems lame. But I am doing well and stating positive.
   
   
2. Your emotions definitely alter your brain's production of pain signals. If you're familiar with the gate theory of pain, I read a good quote somewhere "negative emotions open the gate for pain, and positive emotions close it". I am addressing the negative thoughts I have about pain (a lot if "oh I've screwed it up, now I'll be in pain for the rest of the week and it will be terrible and I'm a bad person") and trying to change the way I'm thinking using CBT.
   
   
   I'm also meditating and exploring different guided meditations specific to pain management (quite a few available on a you tube search for free). I hate meditating and will make any excuse to get out of it but it does relax me. I think CBT and relaxation can help a lot, even if it just helps to reduce distress associated with pain and not the pain itself. Also, muscle tension that goes along with frustration, anxiety, and worry makes me hurt more. So improving my mood and relaxing my muscles makes sense.
   
   
   Anyway, good luck with it, I hope this is of some help!