“WHERE YOU LOOK AFFECTS HOW YOU FEEL”
WHAT IS BRAINSPOTTING?
Brainspotting is a trauma therapy that works with the deep brain and the body through its direct access to the autonomic and limbic systems within the body’s central nervous system. It is considered a treatment with profound psychological, emotional, and physical benefits.
This therapy gives us a tool to locate, process and release experiences that are typically out of reach of the conscious mind. These are things we often struggle to even put into thoughts and words.
Below you can watch a Q&A with Cynthia Schwartzberg and Lisa Terry about Brainspotting. Cynthia is the President of Southeast Brainspotting Institute and trained with the creator of Brainspotting David Grand. I had the privilege to train under Cynthia and learn so much from her!
It is theorized that Brainspotting taps into the body’s natural self-scanning abilities to process and release areas which are in a state of survival mode. This may also explain the ability of this therapy too often reduce and eliminate body pain and tension associated with physical conditions.
RESOLVING PHYSICAL & EMOTIONAL TRAUMA IN THE BODY
There is growing recognition within the healing professions that experiences of physical and/or emotional injury, acute and chronic pain, serious physical illness, dealing with difficult medical interventions, societal turmoil, environmental disaster and other problematic life events, will contribute to the development of a substantial build up of life trauma. That trauma is held in the body.
In most cases, the traumatized individual does not usually have the opportunity or the support to adequately process and integrate these traumatic life events. The traumatic experience then becomes a part of that individual’s trauma reservoir. The body and the psyche is heavily affected by the physical, energetic and emotional costs of this accumulated trauma. The medical and psychological literature now acknowledges that approximately 75% of requests for medical care are linked to the affects of this accumulation of stress and/or trauma in the body.
BRAINSPOTTING AS AN INTEGRATIVE TREATMENT APPROACH
Every health care professional encounters treatment situations in which physical symptoms cannot be separated from their emotional or psychological correlates. Traumatic life experiences, whether physical or emotional, are often significant contributing factors in the development and/or maintenance of most of the issues encountered in health care.
Brainspotting is a physiological therapeutic tool which can be integrated into a wide range of healing modalities. Brainspotting can be useful as a complement to various body-based therapies including advanced bodywork, chiropractic, acupuncture, somatic therapies, physical therapy, nursing, medicine, and other specialized approaches to physical healing. It is a valuable resource in the treatment of a wide range of medical, physical and psycho-emotional issues encountered by health professionals.
Brainspotting provides a tool for accessing, diagnosing, and treating a wide range of somatic and emotionally-based conditions.
BRAINSPOTTING AS A RESOURCE
Brainspotting is also very useful to access and develop internal resources. These resources allow the therapist and patient to “pendulate” between resource and trauma states during Brainspotting. The experience is more gradual and desensitization of intensely traumatic and emotionally charged issues is more tolerable.
Below, a client talks about his journey to healing from the effects of childhood trauma through Brainspotting.
