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April 9, 2010
Neurofeedback, Growth, and Habit
By lincoln stoller
I describe a holistic approach to changing addictive behaviors based on neurofeedback with elements common to the therapies of indigenous cultures. The transformative journey does not have to be terrifying, though it will be disturbing, confusing, and probably dangerous. Perhaps, in the end, it's not even a choice.
::::::::
Lincoln Stoller, Ph.D.
Copyright 2010, Tenger Research. LLC
I describe a holistic approach to changing addictive behaviors based on neurofeedback with elements common to the therapies of indigenous cultures.
"Your relationship to your psyche is like an addiction. It is constantly making demands of you, and you have devoted your life to serving those needs." 1
-- Michael A. Singer
We focus on learning about things, and
we're not accustomed to considering ourselves as things that need
learning about. We're taught to recognize problems and seek solutions,
not examine how we recognize, or what it is to seek. We take these
processes
for granted and assume they take care of themselves.
Autonomic processes, like breathing,
seeing, and hearing, are supposed to take care of themselves. Yet if
you examine these processes you'll find we habitually over breathe
-- raising blood alkalinity and depressing oxygenation2
-- misuse our visual system -- resulting in restricted awareness,
dulled perception, repressed emotion and degenerative vision3
-- and fail to listen as a conscious, active process -- resulting
in deficient hearing, speaking, reading, and communication4.
Even our heart's rhythm may require our attention to achieve healthy
variability5, not to mention the function of our bones,
joints,
and vascular systems, which also require participation.
So it should come as no surprise that
using our brains, and the myriad processes this involves, requires
attention
lest these processes fail to grow or maintain. Yet we have little
awareness
and practically no training in exploring, sensitizing, exercising, and
expanding our neural capacities.
Add to this the list of processes over
which we exert conscious control and struggle to manage, such as eating,
sleeping, moving, and planning our lives, and the workload becomes
overwhelming.
In the end we consider personal growth to be a luxury. It is no wonder
that we are fall apart as we age, and that our societies do too.
You cannot consciously monitor every
process, system, and function in your body, but you are aware and do
monitor them semi-consciously. Maintaining and enhancing your health
is not accomplished by juggling more balls, but by juggling less. Use
your attention to train these semi-autonomic systems -- your senses,
metabolism, and cognition -- and they will take care of themselves,
like the skilled managers they are.
To enhance your life you need a deeper awareness of self, not just of your conscious mind and emotions. And you certainly don't need more facts. With awareness you can develop the acuity to sense and rebalance all the systems of which you are composed. It is not a conscious activity, but it is not an entirely unconscious one either. It exists in that middle realm of the subconscious, in which also resides spirit, love, insight, inspiration, healing, ancestry and culture.
How far does a person extend in time?
The forces that form one's personality extend over generations with
trauma passed down through the actions of parents, and though social
context. A person's strengths and weaknesses are a summation of their
individual and cultural conditions. You cannot isolate a person from
their culture, even those who are unaware that they are influenced by
their culture.
Of how many parts is a person composed?
Our emotions, inclinations, and presentations turn like gears in the
clockwork of our personalities. Some of one's guiding voices are quiet,
even unrecognized, yet they vie for control of the one person who most
of us think we are. This illusion of integrity breaks down under duress
where confusion is more a matter of dissociation than of indecision.
Who comes for therapy, what parts of them do not come, and what
constitutes
reintegration? As a therapist are you even speaking to the right
characters?
It is a mistake to think that you, as
one person interacting with another, are speaking with one voice. You
speak with many voices, some of which you are unaware. These elements
of your personal, family, and cultural character simultaneously interact
with similar elements in the character of others. Some of these voices
reflect habits and assumptions of which we are unconscious, and many
we could not recognize even if they were pointed out to us. They range
from spirits, to moods, traits and aptitudes, and while they are not
cataloged, some have electrical signatures that we glimpse in the EEG
brain waves.
Therapy is a growth and learning-oriented dialog that goes on within the mind of the person seeking growth and between their mind and the minds of those around them. Therapy strives for physical change, both within the body and in the environment, but the changing of minds is where it must begin. The critical changes occur in the seeker's mind, but you can instigate change if you can change your mind in such a way as to make clear the seeker's path. To do this you must grow yourself.
Enhancing your sensitivity and balance
is the first of two goals of feedback training. Think of yourself as
a smart car that is able to adjust its' own suspension. When the road
is rough the car raises its chassis and dampens its springs to ride
over rocks and ruts with less vibration and more control. When the road
is smooth the suspensions tightens and lowers for greater speed and
sensitivity. This system interacts with its environment, and to do this
successfully it must sense and respond to changes in the surface of
the road ahead.
You are an interactive system but you
are not a smart car, you are more like a poorly trained smart car. Where
a smart car always responds, you do not. Sometimes you go too slowly
on patches of smooth road letting your emotions oscillate when you
should
be focusing at a distance. At other times you're going too fast when
your life hits a rough spot and you'll be lucky to escape with only
a dent. The key to making you a smarter car is the improvement of your
sensitivity and your ability to change.
The second goal of feedback training
is developing new habits, and this is not so much an intervention as
it is a natural human ability. We are creatures of habit and live most
of our lives on autopilot. Most of what we call "free will" is little
more than a collection of learned behaviors.6
Autopilot is the artificial brain that allows the smart car to take care of itself. Autopilot is good when it works and leaves us with less to do, and with more room to think. Humans subconsciously develop and refine their autopilot functions, but they can only succeed to the extent that they're sensitive and able to adjust. The first part of feedback training serves to make a person more sensitive and flexible, the second part of feedback training relies on each person's subconscious ability to turn new responses into habit.
"In a time of peace the warlike
person attacks himself." 7
-- Friedrich Nietzsche
Addiction is autopilot gone awry, and
since we are all creatures of habit, we all have the potential for
addictive
behavior. In truth we're already addicted to our habits, and none
of our autopilot functions work perfectly. The autopilot functions in
many "healthy people" actually work pretty badly, but we've learned
to cope and what dysfunctions remain we label as disease. It's only
when our dysfunctions become socially disruptive and take on specific
characters that we assign the label of addiction. We all lie somewhere
on the addiction spectrum.
Addiction becomes a problem when it
appears
to fail as a behavior strategy. I say "appears" because internal
forces continue to support it. Without their support it would stop.
The negative view of addiction assumes that by removing the addiction
a better person can emerge. The truth of this depends on a balance of
forces. Removing the addiction without resolving its cause is only to
suppress it and a troubled person will emerge: unstable, neurotic, or
depressed.
Addiction is not a behavior of the
intentional
sort, it's a response to forces unrecognized and unmanaged. Addiction
persists because it plays an important role in the life of the person
who has chosen to be addicted.
The importance of an addiction can be measured by the damage that it causes. The addicted person is choosing the enemy that they know, rather than the enemy that they don't. This choice is not wholly conscious, and replacing it must involve processes that are not wholly conscious. Changing behavior involves subconscious processes.
"The only permanent solution to
your problems is to go inside and to let go of the part of you that
seems to have so many problems with reality."8
-- Michael A. Singer
Neurofeedback is being used as a therapy
for a wide range and growing number of clinical conditions.9
It has the simple goal of making one more sensitive and flexible in
developing one's aptitudes and expressing one's inner personalities.
Neurofeedback works because the mind is self-healing when it is not obstructed. Once one becomes deeply familiar and relaxed with alternative mental states, most of which are not conscious states, then other mental states can begin to replace dysfunctional states. How this happens remains a mystery, but by providing feedback to the brain we can facilitate its occurrence.
The notion of "mental states" is
not well defined and their origin is not well understood. But you don't
need a theoretical understanding of mental states if you appreciate
their effects on health, and have a means to direct them. The same is
true with the body's natural healing abilities: you don't need to
know how they work in order to facilitate them.
If you do not understand how mental
states
work in the healing process, then you should only facilitate and not
intervene. This assumption of a facilitating role, of listening and
helping rather than judging and controlling, is a critical distinction
between the homeostatic approach of neurofeedback and allopathic Western
approach.
The following description of
neurofeedback
illustrates that "hands off" is the most sensible approach. This
aims to remove your need to understand and your desire to interfere
that place obstacles in the way of the healing process.
We change our mental state frequently,
and we usually consider our mental state a consequence of outside
influences,
everything from our automobiles to the planets in the zodiac. The degree
to which we don't take responsibility for our state of mind is odd
considering how much we extol our fee will. Part of the explanation
for this is that we habitually interpret change within us as the
perception
of things outside of us, but another part of it is that we just don't
know how to regulate ourselves. This is where neurofeedback comes in.
Many of the states that we explore through neurofeedback are the same states we encounter in daily life. In addition neurofeedback invokes subconscious and intermediate states. Let's explore what this means.
We use our mental states as filters to
interpret the world, much as an eye chooses to seek and focus on an
image. We have an experience that sets our mood or state, but it is
more accurate to say that we call up a mood or state in order to
interact
with our environment in the manner that has become our habit.
Our mental state is involved with
processing
the world. That is to say our mental state plays a role in the
conversion
of perception to conception, to understanding, to action and reaction.
The brain is involved at each step through processes of which we are
only vaguely aware. These intermediary processes can range from being
well regulated to being poorly regulated.
Here is an example of filtering and
reinterpretation
from the field of statistical data analysis. The first of following
two images is a photograph of a car's license plate blurred by motion.
The second image is the same photograph after it's been digitally
analyzed.
The process of digital analysis uses assumptions of how noise and distortion appear in photographic images, but has no information about this particular image or the subject in the image. The clarity of the plate number is impressive, but notice the emergence of details of which there was no hint in the original. Our minds work in a similar manner to interpret what we perceive, only our mind has more layers, and applies more assumptions.
When we let the brain "watch" itself,
rather than watch things outside of itself, the brain gains a new level
of control. Lacking feedback is like trying to learn how to ride a
bicycle
on a dark, moonless night: you can't because you don't know where
you are or the effects of your actions. Neurofeedback turns on a light
so that your mind can see what it's doing. 30 years of research has
shown that it is quite easy for us to consciously change our brainwaves
as well as increase our brain's activity by being more aware of our
own thinking processes.11
Consider these examples of normal changes
in states of mind. Most people require some trigger to make these
changes
of state.
We engage in predominant ways of thinking
that limit our insight and flexibility. Some therapies, such as those
based on Jung's psychology of types, attempt to enlarge a person's
habitual response in order to provide greater insight into the world.12
We all experience moments of alternate consciousness, but they rarely
provide vantage points from which we can see a new world wholly formed.
The existence of different viewpoints
is no mystery. These viewpoints precede and guide our consciousness,
though we are marginally conscious of them. With practice we can control
these modes of thought and control how we react to unexpected forces,
rather than the other way around. This kind of control is primarily
preconscious and intuitive.
Our mind builds its mental state like
a circus family crossing a tightrope riding a pyramid of bicycles. We
cannot swap one underlying thought form for another without upsetting
the family of mind. And it's because the mind only presents itself
as a family that talk therapy has such difficulty in fully exploring
alternative points of view. In contrast, there are methods that
disassemble
this pyramid and enable the mind to explore itself freely, one bicycle
at a time, as it were. Two such methods are trance and neurofeedback.
The passive process of neurofeedback
encourages you to develop new brainwave patterns without resorting to
discussion; you create these new patterns with little conscious
reflection.
You are simply taught to reset your brainwave patterns and explore the
states that arise.13
The skill of a neurofeedback therapist
lies in guessing which states of mind are the most therapeutic, and
bringing them forth. It takes experience to succeed in coaching a client
to manifest their mental landscape.
The goal is to develop a set of states
that exclude "that part of you that seems to have so many problems
with reality." These develop out of the client's own repertoire
of states, but involve unfamiliar readjustments, the adjustment to
states
that they previously had not fully experienced, or which they denied
themselves access to because of anxious or traumatic associations. The
point is that one can do an end-run around trauma because neurofeedback
deals with raw brainwave patterns, and not the thoughts or memories
with which they're habitually associated.
For example, if a client is obsessed
with guilt or anger, then they will have little success in accommodating
a stable, comfortable mental state at the same time they are guilty
or angry. And because they cannot explore these comfortable states they
cannot become habituated to them. Neurofeedback can lead them around
their "issues" into a comfort zone. And once they have learned that
they can access this zone without first resolving these issues they
gain a new vantage point from which to consider these issues. More
likely,
the issues become irrelevant.
Neurofeedback enables you to relax, release, become sensitive to, and explore alternative states without engaging disturbing mental states. You might say that neurofeedback enables a person to change horses mid-stream because, for many people, there is no way out of the stream.
"The active ingredients in (Alpha-Theta) neurofeedback (include): " the new experience of physiological/psychological self-control in a situation where the client had previously felt helpless; (and) the apparent experience of " significant spiritual insight."14
-- Matthew Kelley
The Alpha-Theta neurofeedback protocol
used for the remediation of addiction was developed by E. Peniston and
P.J. Kulkosky in 1989.15 Six weeks of daily sessions of
neurofeedback
training involving inpatient "problem drinkers" has repeatedly been
shown to result in approximately 85% full or sustained partial remission
after three years.16 This compares with what we might project
to be 40% of the participants achieving the same outcome through
conventional
treatment.17 I will briefly describe what this therapy
entails.
Alpha-Theta, like other neurofeedback
protocols, is a form of EEG biofeedback. It's called "EEG" because
the client interacts with their own electroencephalograph. It's called
biofeedback because the client creates, perceives, interacts with, and
learns to readjust what they're simultaneously creating and perceiving.
An EEG is a simple graph of voltages read from one or more points on the scalp. The voltages vary over time and their graph shows an erratic line. Here is a typical EEG graph:
The first step in extracting useful
information
from the EEG is to decompose this signal into the range of frequencies
of which it is composed. This kind of decomposition can be done with
any signal of any sort and results in an EEG spectrogram that displays
a more structured picture of the brain's activity over time.
The spectrogram in Figure III
shows electrical activity as peaks and ridges across a range of
frequencies
from 0 to 20 cycles per second, or Hertz. This is a typical frequency
range of interest, but the map that emerges can differ greatly between
subjects.
Certain spectrograms are "normal"
for a person of a given age and state of mind. In particular, the
spectrogram
of an alert and focused person will show narrow peaks around 10 Hz.
Waves in this range are called alpha waves. The same person in a
hypnogogic
trance will show a broader ridge formation centered at the lower
frequency
of 5 Hz. These are known as theta waves.
The Alpha-Theta protocol is based on
the observation that we process trauma and achieve reconciliation when
we alternate between an alert state and a hypnogogic state. The protocol
is conducted by having the client lie comfortably for 45 minutes in
a dark room, hooked up to an EEG machine, listening to one or the other
of two ambient sound tracks. These two tracks alternate depending on
whether the client is generating more alpha waves or more theta waves.
These audio tracks provide feedback that
tells the client which of the two states is more strongly present, and
the client is encouraged to listen for and relax into a state in which
the two sound tracks alternate. The therapist does not interrupt this
process.
This protocol involves the therapist
directing the client's intentions, as it's important that the client
move toward a healing mental state. This can be anything from a
generally
positive to specifically healing frame of mind. The therapist uses
guided
imagery to lead the client into this state at the beginning of each
training session. This has much in common with the hypnotherapeutic
technique of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy, already applied in the
treatment of addiction.18
The hypnosis paradigm to "explore
preconscious
and unconscious functions, resolve historical factors, and utilize
unconscious
resources"19 has much in common with neurofeedback. In
most cases the fields use different procedures and terminology, but
the use of psychoanalytic terms and guided imagery make Alpha-Theta
the exception.20
While hypnotherapy is used to address
addiction in a context of other standard therapies, it has a broader
purpose when used with neurofeedback. Here the aim is to two-fold.
First,
along the standard lines it works to resolve the embedded trauma and
conditioned responses typically associated with addiction. In addition,
it contributes to the process of resynchronizing a wide range of brain
functions including attention, arousal, sensitivity, emotional balance,
cognitive function, and pattern and boundary recognition.
Alpha-Theta neurofeedback "has all the benefits of hypnosis because you're re-programming your subconscious mind, but with the added feature that hypnosis can't get to. It clears out the traumatic experiences that have put on the brakes on your ability to progress." 21
-- Dr. Daniel Staso
Hypnotically enhanced Alpha-Theta neurofeedback adduces relevant memories and subconscious states, at the same time encouraging an awake state and discouraging anxious and reactive states. There are several ways in which this treatment is similar to traditional healing therapies.
Addiction is a holistic disorder
involving
conscious and subconscious attitudes, central nervous system functions,
personal history, social history, and cultural context. Reductionist
Western healing rejects integration and thereby fails to provide a
holistic
approach. The shortcomings of this range from uncoordinated specialists
addressing complementary aspects of one's condition -- as in the
story of the blind men describing the elephant -- to entirely missing
the whole -- wherein the blind men cannot find the elephant. In this
case the elephant is one's whole spirit.
Neurofeedback is an integrative therapy that views addiction as requiring a change of one's person difficult to achieve solely through verbal means. Neurofeedback looks within the individual, below the levels of chemistry and personality, addressing the components of perception, regulation, and cognition.22 Neurofeedback aims to introduce the client to a person, or people, they do not know. The therapist does not know them either and cannot force the introduction. The therapist functions less as a doctor and more as a doorman.
Alpha/Theta relies on a patient's ability
to enter into, and benefit from relaxed states. People addicted to
stimulants
are not attracted to relaxed states and have trouble achieving them.
Alpha/Theta is unsuccessful when it is the only neurofeedback therapy
used for this group.
The neuropsychological explanation for
this is that stimulant addicts display excessive theta waves, and
enhancing
these signals through Alpha/Theta therapy is counter productive. In
addition, these people are observed to show below normal brainwave
activity
in higher frequencies, which correlates with their presentation of
ADD/ADHD-like
symptoms.
This mechanistic explanation implies
that if normal brainwave conditions can be restored, then people
addicted
to stimulants will benefit from Alpha/Theta therapy. This has been shown
to be true.
In a study by Scott, Othmer, Kaiser,
and Sideroff23 stimulant-addicted volunteers from a
residential
treatment program were trained with 10 to 20 sessions of neurofeedback
to generate more normal brainwaves. Training was continued until clients
showed normal Test of Variable Attention (TOVA) scores. Thereafter,
these clients were given a standard course of 30 Alpha/Theta sessions.
Tests one year after the completion of therapy showed that 77% were
abstinent. This is on par with the 80% success rate demonstrated for
people addicted to alcohol.
Because these results are repeatable it is concluded that this kind of EEG-based normalization enables stimulant addicts to get the full benefit of Alpha/Theta therapy. That is to say, it allows stimulant addicts to achieve the same high abstinence rates as alcoholics.
Neurofeedback clients are prescreened
as suitable for this type of therapy. Some are referred, some are
frustrated
with alternatives, some like the approach," and they can financially
afford it. Those who elect to continue the treatment either perceive
benefit, or are attracted to the approach, or react positively to the
therapist. As a result neurofeedback therapy is more effective for the
clinical population for which success rates are measured, than it would
be on the average population.
The success of any holistic therapy
depends
on the alignment of many factors and people with dysfunctional lives,
coming from disintegrated cultures, are often unprepared for this kind
of healing. This does not mean holistic therapies are not beneficial,
it means the outcome is hard to predict and may yield slow progress.
The effects of neurofeedback are subtle
and some people report no effect after the first treatments. This is
partly intentional since a neurofeedback therapist wants to avoid strong
stimulation until a client's sensitivity can be assessed. Also,
therapeutic
effects are dulled by medications, distraction, and tension. In most
cases the therapy is considered optional, and people are encouraged
to use their own judgment. As a result new clients may discontinue
treatment
if it fails to meet their expectations even though its long-term effects
would benefit them.
In a Houston, Texas study 430 crack
cocaine
addicts volunteered for 30 neurofeedback treatment sessions at the Open Door Mission, a faith-based, 120-bed
drug treatment facility for homeless persons.24
These people were highly addicted and socially disadvantaged: 65% had
been incarcerated, 67% had daily crack use, 86% were undergoing repeat
treatment, and 84% were unemployed. The
program did not utilize traditional substance abuse treatment modalities
such as individual, group and family therapies nor adherence to
twelve-step
programs. The program did require religious education classes.
In this study 54% dropped out and only 46% of the subjects elected to complete the treatment. 89% of those who finished were assessed one year later as having made significant positive social adjustments and were drug-free. In the similar study by Scott, et. al., that was mentioned above, 54% of the subjects completed treatment and 77% were abstinent after 12 months. Taking a simple average of these two trials as representing the population at large indicates that 50% of the population will be comfortable with neurofeedback, with an 83% success rate within this group. We can infer that neurofeedback "works" about 40% of the time in a general population with this kind of voluntary participation.
Traditional therapies typically create
a physically and spiritually protective setting, and establish a
positive
mindset in the participant. Participants focus on healing intentions
before engaging subconscious images and meaningful archetypes. These
therapies usually require participation in ceremony, though often in
an altered state. And while many ceremonies do not address specific
ailments, traditional methods are being successfully used to treat a
wide range of chronic medical conditions.25
In addition to these similarities,
parallels
exist in brain physiology between those undergoing Alpha-Theta
neurofeedback
and participants in the Amazonian ayahuasca ceremony.26 These
similarities are likely shared between neurofeedback and other
traditional
therapies.
Traditional healing is holistic. When
performed in the indigenous context the ayahuasca ceremony aims to heal
the body, mind, spirit, family, culture and cosmos. Neurofeedback
therapy
does not aspire to this level of integration but I believe it can.
"Shamanic cultures view illness and trauma as a problem for the entire community, not just the individual or individuals who manifest the symptoms. Consequently, people in these societies seek healing as much for the good of the whole as for themselves." 27
-- Peter A. Levine
Ayahuasca and ibogaine, which come from
widely separate traditions, are successfully being used in the
remediation
of addiction through what can be best described as deep, personal
transformation.
The 6-month ayahuasca-based program at the Takiwasi Center in Peru has
offered substance addiction therapy since 1992 with roughly 70% success
in remediation.28
"Ancestral medical practices are based on a highly sophisticated practical knowledge and, in contrast to the clumsiness with which Western peoples induce altered states of consciousness, view the controlled induction of non-ordinary states of consciousness as potentially beneficial, even in the treatment of the modern phenomena of drug addiction." 29
-- Dr. Jacques Mabit, Physician and founder of the Takiwasi Center
Trauma plays a central role in our lives
because fear, and the anxiety it creates, is the glue that fixes our
habits. Psychological trauma is recognized, by far, as the major source
of spiritual distress.30 Acute trauma is a recognized
condition,
but this definition is insufficient because "any event or ongoing
condition may be considered traumatic if it overwhelms an individual's
ability to cope, rendering them helpless."31
Historical trauma, developed by Maria
Brave Heart and her colleagues, is an integrated description of a
condition
that underlies a range of chronic ailments. It is an approach that looks
outside the individual, and beyond one's own recollection and genetics
as we know it. Historical trauma recognizes that people find meaning
through the context of culture and family. And when one's culture
has been traumatized -- as in the case of Native Americans -- or has
been anesthetically amputated -- as in the case of the melting pot
of Western culture -- individuals may lack the internal resources
necessary
to build a viable identity.
"Studies among the Lakota provide evidence to support generational trauma response features similar to the survivor's-child complex. Closer examination of suicide studies reveals implicit unresolved, fixated, or anticipatory grief about perceived abandonment as well as affiliated cultural disruption." 32
-- Maria Brave Heart
Brave Heart argues that the high rates
of alcoholism, depression, suicide, homicide, domestic violence, and
child abuse among American Indians can be attributed to these processes
of internalized oppression. She suggests that remediation starts with
identity formation which, in turn, rests on a revival of extended kin
networks, a sense of belonging, and recognition of a shared history.
Traditional Diné(Navajo) therapy addresses trauma in the remediation of substance abuse. Matthew Kelley points out the following seven advantages of traditional therapy over accepted Western methods.33
(1) Cultural congeniality between client and practitioner.
(2) An emphasis on personality, "power," and rapport of the healer over mechanical technique.
(3) Traditional healers are accessible, available, and permanent.
(4) Indigenous practitioners act as role models to anchor the community.
(5) Holistic therapy integrates psychology, physiology, social, and spiritual components.
(6) Enhanced altered states, engaged emotional conditions, and sharply focused awareness are utilized in conjunction with culturally validated images.
(7) Therapy reintegrates family,
kins-people, and community.
Victimized cultures carry a unique
unresolved
grief, but they have no monopoly over alienation, which is recognized
as a defining feature of Western culture.34 Trauma and
alienation
have similar malingering effects in undermining one's character and
spirit.
In those cases where alienation triggers substance abuse -- which are most cases -- indigenous therapy retains these same advantages. Why can't Western therapies and Western therapists provide these benefits even to members of their own culture?
"The shadow of the therapist
crystallizes as pathology perceived in the patient."
35
-- Eduardo Duran
Western therapies fail to appreciate
the breadth and depth of addiction. This must change for the benefit
of culture generally, for the benefit of all of us who are addicted,
and not just for the remediation of substance abuse.
Western therapies have not identified
whom they serve, whether it's the corporate, state, and healthcare
institutions, or the individual, family, and culture. Traditional
healing
unequivocally serves the individual, family, and culture. We should
too.
Western therapists lack the power to
direct healing on the family, kin, and community levels. Half of this
is because we're not taught how or asked to play these roles. The
other half of it is because our Western healthcare system serves a
socio-economic
structure that requires a level of alienation, just as the economy
requires
a level of unemployment.
Most importantly, Western therapists lack insight into their own self, family, and culture. This normal level of alienation is the heart of the Western predicament.
"How do we help patients when in
reality we are in need of the same help we are offering?"
36
-- Eduardo Duran
It won't help if you agree with what
I've said, but it might help if you recognize and fix your own flaws.
Your best candidate for addiction therapy is yourself.
The first flaw of most professionals
is to believe what you've been taught, and to think that you know
what you're doing. The best thinkers have limited faith in what they
know, and do their best work when they leave it behind.37
Traditional healers emphasize that they are not doing the healing, it's
the energies that do the healing. Their role is simply to bring those
energies to the patient.
If you want to enhance your skill in
healing, then collect your power, sensitivity, and flexibility and seek
your demons in the land of fear and confusion. If you have trouble
finding
this place, then recollect all those things that are most important
about who you are and the life you lead and imagine permanently losing
them one by one. This is your underworld, and it's a place of
transformation.
Going there is traumatizing and I hesitate to recommend it, but knowing
its location will help you get your bearing.
Perhaps there is both good trauma and
bad trauma because journeying to the underworld can be productive when
you're prepared. Being prepared requires spiritual power, emotional
sensitivity, and flexibility. I find power comes from life experience,
while sensitivity and flexibility come from meditation and
neurofeedback.
The transformative journey does not have
to be terrifying, though it will be disturbing, confusing, and probably
dangerous. Perhaps, in the end, it's not even a choice. Perhaps your
task as an addiction therapist is not to prevent addiction, but to
enable
the addict to complete their journey through the underworld. Try it
on yourself first.
"The renegotiation of trauma is an inherently mythic-poetic-heroic journey. It is a journey that belongs to all of us" that will have moments of creative brilliance, profound learning, and periods of hard tedious work." 38
-- Peter A. Levine
Your second flaw, if you're like most
people, is that you will create this land of transformation on the
physical
plane by making real the troubles you want to avoid. We always move
toward what we focus on. In a tense situation we focus on what we want
to avoid, thereby making it more likely. If you need a lesson in this
truth, then ski through a steep, wooded slope and reflect, if you can,
on where you're placing your attention. If you're looking for insight,
don't be too attached to what you see and think.
This presentation is about neurofeedback,
and the conclusion is this: find neurofeedback training for yourself
because it can enhance your mind and your understanding of mind. Once
this occurs you will better understand addiction, and be better able
to help others understand it.
"Our inner world of emotion, intention, and awareness plays a profound role in our ability to see" yet we spend years resisting exactly what we need in order to cure our "nonexistent incurable disorders.'" self-awareness is the key to self-transformation." 39
-- Jacob Lieberman, O.D., Ph.D.