I recognise I have a naturally skeptical part of me. So when I met with Mark Grixti (Chartered Clinical Psychologist, Systemic Therapist and EMDR Consultant) and he started to talk about Brainspotting, a new approach which he said had transformed his practice, I raised my eyebrows. Brain? Spotting? It was a new therapy discovered by one on the most experienced EMDR practitioners, David Grand, Ph.D, he explained. He had been using it very successfully with his clients. He was one of 9000 practitioners worldwide and he was now the UK trainer. I listened to him go on to describe how it worked with great enthusiasm.
He suggested the best way to understand how it worked, was to experience it first hand and come to the next training. Since luckily I also have a very curious part, I signed up straight away. I bought David Grand\’s book and I set off to London with a slight sense of trepidation. I read it acted in deep and primitive areas of the brain. That it provided direct access to the autonomic and limbic systems of the central nervous system. I knew it was going to be different to my previous training. Thankfully, there was an excited part of me that was very keen to experience this new approach for myself and learn it so I could also use it with my clients.
The training was very intense. I, and a group of other highly experienced psychologists, psychiatrists, EMDR practitioners and psychotherapists, all went through the training and practiced Brainspotting on each other. We all experienced the power of this approach. This was beyond EMDR, a proven evidence based technique already used within the NHS. It followed the client, it worked in a very focused way with the field of vision and the body via the limbic and deep brain; our \”unconscious processes\” in the language I was more familiar with. It stressed what had been told to me by Mark; that where we look changes how we feel.
I will admit to having a profound experience. I had a shift in an issue I had previously worked on for several years in therapy. The shift happened over the course of the training and I noticed it consolidating in the weeks that followed as the processing continued. I felt differently. As I kept bringing the issue to mind, there seemed to be less of a reaction in my mind and body than there had been.
I went back to my practice and began to notice how my clients seemed to focus on one spot as they spoke; \”gaze spotting\” as David Grand, the founder described it. So I used the technique with my clients, I worked with these \”Brainspots\”. I followed their process, through the body. I have since been privileged to witness some powerful experiences and results.
Let me be clear, I don\’t believe in magical cures and this is not, as no therapy approach can be, a cure all, quick fix to every problem with every person. What it can offer is a different, deeper, often faster way of processing a range of issues within a safe and trusting therapeutic relationship. It offers the potential to access the unconscious or \”out of awareness\” deeply held thoughts and feelings. Such processing, or as Freud called it \’working through\’ can take longer with purely talking therapies that work with and process more directly through the Neo-Cortical, analytical, or conscious parts of the brain. It is a different way to get in touch with our feelings in an embodied way; a deep and focused means of accessing emotions safely within the therapeutic relationship. It can also help to promote self regulation through working at the edges of the \”Window of Tolerance\” (as described by Daniel Siegel).
I invite clients to experience this technique and use it when I feel that perhaps a person feels stuck or when they find it hard to be in their bodies and access deeper, unconscious feelings.
If you are interested to find out more or experience Brainspotting, please get in touch. I\’d be very happy to discuss it further and/or to give a demonstration during an initial session.
claire@brightontalktherapy.com
+44 7557 656960
