Neuroscience Training Summit May 2016 organised by Sounds True

I listened to a whole ten days of neuroscience talks this month, 30 hours of information and many of the talks were really interesting.
Linda Graham, whom I have often quoted on here, was speaking on learning to bounce back from trauma and difficulty. I still find her work exceptional.
Janina Fisher talked about healing the fragmented selves of trauma survivors
http://www.janinafisher.com/tmodel.php
and David Grand talked about Brain Spotting, the modality that he says treats multiple trauma clients better than EMDR does.
https://brainspotting.pro/page/what-brainspotting

This last one is really intriguing and I have ordered his book so that I can try to understand it better.

I haven't written on here for a while. I actually forgot that I started this blog!

I have been working on inner child healing and doing a few teaching sessions voluntarily and the occasional conference presentation on compassion.
I have been working on self compassion at an intensive level and trying very hard to create a nurturing and healing daily routine for myself.
I have just completed the neuroscience training summit by Sounds True - 20 ninety minute presentations on the latest cutting edge ideas on how to heal trauma and attachment issues. It makes me realise how backward the UK is in this field on the whole.
I have a plan to train as a teacher of the self compassion 8 week course. I would feel good passing that kind of information on, especially as I have learned to do it at the coal face so to speak. 

There is much contradictory advice about suffering out there.
I have encountered buddhist teachers who laugh when told about rape - in fact the actual words were 'So?'
I have heard buddhist teachers say 'don't get upset, it will create a deeper emotional reactive groove in the mind. Don't indulge it'
This would a little more understandable if the person in question was a drama queen addicted to rehearsing the same old story over and over again. 
but what if the person in question was an abuse survivor who needed to be heard for the first time, needed their suffering to be allowed and acknowledged? Needed a heart open response rather than a heart closed response?

I have a story to tell. It is unfortunately a true story. 
Once upon a time there was a Trickster. He loved being seen as wise and insightful and could get very sarcastic and cruel if anyone crossed him. One of his students, who loved him very much, kept feeling uncomfortable when the Trickster was manipulative or bullying to others and pointed this out to him. He started bullying her and creating an atmosphere of sarcasm and nastiness. Some of his cronies joined in. The poor student was eventually broken by the Trickster who let rip and told untruths to destroy her. She told his own teacher ( a truly good man)  who replied :  His mind has a huge crack in it. If I challenge him to see himself as he truly is, he will probably break and go over the edge. I have to proceed with caution. It is only the adulation of his groupies that is keeping him going. 
Meanwhile a family member of the same good teacher, came to the student and told her she had been sexually assaulted and attacked and nearly raped by one of the monks.  So the student went to the head of the monastery and told him. He said that they would not do anything and that he would move the errant monk to a city instead. Eventually that errant monk murdered the good teacher and two others. All this suffering is happening in an organisation where compassion and kindness and forgiveness and self control is taught. It is a very sad example of how people are just people and keep playing their ego games no matter what ....

How to deal with suffering: your own and others

http://www.ramdass.org/suffering-as-grace/

Accept Others - Allow

Less judging

Therapist Training for Good Attachment

SAMPLE INTERVENTIONS

1. Responsive parenting – becoming an attachment figure
   • I sense you might be feeling a little nervous as we begin our session today. Is that right?
   • You’re feeling discouraged about where you are in your life right now. Can you say more about that?
   • As I hear your talk about your brother, I notice something starts to come up in me, right here, in my chest. Can I check that out with you? I’m feeling…an ache, maybe some sadness, a loneliness. Are you feeling anything like that right now?
   • When you say you can’t trust your wife any more, is there something underneath? Some sadness underneath…some deep, deep sadness?
2. Moment-to-moment tracking of non-verbals
   • Something just shifted; did something just change for you? Can you let me know what you’re feeling in your body right now?
   • I notice your hands shaking and scratching as we talk; is there something happening in your hands we need to know about? If your hands had a voice, what would they be saying to us right now?
   • I notice your energy is different in your body now…more relaxed? Lighter? What’ your sense now?
3. Privilege relational-emotional experiences in therapeutic dyad; make focus explicit
   • What are you experiencing right now, here with me, as we sit together? What’s it like to be experiencing this here now with me?
   • What are you feeling right now? Where are you feeling that in your body? What’s it like to feel that with me? What are you feeling between us right now?
   • Is it hard for you to look me in the eyes as you share this with me? What happens as you try to look me in the eye? What do you see in my eyes as we experience this here together? What do you see in my eyes as I feel what you feel?
4. Stop attacks; cultivate self-empthay, self-compassion
   • Whoa! There’s that inner critic again. Can we just set that voice aside for now and go back to what you were feeling just before?
   • What would happen if you let in that I care about you? That I am so deeply moved by the work you are doing?
   • You can be so harsh o yourself for feeling upset with me! I feel so tender toward that part that feels upset, that needs to be upset with me. Can you feel some compassion for that part that feels upset, that needs to feel upset? If your daughter Kelly were that upset, how would you feel toward her? How would you comfort or soothe her?
5. Soften, bypass, confront any defenses
   • It seemed like you were about to respond to what I just said and then you backed off. What comes up as you begin to respond directly to me?
   • Any time we begin to get near the emotions around your father leaving, you seem to change the subject. Is there something difficult about feeling those feelings and sharing them with me?
   • If we could set the anxiety about being weak or vulnerable in front of me aside for just a moment, what would your heart want to say; what would your heart want me to know about you?
6. Experience and regulate feelings
   • You know I want to go back to something that happened just a moment ago. You were saying something about your boss and your eyes flinched, just for a moment, and I let it go by, but I wonder if something came up just in that moment that we should pay attention to?
   • You seem angry right now, yet you’re holding back on letting that anger out. Can you let me know just how hard it is for you to let the anger out; what do you imagine would happen if you began to let your anger out?
   • So much pain; so very much pain. I can feel the pain as we sit here. Can you let me feel that pain with you? Can you feel that pain with me, just let it be there?
   • Let it come, let it come. It’s OK, I’m right here; it’s been wanting to come for such a long time.
   • You’re not alone; I’m right here with you.
7. Co-create and reflect on relational-emotional moments; meta-processing
   • I’m feeling touched as I hear you say that. I’m so moved that you would share this with me.
   • We’ve been through such a wave of grief here, and now….there seems to be something else. A letting go…a sigh of relief? What’s happening now?
   • Whew! That was quite a ride! And what’s going on now? What are you feeling now?
   • What’s your sense of what’s happened here today? How do you make sense of what we’ve experienced here together today?
   • You’ve opened up and shared of much of your frustration and anger with me today. How do you feel about your anger now?
   • You started out today by saying you weren’t sure what was going on with you, what to focus on. Then here we did this deep piece of work about the loss of your best friend in high school, and felt so much loss, so much loss. How are you feeling about yourself now, having experienced so much loss, really letting yourself feel it? What’s your sense of your self now?
8. Create new attachment experiences
   • Do you think you could stand up for yourself with your sister now the way you did to me last week about the fee?
   • How can you remember what it’s like in here, trusting yourself to know how you feel and what you need, when you speak to your boss next week?
   • 
     
   • http://lindagraham-mft.net/resources/published-articles/the-neuroscience-of-attachment/