My Holistic Approach

As a clinical social worker and psychotherapist, my approach is to understand the totality of current symptoms  &  life experiences into an evolving  comprehensive diagnostic approach and treatment words that best describe  approach. The one word that best describes my psychotherapy approach?

Holistic.

  Figure and Ground, LLC  has a holistic Approach looks at  mind, body and soul.

 

 

1. Clinical Psychology & Social Work–    Graduating from the top ten schools for social work,  my approach begins with early learning of Social Work &  Family,systems as well as Psychological Theories.  One of the  empirically prove strategies offered is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT). The Efficacy of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy: A Review of Meta-analyses .   CBT delves into how thoughts or cognitions have unleashing power over behavioral goals.  Including but not stressing emotions, CBT helps us process & track our automatic responses to life stress.  CBT stresses problems solving & understanding the most common thinking errors that get in our way. 

 

 

1. Mindfulness through  Presence  & Phenomenology

 

Ever talked to someone about a problem but you didn’t quite feel they were there? In the room, yes, but not quite Listening? Were they doing one of the following: smiling and nodding only, looking away, talking about themselves, looking at their phone, or fixated on some part of the conversation that you are not? They may not have practiced mindfulness and phenomenology.

 

Mindfulness is not  new.  It originates from  ancient techniques, like Buddhism and Hinduism. Recent  research has focused on the effectiveness of practicing mindfulness, such as a  decrease of depression,  less reactivity to stress & rumination,  increase memory and focus, allow intuitive responses, improve  immunity,  and  create more relationship satisfaction.  If you want to know more, read What are the benefits of mindfulness?

 

 

 

 

“Why would I want therapy?

 I know myself best. I don’t need to have someone else tell me what I said”

 

Most humans operate at 5% consciousness. That means that the rest of us, 95 % to be exact,  is  our subconscious,  buried deeper is our  unconscious. We take our subconscious and unconscious with us everywhere, even therapy.  Taking our subconscious and unconscious into therapy,  we are often organizing ourselves to  share and  express our stories; retelling our stories is controlling what we  share. If uninterrupted, this prolongs some  degree  of being unconscious, subconscious , which means less aware. Less aware means less knowledge, less opportunity to see options, less change.

 

Humans are also MORE negative than we thought.  How Negative is Your “Mental Chatter”?   At least 70%-80%  of humans are negative.  Further exhausting is our repetition of excessive thinking.   How repetitive? About 90% of our thoughts are repetitive.

 

 

Many of us hear the words “mindful, present, or stay in the moment” without any clear guidance on how to do so.  So we keep swimming against the river of stress, disappointments and heartache. Mindfulness offers more fluidity and less resistance, thus less stres.

 

My therapeutic approach of embodied presence and phenomenology is the antidote to this degree of being negative, redundant and  less aware. 

Presence is a way of being with the other,  but also with self.  Presence is noticing self in the now, being mindful without evaluation and observing without reacting. Bringing presence to therapy,  my approach pays less to the stories we tell, such as what happened, or what we are afraid is going to happen. This is not present, that is past and future.  Instead, a presence teaches us how to be in the moment, fully, rather than talking about and moving away from the now. Offering a  present  focus centered, mindful approach, the client learns how to be in the moments as they occur,  noticing more of self and missing less of what we need to see.  You will learn presence.  A Guided Meditation for Resting in the Flow is a good way to understand this further.

 

In order to be present, mindful and more aware in the moment, we rely on phenomenology. My understanding of phenomenology begins with paying attention to what is happening (observable data) in the present or immediate client experience, not just their stories about life.  Curators at the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum agree, “ Phenomenology situates knowledge in the body: sensual encounter enables consciousness”  [1]. This way of knowing can provide useful information into my client’s reality, attending not only to what you share verbally, but I also attend to what is happening in the room,  myself, you and in the space between us.

 

 

[1]

https://www.cooperhewitt.org/2018/04/03/why-sensory-design

Lipps, A. and Lupton (2018).  The Senses: Design Beyond Vision. New York: Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum and Princeton Architectural Press.

 

 

1. Somatic –

Wait, I thought this was mental health therapy. Why is she talking   about the body?

 

Feeling mentally exhausted, stressed, anxious, stuck, scared, angry or sad?  These  life experiences  influence you mentally and  physically.  * Research has proven that there is an interdependent relationship between mind, body and emotions; they are not separate. 

 

To simplify this integration lets try a diagram. 

 

Stimulus/Life experience

⇩

                    Stimulus  received by  ordinary sensory input

            (vision, touch, hearng, feeling, smelling) 

&

less ordinary sensory input

(neuroception/kinesthesia)

 

REPITiALIAN BRAIN/ BRAIN STEM

 

 

 to  send impulses to the visual cortex  -> 

⇩

 

⇩

 reptilian brain to respond  send info to MAMMALIAN BRAIN/  limbic system

⇩

limbic  system retrieves memory and emotions

Emulates early attachment relationships

⇩

 that creates stress hormones -> telling our body to create chemical responses ->

NEOCORTEX

 

 While images and thoughts are electrical impulses, emotions are neurochemical, taking longer to leave the body, impacting the way we hold, posture and experience our body.

 

 

 

A somatic therapist approaches the mind, body and emotions working closely together towards basic needs and survival.  With understanding of the nervous system, a somatic therapist can help rewire neurocircuitry and internal working memory by inviting more awareness of how and where we physically embody our trauma in our unique story of unresolved pain.  Somatic therapies promote healing through grounding, use of autogenic stress release, breath, chinese energy techniques,  experiential play,  mediation, progressive muscle relaxation,  systematic behavioral modification, titration , yoga nidra, Chinese energy techniques (T’ai Chi &  Qigong),  and other mind-body exercises  to  help release the pent-up tension that is negatively affecting your physical and emotional wellbeing. Somatic therapies are effective for trauma, anxiety, relationship problems and anger management.

 

[2]Neuroception and 3 Part Brain – Age of Awareness

[3] Limbic system: structurewww and function | Emotion (video)

the

 

 

 

1. Embodied & Relational-

Studies indicate that the relationship between client and therapist is  responsible for 30% of progress or change. Therapist Variables That Predict Symptom Change in Psychotherapy With Chronically Depressed Outpatients   Within my embodied & relational approach, we will  engage in a co- created, co-influenced relationship, where my twenty years of   expertise and professionalism levels off to   meet  my client, as his or her own expert, but  within the space between us.  Within this co created space, I embody a willingness to sense, feel and  be a visible expression of what you, your thoughts, feelings or ideas. The space becomes shared, your oneness becomes visible and interrupted relational patterns can become unstuck.

 

An embodied approach is not just a thinking approach to mental health, it is a thinking, feeling, sensing, witnessing approach. As an Embodied therapeutic clinician who helps you  take a challenging idea, feeling, or belief  that is yours and encapsulate it in both my cogntive understanding within and resonate within my physical form, my  body, thus becoming an instrument of knowing and sensing your experience.  Together we will move away from abstractions, dissociations, defensive rationalizations, intellectualization and desensitization of life to experiencing what you say on a more physical tangible level.

 

 

 

 

1. Dialogical Communication

                           Ever felt like the other person was looking at you, but too busy “knowing” what you said, yet you didn’t feel heard?

 

Sometimes even the best listener get stucks in their interest of knowing, understanding that they build  upon your story, your own expertise of self, by jumping ahead, making assumptions, pathologizing or giving bad advice.

My approach uses the key elements of dialogical communication to curtail this possibility.  THE KEY ELEMENTS OF DIALOGIC PRACTICE IN OPEN DIALOGUE: FIDELITY CRITERIA.  Using a dialogical stance, my aim is to slow down and listen with an ear of curiosity and suspending my egoism or need of “knowing.” As I hear my client use words and physical gestures, my response is to build upon their understanding of a word, concept or frame of reference with first getting to know what meaning that word has and personal  history behind the word  itself  the client brings into play.

 

1. Experiential          Many therapists are talk therapists.  Don’t get me wrong, talking is important and  helpful. Talk ONLY can sometimes be futile, possibly even harmful.  When we retell our story & share our  complaints, we run into the dilemma of  repetition, rehearsal and reinforcement of a belief, thought or problem rather than a cure.

 

Experiential psychotherapy works and personally, its more fun! . (PDF) Research on experiential psychotherapies.Experiential Therapy is different from other therapies that might send a client home with a worksheet to complete about a new behavior to try outside of the therapeutic encounter.   All in its name, experiential is not a  “…. is not a ‘talking cure.’ Rather, it is an ‘action cure’…. (Fleming, p. 27 ) as noted by theologican, professor, writer and therapist,  Sylvia Crocker Flemming.  Flemming would say that the client has an active  stance of noticing what is happening in the here and  now with the added bonus of behaviorism;  this approach  is similar to “systematic behavioral modification, incorporating both behaviorism and cogntive behaviorism (Zinker, 1988).  Experiential processing  invites a new repertoire of  noticing, feeling, thinking and finally behaving.  In an experiential approach,  the therapist office  becomes the gym or lab,where we have “equipment” (i.e., resources,  supplies, tools) that invites us to  exercise new ways , try on and experiment with thoghts, beliefs, behaviors. (PDF) Research on experiential psychotherapies.  The goal is to become more aware, the means are not graded, the learning is experiential.

 

This can be challenging, as we are asking someone to do what is novice, unsupported within them.

 

 What does this look like?  First, we build upon phenomenology and  awareness of what interests you.  With Paradoxical Theory of Change , we integrate your own authenticity by experiencing HOW you live in, experience and express your own beliefs, values, conflicts, wants or needs.   We look for where energy is stuck, and where you feel mobilized.  This frees up healthy aggressive energy and vitality, which is what is need to complete to  completing of novice, once challenging expression od self and behaviors

 

 

 

Often, Experiential Play – studies indicate that play reinforces new, desired behavior ____ more than talking and rehearsing. Play, which is the key to pleasure also synchronizes our own affect and mood, helping us regulate stress and build up excitement.Expands repertoire, Rewiring of intersubjectivity, Emotional security ,  Experiential play ___ uncertainty, attachment issues, mutuality, resiliency and creativity. “Scientists have recently determined that it takes approximately 400 repetitions  to create a new synapse in the brain-UNLESS it is done in PLAY, in which case it takes between 10-20 repetitions” Dr Karyn Purvis.

 

1. Psychospiritual-

 Do you know what psychology means?

 What does spiritual have to do with psychological?

 

My approach to  mental health sees the individual as fundamentally related to and interdependent upon our relationship with others and with ourselves. Knowing others is confusing or difficult. Knowing ourselves or self is an even  bigger undertaking, hence the guiding  disciplines of psychology, social work, and spirituality.  Integration of self means intertwining of disciplines and meeting of the psych, soul and spirit.

 

The word psychology does not mean the study of the  mind.  Oddly, Psychology defines as study of the soul.  Soul is our truest essence and the  individualized collection of spirit.  As the essence can not be seen, it can be expressed through the human body, which is the observable self.

 

Many individuals report a disconnection to self, purpose, inner truth, and  support.  Sometimes they find they are disconnected to their soul and spirit. While the soul  is the individualized expression of the spirit, spirit is the universal expression of soul.  Spirit, like most of what we discuss, is not defined by me.  Spirit is your belief, your story, your meaning. I am just a guide.