Brainspotting
“Where you look affects how you feel.” – David Grand
What is Brainspotting?
What is brainspotting and what is it good for? To answer that question, you first need to know what EMDR is. (I promise to keep it short and simple.) In recent years the therapy tool EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) has become more widely known as a way of processing and moving past traumatic events using eye positions. In an EMDR session, the therapist will induce left to right eye movements by having the client follow a light bar or the therapist’s fingers. This is known as bilateral stimulation. While we don’t fully understand how EMDR works, there is belief that this bilateral stimulation helps the left brain and right brain become more integrated and work together more effectively.
Our bodies naturally crave homeostasis (a state of balance needed for our bodies to function properly) and that includes in our brains. For example, when you eat something, your body should produce insulin to bring the sugar level into balance. Or when you go for a run, your resting heart rate rises but when you stop, it returns to its previous state. Everything in your body is wired for homeostasis. When we experience a traumatic or distressing event and our brains get “stuck” in non-homeostasis, we need something to help them get “unstuck”. Think of it like a splinter jammed in your finger. As long as the splinter is there, your finger won’t be able to fully heal. EMDR is similar to a pair of tweezers that helps to remove the splinter and allows full healing, and thus homeostasis, to occur in the brain.
How is this connected to Brainspotting? Brainspotting was developed by Dr. David Grand while he was conducting an EMDR session with a client. The client was a competitive ice skater who had a history of family trauma that became tied to the injuries she experienced on the ice. During an EMDR session, the client was tracking Dr. Grand’s fingers with her eyes and he noticed that when his fingers crossed the midline of her nose, her eyes wobbled significantly and then locked in place. Dr. Grand locked his hand in that same place and the client kept her eyes locked on his unmoving fingers for 10 minutes. Prior to this the client had reported feeling stuck and unable to access what she needed to. During the 10 minutes she was able to access various images and traumas came up that had not previously emerged. She was able to quickly process through the memories, as well as traumas that Dr. Grand had believed to be fully resolved but were now accessed at a deeper level and processed to a more complete resolution. The following day the client was able to complete a triple loop repeatedly, something that she had struggled to do prior due to the trauma her body was holding onto.
So What Exactly is A Brainspot?
A brainspot is an eye position that is connected to an area of relevance in your brain which is connected to a particular issue that you are experiencing. We all have certain places we look when talking about different topics. Say you were in a car accident and every time you thought about it, you looked down and to your left. Or if you have ever been lost in thought and realized that you were staring off into space, often gazing at a particular spot. That eye position is connected to the part of your brain that most deeply accesses that memory and the body sensations and emotions that go with it.
The Neuroscience and How It Works
The neuroscience behind this is fascinating. In traditional talk therapy, the client is accessing the neocortex or the frontal lobe. This is the part of the brain that we access when we are using rational thought, critical thinking, logic, linear processes, judgment, sequencing, and language. This part of the brain is not as involved in things like regulating emotions. This is where the subcortical cortex or the midbrain come in. The midbrain houses the limbic system and this is where our traumas, emotions, survival responses (fight, flight, freeze, etc.), memories, and motor coordination live. This is why talk therapy can take a long time to adjust behaviors and feelings. It requires you to access a part of the brain that doesn’t store the necessary information. (This is not to say that talk therapy is not helpful or useful. No form of therapy will work for every person because everyone is different and we all have different needs.) In a Brainspotting session, the client and the therapist locate the brainspot for the issue that the client wants to work on. As the client keeps their gaze on the brainspot, this allows their brain to begin a self-scanning process and access the neural networks that are holding the information needed to address the issue. The brain will then engage in the process of working to regain homeostasis. The therapist acts as a support by modeling secure attachment, or a sense of safety, to the client through attunement.
Who is Brainspotting For?
You may be wondering if you need to have a big “T” Trauma for Brainspotting to be beneficial. Not at all! Brainspotting can be helpful for working through a variety of issues. People who have struggled with addictions for years have been able to find and maintain sobriety. People who have a fear of public speaking are able to become confident speakers. People with low self-esteem have been able to come to a place of self-love and confidence. There is even evidence that Brainspotting can be helpful for people struggling with ADHD.
Brainspotting can be used for just about any age. There are adjustments that are made in how the session is conducted for small children or someone who is nonverbal but the results are the same. Children are able to process things at lightening speed so what may take an adult several sessions to work through, a child may work through in a session or two. Brainspotting can also be combined with just about every other type of therapy. Practitioners have combined it with art therapy, music therapy, sand tray therapy, Reiki, and various others. It is extremely versatile.
What I Love About Brainspotting
Brainspotting allows our brains to do what they want to do naturally, which is heal themselves. Every client comes in already possessing the ability to heal themselves. As the practitioner, I am simply a guide and a support. Think of it like when you break a bone and go to the doctor. The doctor can set the bone, wrap it in a case, and give you instructions to allow it to heal but they can’t go in and physically knit the bone back together. Your body has to do that. The doctor simply helps create an environment that will allow the healing to occur. One of my goals as a therapist is to give as much power and autonomy back to my clients as I can and remove the power imbalance that can exist between a practitioner and their client. There is no “correct” way for your brain to process things. When I have experience Brainspotting as the client, I had to struggle against my natural tendencies to get frustrated if I felt like my brain was going off in an unrelated direction. It wasn’t what I was “supposed” to be doing. However, I found that when I was able to release those expectations of myself and allow my brain to do what it needed to do, even if I couldn’t see the supposed logic behind it, it was still connected to the issue I was trying to address. Brains are powerful things and if we can get ourselves out of their way, their capacity to heal is incredible.
If you are interested in more information or in scheduling a session, learn more about Lauren Milton here . . . https://healingheartsofindy.com/about/lauren-milton-msw-lsw/
If you are interested in learning more about how Brainspotting was developed, Dr. Grand’s book can be found on Amazon:
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