Desensitisation

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What is a Chakra?

A Chakra is a wheel, or a vortex of energy that exists on many levels in the body. Different system define a chakra is various ways.

The Brain
We think of the brain as a lump of tissue in our skull. Try thinking of your brain as your entire nervous system. Your spinal column connects through synapsis, to every nerve in your body, it is all one organ. Nervous plexuses are formed at seven main points in the system. These are at the crown of your head, your forehead, throat, middle of your chest, solar plexus, just below your navel, and in you perineum between your legs. The amount of nervous energy at each plexus is dictated by the amount needed at any one site. Some are more active than others.

The Endocrine System
Associated with each plexus is an endocrine organ. The crown of your head is the Pineal Gland, forehead, the Pituitary Gland, throat, the Thyroid Gland, chest, the Thymus Gland, solar plexus, the Pancreas, the navel, the adrenal glands, the perineum, the gonads. Each gland contributes hormones into the body system. Different glands will respond differently in different people. Some systems may be dominated by the gonadal hormones while others may be dominated by the pituitary and so on. The entire system talks to itself via the cardio vascular system and hormones are delivered to where they are needed in the blood stream.

The Traditional Chakra System
In the Yogic and Ayurvedic systems of both mind and body each chakra is given a Sanskrit name and has associated characteristics. The crown chakra is the Sahasaram and is associated with creativity. The forehead chakra, the Ajna is associated with sensitivity and harmony. The throat chakra, the Vishuddi is associated with thought and cognition. The heart chakra, the Anhatta, is associated with emotion and power. The solar plexus chakra is associated with intellect and perceptual experience. The navel chakra is associated with sensuality, friendship and family. The base chakra in perineum is associated the body as a whole, sexuality and physical action or behaviour.

The Seven Yoga
The Rishes, or researchers, recognised that people were dominated physically, emotionally and mentally by the hormones of particular chakras that created different personality types. To cater for the self development needs of the differing personality types the Rishes identified seven ways of being that became known as the Yogas. Yoga comes from the root word Yug or to gather. A yoga is all the information that has been gathered and understood about that chakra. The seven yogas are:

Tantra – concerned with the creative imagination
Raja – concerned with meditative and spiritual practice
Mantra – concerned with the mind, thought and the spoken word
Bhakti – concerned with the control of power and the development of service to others
Jnana – concerned with the intellect, experiment and research of new ideas
HaTha – concerned balancing the energy of the body, mind and emotion to create stability
Karma – concerned with the rightness of action

While many personality types followed a single yogic path there were some who followed all seven, this is known as Ashtanga or Integral Yoga.

Bio – Energy
Many people and systems identify the chakras as colours that can be seen in the bio-energetic energy that emanates from and surrounds the body. This energy, that can know be photographed using a Kirlean camera, was traditionally termed the Aura. The colours in the aura depend on the openness of each chakra. Those who have studied the chakra system in depth have worked to develop a form of Ayurvedic psychology. Over time, in the west this has become a form of spectral psychology, which identifies the colours of the chakras and their primary drives.

Crown – Pineal – Creativity – Violet
Forehead – Pituitary – Intuition – Indigo
Throat – Thyroid – Conceptual – mind Blue
Chest – Thymus – Emotion – Green
Solar Plexus – Pancreas – Intellectual – mind Yellow
Navel – Adrenal – Social/sensual – Orange
Perineum – Gonads – Sexual/Behavioural – Red

Spectral Psychology
From all the work alluded to above a small group of western psychologists and other practitioners have, and continue to develop the understanding of the spectral model of psychology. The notables that I have worked with are Christopher Hills, Kevin Kingsland, David Pike, and a few others. David Pike and myself are hoping to prepare a publication that will go into the concepts of spectral psychology and therapy in depth.

There is plenty to read on the chakra system so have a good google. If you want to dive into some good yoga psychology check out Ramurti Mishra, Text Book of Yoga Psychology.

Take care

Sean x

When Did You Last Play?

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Watch a couple of children when they first meet each other, how long is it before they start playing with each other? Usually not very long. The thing about children is they do not need permission to play, they do not need to organise it, they just simply do it. When did you last play?

‘We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.’
George Bernard Shaw/Benjamin Franklin

There are two forms of play, productive and passive. Productive play is, for me, more like doing work. It includes things like athletic racing, football, cricket, rugby and so on. The thing about productive play is that we are seeking an outcome that creates winners and losers. Passive play just involves fun; there is no winning it is just playing for playing’s sake.

Whatever form of play you participate in helps with so many things. We are helped in our developmental stages with brain development, body development and emotional development as in play fighting helps kids learn the limits of aggression.

Research shows that play, in many forms including cognitive play like scrabble and crosswords, sudoku and other puzzles can help prevent alzheimer’s, dementia, depression and increase motivation.

The big issue is fun. Playing is, or should be, enjoyable, it makes us feel good, happy, helps us bond with others and create social connections. We learn to co-operate, negotiate and communicate.

Some of the good reasons to play is to develop life skills, to learn, to create, to feel challenged, to lose ourselves in a pleasurable activity, to be calm, focussed, and to work co-operatively.

We know that play can: relieve stress, trigger the release of endorphins, that promote an overall sense of well-being, they can also relieve pain. Raised endorphins strengthen our immune system

Couples that spontaneously play, improve their relationship, share laughter, develop empathy, compassion, trust, intimacy and sexuality. Play can also loosen you up in stressful situations and break the ice with strangers.

We live in a world that separates our life into work and play. If we get to do what we want with our live we cease to work and begin to play. It might just be that if you learn to play and enjoy your life that you will never need to work again. You can play all day.

Take care and be happy.

Sean x

Depression

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Dealing with Depression

People tell me about being stressed, when they are not, they are busy. People tell about having the flu when they haven’t, that have a cold. People tell me that they are depressed when they are not, they are a little bit down. The natural flow of human emotion is to be high and to be low. This flow is normal and may happen minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day, week by week, month by month. It may flow throughout the year so that people feel high in the summer and low in the winter. To feel a bit down from time to time is normal.

What is depression?

Try and visualise a flat line that starts in the present moment and goes on into eternity. The line represent the normal, normal feeling and normal actions, you might see the line as flatness neither happy or sad, positive or negative. Anything above the line is positive, happiness, joy and as it gets higher euphoria, ecstasy and mania. Below the line is dullness, lack of motivation, inertia, unhappiness, misery, sadness, and depression.

Those described as manic depressive have fluctuating emotions between the highs of mania, through normality of the middle line to the lows of depression. There are many types of manic depression. Some are mainly high with a little bit of low, some mainly low with a little high and all other combinations between these two. Then there are the issues of if these changes are rapid cycling or slow cycling.

Depression describes an emotional state that exists below the normal line. As we all have up days and down days we all feel high and lows. Both mania and depression are the extremes of these normal emotional states.

The mind brain
The mind is the emotional and conceptual part of the system or the software of the system. The brain is the meat, or hardware of the system. Feelings are in the software and, the chemistry or endorphins of the brain, are in the hardware. Both effect each other. If we change the way that we think or feel we will change our brain chemistry. On the other hand if we change our brain chemistry we change the way that we think and feel.

Changing Your Brain

Medication
Anti-Depressants change the brain chemistry that in turn changes the way that we think and feel.

Psychotherapy
This changes the way that we think and feel that in turn changes the brain chemistry.

Both medication and psychotherapy are relevant and will affect depression. In most cases of deep depression they will only work effectively when used together.

Clinical depression
This is when depression is the sole result of deficient brain chemistry. This requires medication, which may need to be used forever; just as if you have an insulin deficiency because you are diabetic you will need medication for life.

Reactive depression
This is when an event or experience affects our thinking and feeling and subsequently effects our brain chemistry. Included in reactive depression are bereavement, loss, hurt, separation and so on. Also there may be trauma and post traumatic stress. Both medication and talking therapies will be useful for reactive depression.

Repressed anger
This type of depression is not always accepted by some professionals, though I often experience it in my consulting room. Perhaps a manager or partner acts in way that creates anger within you that you are unable to respond to. The situation requires that you keep quiet and repress your feelings. Over time, as the anger accumulates, the negative feelings that are unexpressed, eventually turn against you and are eventually excreted as depression. Therapy is an absolute must in this case. Also running, jumping, screaming and shouting to let go of all negative energy will be really useful.

Generally there are many issues of feeling down in life. Post natal depression, the baby blues, midlife crisis, bereavement, loss, being continuously let down, and so on. In most cases when the situation remains unaddressed it will eventually become depression.

Dealing With Depression
The first step is to be clear about what type of depression you have then you can proceed to treatment. We all need to be aware of our emotional health. The self help tip here has to be that if you begin to feel bad, down or depressed do something about it. The more aware you become of your self the more you will be able to attend to your own needs and not get lost in the depth of depression.

Whatever your type, you are least likely to experience depression by practising mindfulness, and those that are depressed and begin to practice mindfulness will not only solve their problems quicker but may also reduce the levels of medication required to solve their issues.

Finally you do not need to suffer from depression. When you feel really down and you can’t shift it get some help.

Be happy and be mindful

Take care

Sean x

Help with ‘Blended Families’

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The Blended Family

“Blended Family” I love that phrase and the concept behind it. I am not sure where the phrase “step family” comes from but blended certainly sounds a whole lot better.

This week on the podcast Ed and I have been talking about what to do when we inherit an extended family. We live in a world where couples no longer stay together as they once did. There has been a drop in the divorce rate of 50% from a few years ago to the latest figure from the office of national statistics of 42%. We probably all know someone who is divorced, living as a single parent, or are part of a blended family.

The issue that was raised by the listener who requested this podcast was about having step children some of whom got on with her very well and one who was positively negative and ‘hated’ her. Sometimes these situations are based in “I love him but not his kids”.

Being a step parent is not an easy job. The best blended family’s work when the old family and the new family all talk together in a civil manner. This will always be dependent on the nature of the split and who blames who for what, who has been able to forgive whom for whatever went on.

The wicked step mother, in all fairy stories is a popular myth. Many step mothers do their very best to accommodate and care for the step children while they are in loco parentis. The problem can be when the other parent is using the child to wage a war on their ex’s new partner. This phenomenon called conflict by proxy and can be very destructive for all involved.

There is also an issue of ethos. The ethos of the two homes may vary greatly so that the children have problems adapting to the different regime when visiting the step home. Perhaps in their main home there are few boundaries and the children do what they want, go to bed when they want and so on. In the step family there are boundaries and routine. This can create conflict.

Often there is limited time with the kids. Access arrangements in Britain are usually every other weekend and a visit during the week if geography allows. So the impact that the step home can have on the child’s life will be limited.

Many young and adult step children will feel that in liking a step mother or father that they are betraying their mother or father. They may also feel possessive to their parent wanting to reject the new partner.

Are there answers? Well the net is full of ideas and blogs, sites and apps many of which are helpful. Most times it comes down to communication and when communication is impossible you need to refer to the Live In the present book chapter on the law of allowing. You can’t push water up hill and you can’t make a guinea pig bark. There is a time when as a step parent, you would be best to step back and leave it to the natal parents to sort it out.

I guess that as the level of blended families grows we will get better at living with them.

Take care and be happy

Sean x

Get (and Stay) Motivated

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Motivation – is about having fun

In this weeks podcast Ed and I have been talking about motivation and how you keep going when you feel like you are running out of energy. The trick is that you need to be living your dream and not other people’s. Motivation is about the life energy that either comes from within you not from without you.

Why do you do what you do?

Many of us do what we do because our parents, friends, teachers, religion, culture, and so on, demand it of us. I work with so many people that get to the point of retirement and question why on earth they did all the things that that have done with their life. They are left with the feeling that they have wasted time; they have wasted their life. From here they often fall into retirement in a state of depression.

Mindfulness is about living in the present, in awareness of what you are doing and why you are doing it. Mindfulness is about being responsible for who you are and what you do. This should not be confused with blame. Fault and blame are not to do with responsibility. Responsibility implies the ability or need to respond.

There is a trick in getting motivated in doing what you want to do with your life. If you wake up feeling the energy to jump out of bed and get on with what you enjoy doing you are living a happy and mindful life. If you wake up feeling like you don’t want to get out of bed and do what you have to do then you are living the mindless life.

This is not a criticism of anyone living an unfulfilling life. But if you are unhappy with your lot this is your chance to change. Wherever you are is your starting point and we are all starting from different places. It is not where you start but where you will finish and more importantly life is about enjoying the journey from start to finish.

To be positively motivated you need to be engaged and connected in your life and living your own dream. To be negatively motivated you will be living someone else’s dream and feeling obliged to.

If you are at a point in life when you need to get focussed and motivated I suggest you get on Amazon and get your self a copy of ‘The Attractor Factor’ by Joe Vitale. Joe takes you through a series of questions that enable you to connect with your inner feelings and discard bits of your life that are de-motivating and create a life goal that will begin your journey.

What ever you do choose to do with your life, live it mindfully and enjoy your journey and you might just get to the end of your life with a smile on your face.

Take care

Sean x

Does what we own make us happy?

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Over the last few weeks Ed and I have been looking at issues from migration to happiness. It seems to me that the movements of people that we see as populations from the war torn middle east moving north are people seeking happiness. We have been talking about whether or not the things that we have, our possession can make us happy.

Is what you have now enough? Is what you have to be shared? Are others allowed to have the same that you have?

Topically does where you live make you happy? People have always moved around the world seeking happiness and fulfilment.

Do we own the countries in which we live?
Having just returned from Italy through the Channel Tunnel led me to think about the idea of ownership of land and the idea of who owns the world. Who are we Brits? Where do we come from? Do we own the land that is described as Britain or the United Kingdom?

“Imagine there’s no countries it isn’t hard to do”
(John Lennon)

When humans moved out from the Eden of the African plains to populate the world we took possession of territories, which in turn became tribal domains, kingdoms and countries. As we did this we created a sense of belonging. We began to own our territory that belongs to “us” and no one else.

When we identify with a group of human beings we see them as ‘us’. Those people that we do not identify as ‘Us’ who exist outside of our group we identify as ‘them’. ‘Us’ equals inclusion acceptance and support. ‘Them’, equals denial and rejection. When ‘They’ seek to take what ‘We’ have or what we feel that we own we fight to defend it.

And so in 2015 the ‘Us’ that is the UK has an army of migrants massing on the borders attempting entry. The ‘Us’ that is the UK says you cannot come in becomes you are not ‘Us’ so they are ‘Them’ and you do not belong here.

And yet Britain is, and always has been, a melting pot of many people that has been mixed for thousands of years by people from all over the world.

1968, Kenyan Asians flee to Britain
1951, people from the colonies mainly the West Indians were encouraged to work here
1881, Jews flee to Britain from the Russian pogroms
1066, it was the French and William the Conqueror who populated the UK.
793, it was the Vikings
410, it was the Angles and the Saxons.
43, it was the Romans
500 BC, the Celts invaded Britain

I am only picking out a few of the events that I am aware of. I am sure that there are many, many more as people, that have, for a variety of reasons moved around the world, and will continue to do so. On the basis of what I have written above should we concede the domain of the UK to the Celts? That would be the people of Scotland, Ireland, Wales and Cornwall.

I do not know anyone who is pure British or who could even claim to be Celt. With the wonders of the Internet we can now do amazing research and discover all sorts about our own ancestry. In my own case on my mother’s side there is Irish, Negro and Chinese and on my father’s eastern European Jew and Viking. Yet I would say that we are as British as you can get. My lot all fought in the last two World Wars and I guess we all fight again if we feel threatened.

Human beings are all one people. We choose the divisions of colour, race, religion and ethnicity. What would solve the world’s problems, our problems, would be inclusion, tolerance and the law of allowing.

Perhaps we should be asking ourselves why are these migrants wanting to be here with us and not staying where they come from? Perhaps our energy should be focussed around helping heal and develop their places of origin and in so doing, help to expand the concept of humanity rather than developing our bunker mentality and reinforcing that sense of “Us” and “Them” because in the end surely we are all one.

The big question is do we own the territories that we deny other people?

The coming years will test our concepts of who owns what.

Take care and be happy

Sean x

Should Drugs Be legal?

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They already are!!!!

Alcohol, nicotine, tannin, caffeine, legal highs, all easily available on the high street. What about exercise, chocolate, carbs? They all create a chemical dependence in our brain chemistry. But would we think of religion, education, reading or knitting as addiction?

We all have an internal and individual chemical normal. Your internal chemistry is different to mine, but when yours is in balance you feel that all is as it should be. If you had my chemistry you would feel horrible, like wise if I had yours.

The nearest we get to normal is at the moment of birth, yet even then our individual internal chemistry is set by the genetics from our parents and from the things that we ingest like our mothers milk. As we grow and move on in life different experiences create different internal chemical states that, when repeated, we experience as normal. In the end we say, “that’s just the way I am”, no it is not, it’s the way we have taught our system to be. What it comes down to is that you normal chemical balance is your addiction and you will do things to maintain your normal. That is called ‘your addictive behaviour’. So what is yours? Remember the person who needs to go to mass everyday is as addicted as the cocaine user, it is us that see it as good or bad.

A class drugs are those substances that we, collectively as a society, have decided are so bad they should be made illegal and people, our population, should be (are) banned from using them. The popular image of a Class A addict is of a spotty no-good living in the gutter. Yet, functional addicts are everywhere.

Functional alcoholics famously run governments, functional cocaine addicts run the financial sectors and functional heroine addicts run businesses. I am not saying that we should all go around ‘off our cake’ and ‘out of our tree’ but being stoned is more common than we realise.

Does drug addiction damage people? Yes! Should we do something about it? Yes!

Human beings have used drugs throughout their evolution. The chances of this stopping are remote. Making drugs legal enables us to take control of them and it stops the negative associations such as people trafficking, violent crime, robbery, prostitution, and so on.

There is another issue of balance. The government creates income from the tax on cigarettes. There is also a cost in the health costs of the diseases caused by smoking. Is the income greater than the health costs? I do not know the answer. However, if all drugs were legal and subject to tax, we would create income to deal with rehab and recovery. At the same time we would reduce violent crime and maybe make the world a little safer.

Whatever your addiction is, be happy and live in the present.

Take care

Sean x

The Book of Face – Good or Bad?

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I have just checked my facebook and twitter, I attempt to check it when I go to bed. What did I do before facebook? well, I went to sleep or, maybe, read a book.

I once heard a wonderful talk given by Stephen Fry. He read out a quote about a new invention that suggests it was, and would, ruin the world. It was destined to destroy society, break up families and relationships, turn children against their parents and people against their governments it would be the end of society as we know it. The invention he was talking about was, the book.

The book, at that time, was a creation that followed on from the invention of the printing press. The book was not seen as a good thing. Thinkers and philosophers of that time thought that if someone was sat alone, or in a corner of the family room, having an exclusive experience in their own mind that was not shared with their friends and family, that this would destroy the fabric and foundation of what a family is. Of course, prior, to the book on a winter’s evening in front of the fire, people talked, told stories, shared the day’s news. Would or could the book stop this?

Now we are in the position where people fear that the book will now be lost to the Kindle book reader, the computer, the tablet and the mobile phone. Seems to me that as each new invention of social distraction comes along what we fear most of all is change.

So what about social media?

Facebook allows people to share in a digital electronic way. It allows people to share at anytime with anyone anywhere in the world. It opens up the world and creates an awareness of other people in other situations and other countries. But what it does is creates change. It is a new form of communications. Those people that grow up with modern technology will see it as normal and the way that it is. They will not feel bereavement for the loss of the paper book when they can hold 200 books on their Kindle.

Just as the book was a feared when it was first developed so too is social media now. For many it is a threat. Some governments are so scared by its existence that it is blocked from the servers in that country. Why would a government or an interest group be sacred of people openly expressing their thoughts and feelings in a public forum? It is probably that they have things that they would rather keep hidden.

I think, that like most things, social media is neutral. Think of a knife! The knife is neutral; it is neither good nor bad. It is what we do with it that makes it good or bad. There are good books and bad books. There is good social media and bad social media. It is not what it is, it is what we do with it that counts.

Be happy, live in the present, and use your social media positively.

Take care

Sean x

Bereavement

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Bereavement goes way beyond death and the loss of a loved one. We may experience many losses in life before we experience our first death. When we experience any loss it is the emotional bond between us and that person, thing, event or object that we feel as they are stretched and sometimes, snapped. So, in this blog I want to look at the sense of loss beyond that of death.

Loss assumes that we own something. We cannot lose what we do not have or own. This may seem obvious when we are talking about losing a watch or having a wallet stolen, if our house is burgled or the contents of car taken. Yet, there are many levels of loss that are not material. They may be to do with love or emotion, though with all things we may also feel some ownership.

Status and our sense of self
The loss of face, position or status can leave us feeling diminished or that we have lost something. This is because we tend to define ourselves by what we ‘do’ rather than by who we ‘are’. At the dinner party we turn to the person next to us and ask “what do you do?” This sense of ‘doing’ is often regarded above ‘being’. We tend to value our-self and others by what we do. In your value system is a surgeon of higher status than a dustman?

They way that we see ourselves as list of what we do tends to come out when we answer the question “Who am I?” In most cases the answer will comprise of a list of the things that we do or the roles that we play. When what we do is seen as more important than who we are things like retirement becomes big issues of loss because we no longer have a place and a role in society, we have lost our label.

The loss in change
This is why there is often a sense of loss when life changes. The rites of passage as we move through life from, school to, university, Job, relationship, children, grandchildren, retirement and so on all describe the loss that is the past and may, to the awake mind, embraced the potential gains of the future that can only come with change.

Change by choice
When we choose to change we may move joyfully towards a new situation. Perhaps the past has not served us well and we are happy or even eager to leave it behind. However, even during the most positive of changes, it likely that there will still be a sense of loss from the broken connections to the past

Imposed change
To have change enforced on us through redundancy, dismissal, divorce, accident, illness and so on will often leave us feeling anger and resentment to those people or circumstances that have brought about the change. Imposed change may effect what we do or what can do. If we have an accident or a stroke we may lose the physical or mental ability to function as we have done in the past. Such losses change how we see or describe our-self.

Consider this
If you were to write a description of yourself from ten years ago how different would it be from your description of how you see your self today? You would doubtless see some change that may even be positive. What are the losses that you can see? You might also try projecting forward ten years and consider what changes you would like to see.

Preparing for change
Being aware that change is the only constant, knowing it will always happen, allows us to prepare in advance. Preparing for the loss of loved ones and close family members eases the passing when it happens. A pre-retirement course can minimise the loss of identity that come with the loss of role. Parenting courses can prepare us for the huge impact that children will have on our lives and our relationships.

Preparation for material loss
For most people this means insurance policies that are there to compensate us when we suffer material loss. That may include critical illness cover, redundancy cover, car insurance, house insurance, travel insurance all of which compensate us for loss. In these cases insurance seems like a waste of money unless or until you need to call on the policy after a loss.

Preparation for emotional or spiritual loss
In this I mean loss of relationship though estrangement, divorce, death and so on. The only way to prepare for these is to live in the present. Not to be attached to the past and what was or to crave what might be in the future. To live in the now is to be Mindful.

Mindfulness
Because loss is related to change the experience spans the line from past, through the present to the future. The bereavement of loss is the attachment that we have to the past. Many losses will always have a connection to past either through nostalgia or sometimes anger and hurt. In Mindfulness we encourage the ability to live in the present to be here now. Dealing with loss is about dealing with our attachment to the past. To live in the present we need to let go of the emotional attachments that we have to what was, enjoy what is and embrace what is yet to be.

When considering how you deal with loss I highly recommend Step one in our book, Live In the Present.

Be happy, be lucky and enjoy your life

Sean x

Dealing with PTSD

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What is a trauma?

Trauma, is a Greek word meaning “wound”. A wound can be physical, mental, emotional, financial and so on. The concept of trauma comes from the idea that the wound, or event that is being experienced, is greater than our resources to deal with it. In that sense we have been overwhelmed. However there is a difference between experiencing trauma and being traumatised.

Traumatised, or traumatisation is when the overwhelming experience/trauma creates an amount of stress that is so great that it exceeds our ability to deal the emotions aroused. This is clearly an emotional issue. Trauma or traumatic disorders are always emotional.

Post trauma is the emotional fall out that stays with us after the experience has ended. It is our time to process the emotions and this may take days or weeks. In most cases the emotional effects of a trauma will be normalised in eight to ten weeks.

Repressed trauma can happen when an event is too difficult for us to deal with and we hide it in the recesses of the mind. When this happens we may have no direct memory of the event that caused the trauma, though it may still effect who we are, how we experience the world and, our behaviour.

Recovered memory may be delayed by weeks, years, or even decades. Though when it does emerge the original repressed emotions are released as though they have just happened. Therapeutically this release of emotion and memory is termed an abreaction and involves the re-experiencing of the trauma physically, emotionally and mentally.

Emotional responses Although in repression the memory is lost to the consciousness of the mind it has a constant effect on everyday life and experience and may appear as irrational fears, anxiety, depression, phobia etc. This is described as something within us but outside of our control.

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is when the emotional responses are not repressed but are also not processed. When the effects of the event remain active after six weeks it is given the PTSD diagnosis.

PTSD Symptoms will vary but will include finding it difficult to forget the incident or event that happened. There may be flashbacks, daymares or nightmares about it. Unstable and irrational emotional responses such as anger, tears, anxiety, depression, phobias, disturbed sleep/eating patterns, and so on.

Rumination is the symptom builder. We know that what we think about we bring about that thoughts become things. When we continually go over traumatic events and are unable to let them go they become more intensely embedded in our unconscious and conscious mind because we keep thinking about, and reinforcing them in our mind/brain.

The MindBrain This is where the software of the psychological mind and the hardware of the brain interface. The main aspect of the brain that effects our emotional self is the limbic system in the centre of the brain. Within the limbic system is a little organ called the amygdala. In this organ are templates of cells that relate to out emotional responses. Let say that when I am young I watch my mother reacting phobic-ally to spiders, I then build a template of cells in my amygdala so that when I see a spider the cells release chemistry and so I also react to the spiders as a phobia. Over time my spider template will become hotter and more embedded the more I visit it.

All emotional responses are like this, even the positive ones. So, that if I see the object of my love the love template of cells become hot and releases the chemistry that make me feel loving.

It normally takes about five repetitions of emotional experience to set up a template unless it is punched traumatically and then it is created immediately. Once a traumatic template has been established it will remain hot and active and become more embedded over time unless, or until, it is treated.

Treatment for trauma is a variable feast and will depend on where you live and the therapy that is fashionable at the time. Cognitive therapies such as CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) given over a few sessions are not that good at dealing with trauma in the long-term. They do have a short- term effectiveness by putting in place cognitive tools, sometimes if the emotion was repressed it can reappear at a later date.

EMDR or Eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing is a therapy that mimics the rapid eye movements that happen during the dream cycle in the sleep pattern. As the emotional trauma is encoded into the MindBrain using the same part of the system EMDR is surprisingly effective in the majority of cases.

Rewinding is by far my best option, as it uses the very same process to desensitise a template in the amygdala as was used to put it there in the first place, this is visualisation. When we revisit a trauma it is through the senses of sight, smell, taste and touch, none of which are cognitive. During rewind therapy the emotional memories are address directly and desensitised.

Mindful meditation is becoming mainstream psychology. Mindfulness is the best prevention for all forms of stress and provides the resources needed at the point of trauma. The process of mindfulness is relaxation, contemplation, concentration and meditation a process that is in itself therapeutic. Consistent meditators become their own therapists and counsellors and are able to overcome many things that overwhelm others.

Medication has to be the last on my list. I am not against medication on this basis, if I have a headache I will do all that I can to get rid of it, as a last resort I will take an aspirin. There are medications that can help with anxiety, depression, panic, high blood pressure and so on. There are also natural alternatives that maybe gentler on the system both psychologically and physiologically.

If you do suffer trauma never suffer alone psychotherapy is a good and powerful thing.

Take care and be happy

Sean x