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There is nothing quite like going to therapy and feeling really heard, seen, and cared for by your psychotherapist, and given the toxic stress of the coronavirus, the entire field of psychotherapy is fast-forwarding to become even more effective in combating toxic stress. It integrates brain science in ways we did not expect until 2030!
The new "bolt-on" to psychotherapy is emotional brain training (EBT), which gives us all simple emotional techniques to clear toxic stress rapidly, often getting from stress to joy in four minutes (or less).
As EBT's founder, I have written many books on the method, and in the last decade, I went deep into the science, finding ways to make the tools rewire trauma, addictions, obesity, as well as anxiety and depression. Then one day, I realized that people could feel much better by using one simple tool of the method. Actually, it was my husband Walt, who said, "Laurel, a person can get 80% of the value of EBT by using one skill. Why not write a book on that one skill?"
I only met him seven years ago, and at the time, he had a list of stress-induced problems (who doesn't?) and perhaps as part of our "courtship," he started learning EBT and joined a telegroup. All these problems are gone now and we use EBT several times a week in support of dealing with relationship stress and ... life.
I realized that he was right. So, soon after "shelter-in-place" started, I wrote my new book, The Stress Vaccine, which was just released last week. I'll share excerpts of it, particularly key ideas that will change how you think about therapy, here on my blog. You can get a dose of "the vaccine" along with a mobile app and workshops at the EBT online community, but let's start at the beginning. This is the first of a series on EBT that will help you appreciate how resilient you can be — anytime and anywhere.
The first step in understanding this stress vaccine is to know that the relationship you have with your therapist is so powerful because of emotional connection. Your therapist sees you and understands you, and in those moments of therapy, you feel so much better. That's in part because the therapist is trained on how to "co-regulate" with you, so your emotional brain gets the benefit of their brain which is highly resilient. They have the emotional skills to be at "Brain State 1," which is the state of neural integration, in which you feel joy.
Then you leave the therapy session and a bit later, you're triggered. All that progress you made in therapy seems to disappear and, what do you do? In the past, you may have blamed yourself, tried to think your way out of that anxiety or depression, or soothed yourself with sweets, streaming videos, or a drink or two. However, in support of your therapy, you can use EBT, that is, take a small "dose" of the "stress vaccine" and return to a higher brain state in four minutes or less.
The benefit of boosting your progress in psychotherapy with EBT is you preserve the benefit and "glow" of the therapy session, and you strengthen your brain's natural pathways of radical resilience. Everyone has these pathways, as they are encoded in the brain of babies. If you've ever seen a good mother respond to a crying baby, she emotionally connects with the infant and proceeds to spiral up to a state of joy, in which both mother and infant are in joy.
You have those same pathways. They are quick, emotional, and universal. The purpose of The Stress Vaccine is to give you a simple structured way to strengthen these resiliency pathways in your own brain. You not only feel better at the moment, but with each use of the technique, you make your resiliency pathways stronger, so they are activated more easily and, over time, spontaneously.
Activity for Day 1:
Pause whenever you are stressed and say, "I have a hidden pathway in my brain that takes me from stress to joy. Why don't I use it?"
Just knowing you have that pathway will boost your confidence. Look for my next blog on The Stress Vaccine to learn more about how to wire your brain to get from stress to joy in four minutes or less. You can use EBT alone or as a way to sustain and deepen the benefits of your psychotherapy.
Next: Clearing Away Your Demons
References
Mitrovic, I., Fish, L., Frassetto, L., Mellin, L., (2011) Rewiring the Stress Response: A New Paradigm in Health Care. Hypothesis (9),1-4.
