Now that you have your first Reprocessing Plan ready to go, you typically start with the youngest memory to reprocess. Why? It is the seed that planted the whole tree. The pattern of behavior, emotions, sensations, difficulties you are trying to change. It is the most efficient way to reprocess memory networks.

The cool thing about the brain is it is very efficient at reprocessing. It will not only desensitize the memory but will reprocess other memories as well. So other memories that have some similar association may also be reprocessed. This is what I love about EMDR therapy.

In the early days of EMDR, when it was only a technique, the memory targeted would be desensitized and symptoms would improve. But we started to notice that symptoms would sometimes return. EMDR started to get a reputation that it worked for a while but then stopped working. What I love about the EMDR community is, we don’t say it doesn’t work, we start asking and researching what will work. It has evolved to this 8 phase model of therapy all to itself. It is no longer a technique.

We started realizing there were many memories that could be driving the same symptoms, patterns of behavior, emotional states and so on. The three-prong plan was developed.

The Past Prong makes a comprehensive list of memories related to the Presenting Issue. For instance, if your Presenting Issue is being abused or feeling abused, you will have a list of memories when you were abused, or felt abused, physically, emotionally and/or sexually. If your Presenting Issue is being or feeling abandoned, you would have a list of memories when you were or felt abandoned.

When you are ready to reprocess your first memory, if you choose the youngest memory, the first time it happened, when you reprocess the brain will rapidly and spontaneously revisit other memories of the same kind of thing happening. This is what reprocessing is. This is why it is so efficient.

The youngest memory can take a long time to reprocess in some cases because it is accessing a lot of memories in the network. By the time you move up the list of memories you will find some are already less upsetting and some are completely resolved because earlier memories that were reprocessed cleared those as well. Often when I go up the list of memories with people, they are amazed, and relieved that they did not have to do all of them. It takes a lot of work sometimes to put the past list together, but it pays off in a big way later. You get to see more of the progress made than if you did not. The more memories on the list the more opportunity for the brain to access memories that were not consciously recalled. There are always more memories in the other than conscious parts of the brain than in the conscious parts of the brain.

Sometimes people start with later memories because of some difficult circumstances. It is not as efficient and sometimes does not work (remember when I mentioned in Part 5 about the woman whose recent sexual assault would not resolve and it turned out she had two previous assaults. Once she cleared the earlier ones the recent one was resolved). But in complex circumstances it can be a way to start and build capacity for reprocessing.

Phase 3: Assessing a Target Memory for Reprocessing

As we talked about before, memories have different components, sights, sounds, smells, tastes, beliefs, thoughts, sensations.

So, in Phase 3, we are assessing the most upsetting part of the memory to activate the components so we can start reprocessing.

When you bring up the most upsetting part of the memory, we start with an image, which tends to start the activation already. Then look for the negative self-referencing belief about yourself that you experience today when recalling that worst part of the memory. Notice we are not asking what you believed about yourself back when that memory was happening. We are looking at how the memory is affecting you right now.

Core Beliefs Are Not Thoughts

This is one of the most challenging parts of starting to reprocess a memory. Especially in this day and age. Everyone is up in their head thinking. The thing is, if you are thinking you are not reprocessing. So, experiencing the difference is quite a challenge for some people.

Beliefs are short, one liner I statements that tend to bring up emotion. Thought often is a way the brain tries to manage things by avoiding emotion. Some examples of core beliefs are: “I’m not good enough.” “I can’t trust myself.” “I’m not safe.”

We are conditioned to go into a bunch of explanation, rationalization and justification for out thoughts. That is not a core belief. Explanation, rationalization and justification are not only conditioning but also a way to keep the pain at bay. Which is useful until the backlog of internal suffering becomes too much and symptoms become too much, often unmanageable. We go for the core belief that is driving the symptoms.

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After you have identified an image and negative self-referencing belief, you will choose a positive self-referencing belief you would like to have instead when thinking of the memory. And you will measure how true it currently feels when you recall the memory. This will be used later in reprocessing and could change after reprocessing upsetting material.

Once we have completed those two cognitive processes, we get things activated to start the reprocessing. We have you bring up the image and the negative self-referencing belief and notice what emotions show up, how upsetting it feels, and where you experience the upset in your body. Then we start the reprocessing of the memory and other memories in the network that may arise.

You don’t have to hold all of this. Your EMDR practitioner should know how to do this. It is most important that you are experiencing what you are experiencing as you and your clinician are assessing the memory target for reprocessing. I just thought you should have some awareness of the assessment process.

When you have an experience there are a number of things you are experiencing all at once. Sights, sounds, smells, thoughts, tastes, sensations, beliefs and so on. Each of these components is stored in different parts of the brain. So, when you have a memory arise you will often have many of these components arise at the same time.

The sights, sounds, smells, tastes, physical sensations are all stored in the unconscious parts of the brain. You can’t use your thinking to change them. The thinking part of your brain is in the prefrontal lobe.

Let’s say you are driving down the road and suddenly a song comes on and you are suddenly flooded with sights, sounds, smells, emotions, thoughts from a particular memory that happened when you were in junior high school/middle school. You suddenly feel like you are 13 or 14 years old. You might feel ashamed or humiliated. But nothing bad is actually happening to you in the moment. You are reliving the memory.

This is why in EMDR therapy we work from the Adaptive Information Processing Model, which essentially say past experiences drive current behavior. If those past experiences are adaptive, you will have a positive or neutral experience. If those past experiences are maladaptive, you will have a maladaptive experience.

I often say to people that if you want to clear a lot of maladaptive experiences out just listen to songs you listened to in your early years. I know if I react to a song from my past, and get a flood of memories that I need to take some time to reprocess those memories, so they no longer inform my current experiences and choices.

The other than conscious parts of your brain can process billions of bits of information per second. Your prefrontal cortex only processes 6 bits of information per second. So, trying to think your way into change really cannot occur unless the other than conscious parts of memories also change.

In EMDR therapy we use rapid lateral eye movements to reprocess old memories that are still driving current thoughts, emotions, sensations, beliefs, etc.

When we use rapid eye movements it prevents us from thinking. Thinking is basically conditioning from the outside world in how you should do things, what is acceptable and what is not. How you view the world that will be different from how others have experienced the world, or how it is the same as some people have experienced the world. All that is fine and good in some situations, like not hurting someone. But it can also be a huge problem if you are attacking yourself based on external conditioning that is detrimental to you and or society.

When we reprocess maladaptive memories in EMDR therapy, we bring up different components of the memory (sights, negative self-belief, emotions, physical sensations) to activate it and then start the reprocessing.

When a memory is reprocessed the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, physical sensations, self-beliefs that were painful become neutral. People often report the memory is neutral, has no charge, even in the past and no longer relevant. I am always amazed at how someone starts with a particularly horrific memory causing so much suffering, and ends up saying the memory is irrelevant, is over and in the past once it is reprocessed.

There is no thinking involved in this process so the brain can actually neutralize the other components of memories.

Now the brain already knows how to do this. Notice that there are some memories you have that when you think of them, they are just old memories. They may seem faded and really do not bring up a lot of components. That is a memory your brain reprocessed on its own. Then if you think of other memories that bring up uncomfortable or painful components to the memory, those memories have not yet reprocessed.

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One of the things that often happens when someone is clearing old memories of trauma is a sudden feeling of emptiness inside. Of feeling something is missing if they let go of the trauma. Of feeling they will not know who they are any longer.

“Who will I be if I let this go?”

“You can’t take this away from me or I’ll have nothing.”

“If I let this go there will be a big hole in me.”

This is an existential crisis.

This can happen because we define ourselves based on our life experiences. If those experiences have been detrimental and/or traumatizing, and happen repeatedly, our personality is a result of those experiences. The foundation of our experience and definition of ourselves is shaken. It can feel like the bottom will drop out from under us. Even though the change is exactly what we have always wanted. It is just that our fantasy of how things will change is not in alignment with who we really are.

If we are brought up by parents who live from their authenticity, who were mentored to live from who they really are and supported to really step into their innate gifts and capacities, then we would receive the same kind of upbringing. It used to be that the grandparents did most of the child raising since the parents were out making a living. Which worked out really well since the grandparents had a lot more life experience and had worked through much of their youthful challenges. Grandparents usually had the capacity to see the bigger picture.

Now a days kids often do not have grandparents around and are cared for by strangers. Some of those strangers may have some good skills and some just need a job and are not well versed in the intricacies of child rearing. Very often very young with little experience.

There are many very important foundational developments that occur starting in utero up through teen years. These developments build either a stable or unstable foundation for life.

If you have had little in the way of positive, or even neutral experiences growing up, then you are missing some key internal resources.

In EMDR therapy this is something we recognized and made adaptations to the model. We added Phase 2, Preparation and Stabilization. We identify what kind of internal resources someone has and what needs to be built in for the person to successfully reprocess traumatic memories. This is particularly crucial for those who have had extensive traumatic experiences.

I think of this phase as assessing for, and if needed, as building a core stable foundation so that the bottom won’t drop out from underneath the person. And they can let go of the old experiences that they have defined themselves from, in a limiting way.

It is even more exciting when someone can let go of the old and just observe their natural state arise spontaneously and fill in the gap. I love helping clients identify who they really are, before the trauma and conditioning, then strengthening who they really are so they can feel more core stability before taking on reprocessing traumatic material.

It is actually a good thing when someone reaches the crucial point of redefining themselves from Truth rather than the lies and limitations that arise from trauma, neglect and so on. It is not comfortable when it arises, but it is a good indicator that major progress is about to happen.

Doing good internal resource building prior to reprocessing traumatic material lays good groundwork for this transition when it arises. The resources are available to slide in and take the place of the traumatic experiences. People often have impressive improvement in Phase 2 before moving to the reprocessing phases. And those resources become even more available as the trauma is resolved.

If you have had the experience of being afraid you will not know who you are if you let the trauma go, there was nothing wrong. It was just an indicator you were leaving the old definitions of self, based on trauma, neglect, etc. and stepping into who you really are. You just need the help and support to make the transition.

When it comes time to reprocess memories you will return to your Master Treatment Plan from Phase 1, choose your first Presenting Complaint and create a Reprocessing Plan for that complaint. For each Presenting Complaint you will make a list of as many specific past memories as you can find where you had that experience going all the way back to the first time you had the experience. It is an important timeline to really clean out the memory networks that drive the Presenting Complaint

What are Memory Networks?

Think of it this way. Every experience you have colors how you see yourself, others and circumstance. We have a ton of memories every day. Your brain actually knows how to reprocess memories spontaneously on its own. You have some difficult memories, that when you think of them, they do not have any charge physically or emotionally, and they do not bring up really upsetting thoughts. It just feels like an old memory, and it may have been difficult, but you may have gained valuable lessons, awareness or learning from it that you use in the future. (EMDR’s AIP Model (Adaptive Information Processing).

You have other memories that when you think of them you have distressing physical and/or emotional reaction to them and they bring up distressing thoughts or beliefs. Those memories the brain has not reprocessed yet. Something interfered. Sometimes that is because it was so overwhelming, or it kept happening over and over so the brain could not reprocess it. And you keep getting triggered by similar circumstances, sights, sounds, locations, smells, a tone of voice, a type of personality, and so on, because the memory has not yet reprocessed. This is what Dr. Shapiro discovered. And, then how to reprocess them memories so they are no longer driving current thoughts, and actions, emotions and sensation from a distressing perspective.

When we choose a Presenting issue from the Master Treatment Plan and create a plan for reprocessing the memories that contribute to the issue.

Past Prong: Past Memories

You will list past memories from present time back to when this Presenting Issue started. You won’t need to find all of them from the time the issue started to present time to clear out the pattern. But you will need to find memories representative through time to make sure the network of negative experiences clears out. If you have big gaps in time between memories it is likely that some of the memory networks will not be accessed and cleared during reprocessing.

Present Prong: Present Triggers

Present Prong - you will make a list of things that trigger you to experience that presenting issue. Ie: any time you get called to the boss’s office, any time you drive by a location where the issue occurred, any time you hear a particular song. A trigger is a part of a memory, ie: a sight, sound, location, tone of voice, an authority figure.

Making a list of Present Triggers is a way you will check to see if the negative memory networks were cleared out after reprocessing all the past memories. If you are still getting triggered after clearing all the past memories, there are still some memories that have not yet been processed. Memories of when you were triggered will be reprocessed.

Future Prong: Future Templates

Past Prong - For every trigger you list in the Present Prong you will do a Future Template to build in more adaptability. By building in more adaptability for the future you will have more resilience when challenges come up in life.

Once the plan is complete you will choose the youngest memory to reprocess. Why the youngest? Because it is the seed that planted the whole dysfunctional tree. It is very efficient to process the youngest first because once you start reprocessing your brain will spontaneously link into other memories with similar components (circumstances, locations, sights, sounds, smells, tastes, personality types and so on).

People usually want to target the most recent incident first. Mostly because you are not aware of how the past is actually driving the current experience. When you reprocess the earliest memory first, it will often change other memories in the list. This often makes later memories easier to reprocess since they will be less upsetting than when you started the plan. It is the most efficient way to resolve past memories.

Reprocessing more recent memories first is not very efficient since it is sitting on top of years of other memories. Often a recent memory will not clear completely because there are earlier memories that are informing the present memory in a maladaptive way.

For instance. Someone came to me once saying they were helping someone clear a recent experience of sexual abuse, but the memory would not clear. My question to them was, “Have they ever been sexually abused before?” The answer was yes, two other times. So, they went back and cleared the first time it happened and then the second. Once those two were done they were surprised that the most recent memory was now clear and did not need to be reprocessed.

I know this doesn’t make sense, but much of what I do does not make sense. When I did the things that made sense clients did not get change. Now I do what works.

My clients are often shocked that clearing earlier memories suddenly shows up as them handling things much differently in present time without even thinking about it. It just is easy, and in many cases, they didn’t even realize they were doing things differently until we evaluated what was changing after every reprocessing session.

If you have a severe history of abuse, neglect, etc., your therapist may use specialty protocols and interventions to take some charge out of a memory in parts to make it easier to reprocess the whole thing.

Phase 2 can look very different for each person. It depends on what your background is. There are a number of capacities you need to be able to reprocess memories safely and effectively.

So again, looking at your foundation and what is needed for you to be successful in the reprocessing phases.

• You must have enough core stability to feel safe in letting things change.

• You need to have a good relationship with your therapist so that you can let them support you, especially if difficult memories come up.

• You need to be able to dual focus. This mean you have to be able to stay in present time while recalling past experiences, so you reprocess a memory, not relive it. It also means you have to be able to do two things at once. Internally watch the old memory while moving your eyes during reprocessing. This takes some practice for many people.

• You also need to be able to let whatever happens happen. This means that if you have emotions come and go you allow that to occur. If a physical sensation gets worse, you can just observe and let it change. When other memories come up you just observe them so your innate wisdom can do its job.

• There may be other skills or capacities you will need as well. So, you may need to do some or extensive resource development. Everyone is different.

• You will need to stay in window of tolerance: be able to bring a memory to mind with enough disturbance for reprocessing to occur, and not get overwhelmed by the memory(ies) so reprocessing can occur. This means you will need a variety of tools for self-regulation if a lot of upset occurs. Since you continue to reprocess in between sessions you may need these tools to support you as reprocessing continues.

• You will need to be able to give your clinician enough information both during reprocessing (without going into detail), and what happened between session. This allows them to know where to guide you next.

  • EMDR is not talk therapy, so you have to give BRIEF feedback so your therapists knows where to guide you next.

  • The longer you talk you will lose where you left off physically and emotionally, and restarting the eye movements may not work as well.

  • Your prefrontal cortex can be very good at going into defensive/protective mode and you lose the moment of change.

  • With EMDR therapy the longer you talk the less you get done.

In Phase 2 I use various tools to prepare someone for reprocessing. The tools I use helps both myself and my client see what internal resources they have and build in anything that is missing. If there has been extensive trauma it may take quite some time to complete Phase 2. I help people build a core sense of self and stability so they will be able to reprocess memories. Many people experience improvement in their circumstances with Phase 2 work before getting to the reprocessing. These same tools are often helpful if someone gets stuck in reprocessing.

Some of the skills and internal resources you will develop in Phase 2 will use slow eye movements to strengthen your experience of the resources. For me, I am looking for clients to have the “felt sense” of the resource, not just an imagination of the resource as it is often a fantasy reality of the resource and is not embodied when allows the resource to show up spontaneously.

For instance, let’s say you would like to be able to feel more confident when disagreeing with someone. If you have the “felt sense” of feeling confident when you engage with somone who may disagree with you, you may find yourself spontaneously not taking in their upset or discomfort because you are feeling more confident in speaking up. Sometimes you may not notice a change, but others may comment or compliment you in handling things differently that you were not even aware of. There really is not force of effort once a resource is embodied. (That is my body-centered psychotherapy training talking.)

Slow eye movements will strengthen and enhance experience. We only use it with positive or neutral resources. We do not want to link into anything negative in this phase, so we go slow.

This gives you the opportunity to become familiar with eye movements and learn how to dual focus. Dual focus is literally doing two things at once. Moving eyes while paying attention to what you are experiencing internally. Notice the attention is on your internal experience not what the eyes are seeing or looking at. The other part of dual focus is to be able to look at and notice your internal experience while staying in present time. This is not about going back in time and reliving a memory. That is what talk therapy does, and it is often retraumatizing. Looking at the memory from present time is what disrupts how it is stored.

Once you have completed Phase 2, you return to Phase 1 for treatment planning.

You will choose a Presenting Issue to address and Create a Reprocessing Plan for that Presenting Issue.

One of the things to know about the phases is that you will be revisiting them. They do not go in order 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 and you are done. You will be moving around them until all of your Presenting Issues are resolved, meaning your symptoms will no longer be present.

Phase 1: History Taking & Treatment Planning

When you start therapy, your therapist needs to do a Biopsychosocial history to identify:

• What have you come to therapy to resolve?

• What your life experience has been like. Your life experiences create how you perceive and experience the world.

  • Developmentally, starting from in utero, there are many very important activities and experiences that form a core stable foundation. If you do not have them or they have been breached the core foundation is not stable. You are missing resources not available to you for negotiating even simple things in life: focus, attention, impulse control, skills in math & reading, sensory integration, emotional regulation. This is like building a house. If you build the house on a swamp, it will eventually collapse under pressure. If you build it on a strong, stable foundation it will support you.

Visit “What Does Your Foundation Look Like?” for more information.

• What has your ability to be and feel connected to others been like.

• Do you have a sense of safety and security?

• Can you identify what you need, and can you get your needs met?

• Have you experienced losses? How many and how far back in life?

• Have you experienced physical, emotional or sexual abuse. How often and how far back in life?

• Have you experienced medical trauma? When, what kind and how often?

• What medications and supplements are you on? Do you use substances? What, how often and is there a dependency and/or addiction? If you do have a hx of dependency/addiction, for how long and is it current?

  • Some medications block your ability to reprocess.

  • Some drugs and medicinal plants specifically work to block emotions and sensations. This means when you attempt to reprocess a memory the emotions and sensation related to that memory cannot be accessed for reprocessing.

  • There are ways to work with all of this in Phase 2 so reprocessing can be successful.

• How do you take care of yourself (diet, exercise, sleep, etc.)

• How do you handle stress? What tools to you have, do you use them and do they work for you?

• What does your support system look like?

• Can you dual focus? Stay in present time will recalling memories. Observe your internal experience while moving your eyes.

• Can you observe old memories without reliving them.

• Can you allow yourself to move from upset to positive emotional experiences?

• What internal resources you have and what is missing.

• What you will need to be successful in EMDR therapy.

• This helps identify what you will need in Phase 2 to prepare you for reprocessing memory targets, and make sure you have the internal stabilization needed to handle what may come up when reprocessing memories.

Once the history has been gathered and reviewed. It is helpful to create what I call a Master Plan. A Master Plan is where you identify Presenting Issues (what you want to resolve). These could be:

• Negative beliefs: I’m not good enough. I never do anything right. I don’t have a right to exist. I’m a burden

• Patterns of behavior: overreacting when someone gives you feedback, lashing out in anger if someone disagrees with you, wanting to isolate and avoid people.

• Emotional Patterns: Feeling something is wrong with you, powerless, unsafe, like you don’t belong

• Having been abused (physically, sexually and/or emotionally)

This Master Plan is a working document that you can add to as you progress in your EMDR therapy. It is helpful to list symptoms you experience at the beginning of therapy and the Presenting Issues. This way as you work your way through your therapy process you will be able to see things resolve. My clients find this helpful because they can track and see their progress.

People usually have more than one Presenting Issue when they start therapy, so this is a good way to keep track of things and make sure everything is resolved.

Then you move to Phase 2.

If you decide to do EMDR therapy this will help you understand some of what the process is. Things are not linear in EMDR therapy and yet they are in some ways. But people are not linear beings either, as much as everyone in most circumstances attempt to try to make us linear.

One of the things I often say to my clients is that nothing I do makes sense. The things I did that made sense did not work in freeing people from limitations. The things I do that don’t make sense tend to facilitate change. EMDR is one of those things.

It is important to know that once you have the experience of EMDR in the different phases, then the light bulb turns on and a whole new awareness opens up. This includes therapists. When they come to EMDR training they will try to fit EMDR therapy into what they already know. But it does not fit. Other modalities can fit into phase 2 of EMDR therapy but how we conceptualize what is going on the build plans for reprocessing memory networks is very different. Therapists are often surprised and even shocked at how fast things can change when they experience the practicum part of the training.

I often tell my clients, there is a method to my madness and once they have the experience of the different phases and parts of the plans for reprocessing, things will open up in a whole new way.

It is often hard for people to do EMDR therapy because they don’t “understand” it. Most often this comes from the fantasy that they just come to session and the therapist waves their hand in front of them and they get better. This perspective comes from way back at the start of EMDR therapy when it was new and just a technique. It has evolved into a full blown 8 phase protocol. And depending on the person and their extent of trauma, neglect, abandonment, etc., it can take a while to prepare them for being able to reprocess memories. Sometime extensive preparation and specialty protocols depending on the circumstances.

There are many therapists who have taken the EMDR training in the past, and especially in the beginning who have not kept up on the changes. So the information they pass on is no longer accurate. The EMDR International Association encourages EMDR practitioners to repeat the Basic training periodically to keep up on the changes.

The good news about the EMDR community is that we don’t say it doesn’t work we ask how it could work for people with more complicated circumstances. So much had been developed over the decades.

8 Phases

As I mentioned before, EMDR therapy is not a technique. It was when I first learned it (1991). Dr. Shapiro had only been teaching EMDR for a couple of years. Not much was known about it back then, only that it seemed to have promising results.

Dr Shapiro did a really smart thing; she created a newsletter and invited people she trained to send in the results they had with the clients they worked with. To give feedback on what seemed to work and not work with various mental health issues. She also really pushed for research.

Over time it was clear some people had difficulty reprocessing. Reprocessing was overwhelming for people with severe and complicated histories of abuse, neglect, addiction and so on. What I love about the EMDR community is that we don’t say it doesn’t work. We ask how could it work for that population? This is how EMDR as a technique evolved into its own form of psychotherapy. And, how other protocols were developed for more complicated circumstances.

We realized we had to do extensive work to create stability for someone with severe and complicated histories to be able to handle reprocessing. Protocols for building internal resources that can create internal stability.

I had been working in locked psychiatric programs, social service programs, and mental health programs with people who have a great deal of trauma, neglect, abandonment and worse from early in their lives and throughout their lives. They did not do well with reprocessing. It became my mission to find what could create the internal stability.

There are eight phases in EMDR therapy. They do not go in order. You will be moving in and out of phases as you progress in your therapy.

What do we do in EMDR therapy?

I will continue with describing the phases in the next post.

EMDR therapy is a completely different kind of therapy than you may have encountered before. EMDR therapy is a completely different way to conceptualize what is causing distress in someone’s life. It is not like traditional forms of psychotherapy that focus on trying to change cognitions and behaviors, to change things. EMDR therapy does not try to control or manage symptoms. It is a steep learning curve for most therapists. You have to unlearn what you have learned to be proficient at EMDR therapy. There is much to learn from a very different perspective.

Dr Francine Shapiro, the originator of EMDR therapy, discovered that rapid lateral eye movements while recalling a disturbing memory desensitized the memory and reprocessed memories with similar components at the same time.

She realized that we all have an innate capacity to move towards health psychologically. Just like how our body can heal cuts on its own. When something difficult, challenging or overwhelming happens, as we get through it our innate capacity to heal kicks in. We often learn things from the experience that we can apply to future circumstances.

If you have spontaneously reprocessed a memory, when you recall the memory, it will have less and eventually no physical or emotional charge to it. It will not bring up negative thoughts. It may look faded or distant or black and white. People often report that it is just an old memory and not relevant any longer. These are just some ways people describe the difference in a memory after it has been reprocessed.

Sometimes circumstances interfere with our ability to reprocess a memory organically. For instance, the physical or emotional experience was too overwhelming. Or something interfered with our ability to learn from the experience and apply the learning to the future. Or the same thing kept happening over and over, so we never get over it.

When we have an experience that has a component of a previous memory (sights, sound, smells, sensation, location, similar circumstance, etc.) we will react much like we did in the previous experience.

Essentially past experiences inform present circumstances. What Dr. Shapiro called the AIP Model (Adaptive Information Processing Model). We may react as if a past experience is happening again even if the present circumstance is different. This happens with both positive and negative past experiences. Essentially, we see the world based on what we have experienced in our lives. This is why there are so many divergent experiences of the same circumstances.

We tend to project our experience out onto what is happening in the moment and onto other people. Depending on life experience and conditioning, you may see what is happening as positive or negative.

For instance, you are in a car accident. Every time you drive down that same road you get jittery and fear you will be in an accident. Or every time you see a white truck you start to panic. In this situation the location and the color and type of vehicle is a trigger. You will react as if you are in danger even if that vehicle and circumstance on the road currently are not causing a problem.

Or, why war veterans can have flashbacks of a mission gone bad even when they are state side in a safe environment. There would have been a component of the memory in their environment, a sight, sound, smell, taste, circumstance, sensation that was present during the mission that triggered the flashback. It could have been a simple as the sound of a bird or the wind that was the same in both situations.

I had a firefighter once who reported being triggered every time they drove by the location where they got injured and every time their neighbor put out their recycling. Ok, so the location makes sense but why the recycling? There was no recycling going on at the scene. The sound of the class clinking in the recycling bin triggered the memory of the glass breaking on the windshield of the car that hit him.

The brain stores a memory in different parts of the brain based on its components, sights, sounds, smells, sensation, tastes, location, circumstances and so on. The other than conscious parts of the brain can process billions of bits of information per second so it will associate current circumstances with past information lightning fast. It helps us apply learning to present circumstances but if past memories are not reprocessed it can give us unhelpful responses.

I often tell clients that EMDR therapy is like jump starting a battery in your car. When you get to the reprocessing phases of EMDR therapy, and you start reprocessing old memories your organic capacity to reprocess is activated. You continue to reprocess outside of therapy sessions. You essentially get more for your money since you continue to reprocess outside of your therapy sessions.

It can take a while to get to the reprocessing part of EMDR therapy, depending on your history, internal resources, ability to let go and let whatever happens happen, and your ability to change states from upset to calm. More about the EMDR therapy phases below.

When Dr Shapiro originally developed EMDR it was just a technique applied to upsetting memories. Over time there is much we have learned about EMDR and how it can be most effective. Sometimes people became too overwhelmed when reprocessing a memory, so we had to build in a phase to assess a person’s ability to reprocess memories and prepare them if they are not ready. EMDR therapy is now its own form of psychotherapy.

EMDR therapy is a comprehensive therapy all its own. Originally when it was just a technique. Now it has evolved into a full form of Psychotherapy. Some clinicians are still using it as a technique. Integrating it in with other things they do. This is different than from receiving EMDR therapy that comes from the benefit of its comprehensive approach that allows for other modalities to be used in Phase 2 to prepare people for reprocessing. More on the phases in the next article.

Very often when I hear people talking about boundaries they are actually talking about walls. “I had to put up my boundary.”

One of the most helpful trainings I took part in in the late 1990’s was Bodynamics. It originates out of Denmark and was developed by Lisbeth Marcher. Bodynamics is a body centered training that intricately looks at how our life experiences affect how we develop over time. Lisbeth and her colleagues looked at the physical, emotional and psychological development of children from in utero up to adolescents. They observed the muscular development at each stage and what the emotional and psychological development was at each stage and how the muscle tone in various parts of the body hold the healthy, or unhealthy development.

We learned to read bodies and could see what stages of development were interfered with either early or late in each stage of development, and in some cases both early and late. This training was critical for me in identifying what someone’s internal resources are or are not in Phase 2 of EMDR therapy, so I knew what needed to be built so reprocessing traumatic memories could be successful.

Boundaries were one of the areas that was very helpful. What I love about Bodynamics is there are activities to do with people that allows both myself and the client to see what they have and what is missing or has been breached because of trauma. The really fun part is that by repeating the activities regularly the internal resource will come back online. That is if someone is willing to do the work to repair the issue.

Our healthy or unhealthy development starts in utero. In utero we a just a clump of cells to start out with and we have no sense of separation from mother. We rely on both mother and father’s boundaries up until around age 2 when we go through our first process of separation. If our parents’ boundaries are not healthy then we will learn unhealthy boundaries early on. Our parents can’t give us what they don’t themselves have.

Of course there is also the boundary of our skin. This is where we can see issues if someone has sensory integration issues. They cannot stand to be touched. Working with skin boundaries can be helpful.

As we tend to explore the world separate from our parents, ie: a toddler running away from parents, getting overwhelmed without their boundaries and then running back to them, we learn to develop and rely on our own boundaries but they will be modeled from our parents.

Being reliant on our parents’ boundaries up to around age two is an energetic process. We have energetic boundaries that young. We sense things around us. We have this same capacity all of the time, but we are taught to ignore it or that it is woo woo. In fact, energetic boundary work I do with people is one of the most effective and empowering I have ever seen. There is just an organic unfolding of healthy energetic boundaries if people repeat the work consistently. There is no having to do anything about them.

The HeartMath Institute has spearheaded this kind of work through their research of coherence between heart and brain. They have actually been able to measure a field of energy around the heart that extends six feet from the heart outward. When the heart and brain are in coherence people have a naturally occurring energetic boundary around them that others can sense. When we don’t have it, we tend to suck in other people’s stuff and misidentify it as our own. We become incoherent. We lose our creativity. We are less productive, stressed. The people want to “put up their boundary” – WALL.

Back to this self-awareness thing I keep harping on. To res

tore your healthy boundaries you will need enough self-awareness to know when you have healthy boundaries, when you have no boundary and when you have walls. When you can catch yourself having dropped your boundary or having a wall up you can use tools to bring your boundary back online in a healthy way.

I have done energetic boundary work with people who have been victims of various kinds of abuse who have been stunned when they realized they were getting accurate signals not to trust the person who hurt them but had dismissed it because they did not trust themselves, let the perpetrators perspective override what they inherently knew. I have also done this same work with perpetrators who are wanting change in their lives, who have recognized that they were picking up the energetics of who did not have healthy boundaries, that they could take advantage of. In both cases, resourcing their boundaries bring people back into a healthy state of boundaries.

Healthy Boundaries

When we have healthy boundaries, we meet others at their boundaries and choose what we let in and what we do not. That does not mean we drop our boundary. It means there are areas our boundaries overlap but are still maintained.

Unhealthy Boundaries – No boundary

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There are many things that affect our early development. Another VERY important early developmental experience is the activities we do as kids. Particularly in utero through infancy.

Did you know that when you are an infant and can do nothing for yourself, the innate wisdom within you knows exactly what to do to build the capacity to be able to focus, have impulse control, have good attention, and have healthy emotional regulation, good sensory integration and learn about the world?

As we lie on our bellies, we hear things or see things out of the corner of our eye, and our curiosity pulls us to discover what that is. We attempt to lift our heads to see but there is no tone in our muscles yet, so we are unable to do so. But our curiosity keeps pulling us to discover what that sound or sight is. We keep efforting to lift our heads over and over until we have built enough tone in our muscles where we can actually lift our head and see what captured our curiosity.

And then something else catches our eye, or we hear something, and try to see but can’t because we have to push up to see more and we don’t yet have tone in our arm muscles. But our curiosity pulls us to effort, effort until we are able to push up and discover what that is.

This curiosity keeps pulling us through different developmental stages, crawling (on our bellies), creeping (on hands and knees), sitting up and eventually walking.

The thing is that each of these activities also build neuropathways in our brain for doing these activities. The early work of crawling and creeping are particularly important for building neuropathways for focus, impulse control, attention, math, reading, sensory integration and emotional regulation. Just to name a few.

Isn’t our innate wisdom just stunning!

Here are some symptoms that will tell you if you have some neurological damage or delay: difficulty naming sensations or emotions, difficulty with attention, poor impulse control, unable to stay focused (ADD, ADHD); difficulty with math or reading skills (Dyslexia), clumsiness, difficulty with reading social cues, Autism, Asperger’s, lack of empathy, sensory overwhelm, emotional dysregulation, behavioral problems.

In some cases, we may have had good early developmental activity completion but have had some experience that has damaged our neuropathways. For instance, really high fever, head injury, or even a small bump on the head, chemical exposure, mold exposure.

If we are not allowed to do our developmental activities that our innate wisdom takes us through, we will have lifelong issues.

Unfortunately, we have several generations that have neurodevelopmental deficits. Why? It became really popular to put kids in swings, walkers, jumpy seats or seats that prop them on their back. What?

You see when an infant is in one of these contraptions, they are not doing their developmental activities to build neuropathways in their brains. There has been an explosion of ADD, ADHD, Autism, Asperger’s, learning disabilities, sensory-motor problems, and behavioral problems. It has become an epidemic. Almost the norm (Normal just means everyone is doing or has the same thing. That does not mean it is healthy.)

There is a way to repair this.

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To critically think involves:

1. being open minded,

2. being curious,

3. suspending judgement (right-wrong, good-bad, black & white thinking)

4. being willing to see how individual parts or circumstances affects the whole,

5. being willing to be wrong,

6. not being attached to your perspective as the only right perspective.

So, for instance:

1. talking to a number of people from all walks of life,

2. gathering information from a variety of sources,

3. being curious about information from perspectives you are unfamiliar with or may disagree with.

This allows you to:

1. To see how this choice or action will impact others, including those different from you.

2. To get a variety of perspectives on how to address the issue, solve the problem, make a choice, create new possibilities.

3. To look at a bigger perspective of the issue.

4. Be more creative

5. Have better problem-solving capacities.

6. Identify bias (your own (self-awareness), and others).

The original Democracy of the United States was based on critical thinking.

1. Gathering information from all of those in the community.

2. Having a representative bring that information to representatives from other communities.

3. Bringing back to the community more information gathered from other representatives.

4. Acquiring more feedback.

5. Returning with more input for other representatives, to be able to make a choice that is the best interest in all who would be impacted.

We really no longer have a democracy. Our system now is based on people wanting power and meeting the needs of special interests.

Critical thinking can fend off mind control by not taking anything at face value or based on your own bias. To research what is being said, presented, sold, etc.

When you are locked into judgment, right-wrong, good-bad, I know-you don’t, your world is very small and self-centered.

Being curious is one of the healthiest and most self-empowering states you can experience. It opens the door to what you are not aware of and to more possibilities. When people step into curiosity doors open and new innovative ways to handle things become available.

I learned a lot sitting in circle. Where each person is allowed to share their experience and perspective without anyone else commenting. As each person shares their perspective and experience amazing information unfolds. Things I never experienced or thought of would emerge. My reference expanded and I could see new configurations that could be helpful for all.

The idea of brainstorming was a good one . Except now often when people brainstorm, they have an agenda to be right. If it is done with no attachment to outcome and a suspension of judgment, new configurations can come from a diversity of ideas.

One question I love to use to open things up is, “What is available that I cannot see because I am locked in my perspective?”

Very early in my career I worked in crisis centers and locked psychiatric programs. I was training staff to intervene with violent behavior, nonviolently. The first part of the training included looking at our own history, beliefs and triggers, and how they contribute to the interaction with someone threatening violence.

As a mental health professional, we are all taught in our degree programs about projection, we all project. We will see in others what we believe. What we believe is a product of our conditioning. We don't really see things as they are, we see them through our own filters. Quantum physics has proven that when we observe something, we change the outcome based on our own projections. This is also why I have mixed feelings about research. It can be helpful and has a lot of flaws when it comes to results for a number of reasons. But that is another post.

I always recommend my clients watch Michael Neil’s Ted Talk Video, “Why Aren’t We Awsomer?” He does a great job demonstra…

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When you or someone else is suffering people often say things like: “It’s over you can get on with it now.” “Why don’t you move on, get over it.”

The thing is, it is not over if the memory has not been organically reprocessed by your brain. What? You have an innate wisdom within you to move from dis-ease to health. Unless something gets in the way. This is what Francine Shapiro, PhD realized in her development of EMDR therapy. (More on that in a different post.)

To give a very blatant example, a war veteran will have a flashback of being in war and actually be reliving the memory. You may have known them as far back as early childhood and they would be unable to recognize you because their brain is reliving the memory. This happens to us all the time but not in such severe circumstances.

Components of Memory

Your brain stores memory in different components: sights, sounds, emotions, sensations, smells, tastes, beliefs, and thoughts. Most of those components are stored in the other than conscious parts of your brain. (See “Why I am not a fan of talk therapy – Part 1 for more information).

Any time a circumstance that has a similar sight, sound, emotion, sensation, smell, taste, belief or thought occurs in a current situation the unconscious parts of your brain may link back to a previous memory if that memory has not been reprocessed organically. This why sometime people seem to be having an inflated reaction to a current circumstance. They may actually be linking into a previous circumstance but not know it.

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When I started my search for what would create sustained change for people I explored various spiritual traditions, energetic healing methods and body centered psychotherapies. What I learned from all of them is that we have an innate wisdom within us (well really it is not within us, it is us) that knows how to heal, physically, emotionally and psychologically. It is usually our conditioning (what we are told to believe or how to see the world, ourselves and others) or shock trauma that prevents us from healing spontaneously.

When you know how real profound change occurs it is not from thinking, figuring, understanding from our prefrontal cortex, it is from our innate wisdom/truth. Thinking, figuring & understanding from that much slower part of the brain (which processes only 6 bits of information per second – see “Why I am not a fan of talk therapy – Part 2) is out of the way and innate wisdom/truth can do what it knows how to do.

This is why EMDR therapy works so well. When the eye …

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Do you realize that you are always getting a combination of signals, physical, emotional, and thought qualities, that point to important information.

Here is an example.

When I worked in locked psychiatric settings and crisis centers, I learned that my body gives me very clear signals when I am dealing with manipulative people. Teenagers were my greatest teachers.

I would get a twist in my stomach, I would experience confusion, and I would get mad. Once I discovered I was talking to myself it was easy to know how to handle it. There was nothing wrong about the signals, they were very helpful in identifying what was going on. Then it was easy to make healthy choices and the signals would neutralize. The anger would go away because I was no longer buying into the manipulation. The confusion would go away because I trusted my signals and could step out of the dynamic. The twist in my gut went away because I was clear within myself and making healthy choices.

Now it is important to understand…

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So, we looked a little at how talk therapy cannot address the parts of memory that are stored in the unconscious parts of the brain.

The second thing about the thinking part of the brain is it only processes about 6 bits of information per second. The other than conscious parts of the brain process billions of bits of information per second. Which is why EMDR therapy is so effective. It allows all parts of the brain to do the work of clearing the traumatic material. Not just the thinking part of the brain but the other parts of the brain that store the emotions, sensations, sounds, smells, etc. As a matter-in-fact thinking stops reprocessing in EMDR therapy. Many clients (and therapists train to become EMDR practitioners) are shocked at how much gets done in a short period of time when they are reprocessing. And, that when they think the reprocessing stops. I have many clients say to me: “I know why this works. It won’t let me think.”

Other experiential and energetic forms of treatment …

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