Treating PTSD: Good Decisions vs. Bad Decisions
Wednesday, July 15th, 2009 • BRIDGE THE GAP Healing Workshop •
Continuing the NLP coverage…. I’m in Orlando studying with Richard Bandler (the guy in the photo) and John La Valle.
Yesterday, for the first time I hypnotized someone. Learning Eriksonian hypnosis is part of this NLP course; we’re learning to help clients set aside the conscious mind so we can help them reframe experience, change strategies and implement better systems.
Having been on the receiving end of hypnotherapy during my own PTSD healing (and loving the hypnotic process) I wasn’t sure how I’d feel as the practitioner, but it was easy and tons of fun to use what I’m learning to help someone produce an altered state. It’s left me with a greater appreciation for what and how healing ‘is’.
The crux of everything - NLP, hypnosis, healing - is altering something. Whether it’s a state or perception the goal is the same: alter, change, progress.
Distilling things down to their essence, more NLP ideas from the frontlines. Below are Richard Bandlerisms from the past 2 days. (Note: Italics are my own commentary):
“Human beings only do 2 things: they make good decisions and bad decisions.” In PTSD we are acting from what we think are good decisions (meant to keep us safe) but they are bad decisions since they cripple our lives. Healing means seeing the bad decisions and replacing them with good ones.
“It’s not understanding that produces change, it’s change.” We can sit in psychotherapy for years understanding what happened to us and how we have become the distorted PTSD people we are, but that won’t help us heal. Understanding is great but only acting to achieve change will actually make things change.
“Our experience of what’s good and what’s bad changes during a life…. care for yourself as a human being by knowing where you are.” We are supposed to change. Our feelings, emotions, perspectives are supposed to be mutable. Thinking we are stuck in PTSD is utterly wrong; we are human which means we are meant to evolve. No state is permanent. By being present and allowing change we make good decisions about who and where and what and how we are.
“It’s finding the right moment to do the right thing that makes humans functional.” We are dysfunctional in PTSD because we continue doing the wrong thing — accessing the wrong emotions, entertaining the wrong thoughts, protecting ourselves in the wrong situations. And it’s just that easy to imagine the switch: to heal we need to begin finding the right moments to do the right things to help us heal.
“Beliefs are not good, bad, right or wrong; they’re smart or stupid.” Richard would say that in PTSD we’re holding onto beliefs (for example, the belief we’re in constant danger) that are stupid. Learning to let go of those beliefs brings healing.
“Every scar on my face is mine. I earned them.” A survivor of life’s incidentals, including a lab explosion that left his face very scarred, Richard wears his scars with pride without letting them define him.
“If a bad experience is bad I think just once is plenty.” Richard doesn’t believe we should sit in psychotherapy for years discussing and reliving our traumas. In fact, he works with clients without knowing the content of their stories. He only wants to know the ‘how’, as in: how does a system work. He would ask us “How do you do depression?” “How do you do hypervigilance?” “How do you do avoidance?” Based on what we answer he would devise a way to reframe perceptions and redirect the strategies.
Can you see why I’m loving this training so much? The implications for healing are enormous. It’s simply a way of taking who we are and making us, as Richard says, ‘optimized.’
Every day I sit in these sessions and think, We’re close. We PTSDers are so close to being able to take control of our systems, change the strategies and lead joyful, empowered lives.
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Tags: Changing Unhealthy Perceptions, eriksonian hypnosis, neuro linguistic programming, NLP, posttraumatic stress, ptsd, richard bandler, treat
Sounds like a great focus.
“I don’t want to ‘understand’ it, I want to make it stop” is probably the essence of when healing starts.
Brilliant post. I was nodding my head as I read it all. Truly I learned from my own therapy experiences that talk therapy has only limited benefits. Things like NLP (and EMDR, which helped me) are the way to come to terms with our trauma and move forward.
@Mike - Now, the big question is how we can move ourselves into that ‘I want to make it stop’ state when we’re stuck in the inertia of PTSD. Once we make that shift healing picks up enormous speed and offers up all kinds of surprises.
@Svasti - I’m constantly amazed, aren’t you, at how simple the healing process is when we stop fighting the past, shift our focus in a new direction, and start creating the future. Really, why didn’t anyone tell me this 25 years ago??!
@Michele:
Good question. No answer. Buddhism has had the same problem for 2500 years.
There is a buddhist parable about a guy who has been shot in the side with a poison arrow. He wants to analyse the arrow - determine the wood that the shaft is made of, who shot it, what their motivation was, the precise nature of the poison etc. etc. Shakyamuni says that such talk is nonsense - why not just pull the thing out of your side and start to heal.
I’ve taken the story out of context a little but only a little.
It might be down to no more than setting the right beliefs into play.
1. PTSD breaks your body and your mind.
2. You can choose to heal them.
3. You have the power to heal them.
4. In learning to heal you can choose to become whoever you want.
The most powerful concept is that even if you were powerless in the events you are not powerless over the symptoms. Your brain creates them. Your brain can make them stop.
@Michele:
Maybe you should change branding to “I Can Heal MY PTSD” or don’t you believe it?
@Mike - Is that British humor? You know I believe everyone can heal.
No it’s pointing out the fact that “Heal My PTSD” is ambiguous.
It could be “[Please / I want you to] Heal My PTSD”
It could be “[I want to] Heal My PTSD”
It could be “[I can] Heal My PTSD”
@Mike - How ’bout you leave the branding of my company to me and just enjoy the blog.
Interesting idea !
I disagree that we should call decisions either “smart” or “stupid.” That kind of language only reinforces that you have made stupid decisions in the past…why not say “ineffective” or “misguided” instead? Sounds like an easier approach for learning through your mistakes.