mariarosagalter
Forum Replies Created
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Hi David, Gina, and Deanna,
Thanks so much for jumping into the discussion! There is so much to explore around partswork!
I also wonder, like Gina, when is the right time is to introduce parts work…. I see two pathways, the more informal curiosity around “what part of you…” that David was alluding to, and the more formal parts work where you work with the client to create a parts mandala. Perhaps the first leads to the second…..
Not sure around Deanna’s question about a teenager’s brain and if they are capable of integrating their parts. Very interesting thoughts here… Aslo around whether parts “die”. I tend to agree with David. Like memories, they are still there, just less present. I like to think parts perform important protective functions and can be called upon when necessary–as long as Soul is directing the part.
Thank you to all of you for sharing your sessions. Gina, thanks for your share…. I have a client who is also dealing with hoarding and shame. It is really impacting her life and it is so hard for her to make the changes she really wants to make. Like your client, shame is a big player in preventing her from moving forward and her patterns are rooted in her childhood. You have inspired me to see if she’d like to do parts work. David, beautiful work, friend. What great insight to explore the proximity of the parts on the mandala and how they relate to each other. Deanna, thanks for the example of working with the land to represent parts. Your client left with a new perspective of herself and new insights from listening to her different parts.
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Rollin, What a beautiful post. Thank you for sharing this session. Your compassion, patience, and “being” with your client shines through. What a tremendous moment for him to see more clearly what was happening in his life. Nature offers such healing both through metaphor and by being immersed in nature and its so appartent in the experience that you described:”He really started to see his scars and intimate life details as a valuable part of who he is today. He started to see his unique beauty. As he began to “name it”…the trauma had positive movement towards healing.” You were able to create a safe container for him to go deeper into himself. What would you say was your biggest take-away from this experience? What was your internal state like during your session with him?
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I find Parts Work to be an invaluable tool in my persoal work and look forward to using it more effectively and often with clients.
The client that I used parts work with is a client I have been seeing on and off since February. My client has identified new career options through listening more deeply to the guidance of Spirit, collaborating with nature to move further into what is nudging him. He is a very spiritual person and connects very deeply with Nature. Some obstacles he is facing as he creates his business include taking actionable steps to create his online and social media presence. We met outside at a local Open Space park. I had a particular place on the land that I felt called to take him to. I established the coaching relationship by creating the safe container, reminding him of confidentiality and asking permission to guide him, as well as permission to take him to this specific spot since it would involve some bushwacking. We connected with Self and with the Land prior to beginning our session and used the walk to the specific area to get caught up since it had been a while since our last session. As we walked, he began to explain what he wanted to explore during our session which continues to be how to move forward in creating an online and social media presence. Through powerful questions which included past times when he experienced the same blocks, he identified that he has a voice in him that says “Who do you think you are to do this?” Part of his resistance is his feeling of being an impostor. Because of this, he wants everything to be perfect and wants to project a professional image-perfect website, professional image, expert knowledge, etc. This voice keeps him from experimenting and flowing with creativity. He resists putting himself in the light even though he is so Light-filled himself. He used the metaphor of being a Lighthouse and that by doing his own spiritual work and keeping his interior Lighthouse shining, those who need him will find him. Once we arrived at the spot, we began to explore what it felt like for him to be a Lighthouse, filled with his own interior Light. I guided him to explore the territory around as that Lighthouse to see what would come up for him. How did he overcome the obstacles of the terrain as that Lighthouse? As he moved, he came to a standstill on top of a boulder that was in the sunlight. He spent some time letting the light shine on him. I asked him, “What is happening right now?”–He explained how good it felt to be in the sunlight. In the light, he was connecting even more deeply with his interior light–he felt peaceful, content, full, alive, capable, quiet, grounded, strong, stable, safe– I told him what I saw–the light was shinning on his face, his face was reflecting the light, and there was a quiet smile on his lips… Since I knew that my client had done parts work before, I asked him if he would like to explore the “voice” while in the state of being the “Lighthouse”. He felt it would be useful to see what the “voice” had to say. I invited him to connect with Soul (which sure felt like his “Lighthouse” metaphor) and imagine “Voice” standing in front of him. As Soul, he acknowledged and invited “Voice” to speak. After the invitation, I guided my client to move to a different spot and speak to Soul as “Voice”. He named this part “Voice” for now. As “Voice”, he was able to speak to Soul about his concerns for my clients well-being. In the past, my client became overwhelmed and so enmeshed in his work that he experienced major burnout. “Voice” was trying to protect my client and does not want that to happen again. Moving back to Soul, my client was able to reassure Voice, thank him for his concern and wisdom, and tell Voice “I am boss”–he listened and absorbed the wisdom of Voice, realizing that it was important to maintain balance while starting something new. This experience also allowed him to feel more into his body/intuition/creativity and shift out of his over-analitical self.
I felt the session moved very naturally into parts work and that it opened doors of understanding for my client. He was able to see the wisdom of “Voice” (don’t get overwhelmed and burn out) and also how that voice was overpowering his ability to move forward. It was a very loud voice inside of him! After the experience, my client was able to move beyond the limiting beliefs of the “Voice” and was able to recognize where/when this limiting self-belief came into existence. With this new self-awareness, he was able to set goals around his website (it does not have to be perfect), and he felt he could take active steps to move into his own power, his whole self. He felt he could take ownership of himself–of his parts.
I felt that the Land lent itself well to the ceremony, with the initial walk as catching up and moving through severance, the arrival at the spot as a natural movement into threshold, and the walk back as a time for integration and next steps. The Land also offered a real, lived experience with obstacles, with Light, and for different perspectives to arise. Moving through the Land gave my client the opportunity to get into the different energies of his parts. The Land itself held my client in a safe environment in which to explore what was really moving under his feelings of resistance.
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Thanks for your insights, David! Certainly something to think about. I do think that some of us are more comfortable in our bodies and enjoy experiencing movement while others are less comfortable. Perhaps just different personalities–some more intellectual rather than body-oriented. With more clarity, I see that my question to Gina is about how do we move someone who is more intellectual and conceptual into a body-based/sensation-based experience?
=)
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Summary
The Trauma Module was incredibly informative for me and confirmed so much of my own experience with past trauma. The somatic connection with the body is key to letting stuck energy flow through. The additional understanding of brain function opens a whole new world for me and I can now “see” what is happening within me when I process unpleasant emotions while engaging my body–dancing, walking, drawing…. My recent traumatic experience with my son’s wedding left so much unwanted emotions within me that I did not want to process. I wanted to “understand” their choice, thinking that by understanding, the strong fear-based stories and feelings I was experiencing would go away. My spiritual director encouraged me to detach from the need to understand, and instead, engage the emotions without judgement. Through somatic work, getting in touch with my body and experiencing what “detachment” feels like, I felt the freedom of being unattached to future-oriented expectations, assumptions, & anxieties, as well as the past-oreinted story. I could swing freely, above the void, AND could swing with the emotions of grief and sadness I needed to be with, detached from the resentments caused by projecting these emotions on my son and daughter in law. Through this somatic work, I was able to recognize another emotion that was deeply hidden–anger…. The vision came to me as a snake-dragon coiled deep in a dungeon, hiding from shame. Again, connecting with my body, I drew an image of the vision and spent time with the anger through the act of drawing, letting each movement of the pencil shine a light so it would feel seen and heard. Through extreme compassion for myself and my body sensations, I am now able to be with the difficult emotions I was repressing…without blame, without judgement for self or others. I gained insight (pre-frontal cortext) and was able to re-process the old story and create new meaning for myself. In my experience, allowing myself to be with emotions, feel them, move with them, while in the presence of my own compassion for self is the path to transforming the pain into something new. -
Hi James and Gina,
Thanks so much for your posts.
James, the more I learn about ritual and myth-making, the more I see the tremendous importance of this step. Like you, I struggled with the integration part of the ceremony. Since the “integration” is the last part of the ceremony, I often felt time-pressured and unable to fit in a meaningful integration. Now I realize how ritual is the “way” to take the “aha” moment of the threshold and continue to weave the experience into the clients new mythic being. Thanks for bringing this up!
Gina, You state that “resourcing and somatic exercises really stands out and is something I would like to continue to explore when working with clients”. I agree that this is so important! What are some somatic exercises that have been meaningful for you? How have you approached clients who don’t have as much body awareness as others or who might be “shy” to move into their body? I have a client right now who would rather just sit and talk than move…. Thoughts?
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This toolbox has given me so many resources I can use when working with a client. I realize that though the client might not be in an active trauma response, the very act of recalling memories that may be blocking forward movement can be re-traumatizing. Powerful memories can activate the “lower road circuit” and send us into a spin of story, reactivating emotions as we relive the event as if it was just happening. Our nervous system does not know the difference between the memory or a present moment experience. As we work with clients, we can notice shifts in their baseline, sometimes obvious, sometimes subtle. They come to us to guide them as they move forward from possibly painful and paralyzing events that have become part of their wiring. They want to be a new image of themselves, one in which the past no longer has such dominance. Sifting through their expriences in order to understand the connections to the present responses and behaviors can be very painful.
A new client I am working with feels stuck in the reprosessing of painful memories. She has done a lot of work with therapists, EMDR specialists, and has done somatic work to “heal, become whole, and integrate”. While very important, the work of feeling her emotions in order to understand how her past experiences connect with her present moment thoughts/beliefs/attitudes/behaviors, it leaves her in a continuous state of limbic system activation. She is ready to move on to a new image of herself. She is ready for transition and transformation. It is clear she is far along the “contemplation” stage and ready for what’s next. During the initial zoom intake session, we began with some resourcing and grounding–guiding her to find things within her home that she finds beautiful, letting her enjoy the pleasure it gives her. This simple exercise of observing and enjoying moved her into an open state of relaxation and abundance. As the intake session continued, and later discussed how the brain works in respose to trauma and how memories are wired, she became visibly excited. It was as if a light-bulb turned on for her. This knowledge alone gave her tremendous hope. As she absorved this information on how her brain is beautifully made to protect her through the “low road circuit” and how, as she growns in self-awareness, she can choose to shift into the “high road circuit”, she shifted from “I don’t trust myself” to “I believe deep inside that I am capable of having relationships that are not attachment-based”, “I am my best authority”, “I know more about me than anyone else”, “I have within me what I need”, and finally “Movement, I need movement!” She said this last statement as she excitedly swung her arms up in the air with exhileration!
What a powerful and hopefilled way to be!
This toolbox increased my confidence as a coach. The educational information increases the clients self-awareness and their ability to make new choices for themselves. It gives them the tools they need to create their own change.
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Reflection:
I found this toolbox to be incredibly useful. It has opened a whole new way of looking at the intricacies of the human being. It has helped me personally as I reflect on what is happening to me internally, as one interconnected system. Sensory input is funneled through my thalamus to which my amygdala responds with an emotional reaction–what to do? Is there danger? Should I fight? Flee? Freeze? Go into a high Beta state? Quick! Hypothalamus, release the norepinephrine and the cortisol! We are in a life or death situation! Never mind that its just the low and loud rumble of a truck going under a bridge. It sure sounds like the growl of a predator! Or is this a pleasant, relaxing experience that puts me into an alpha state? What memories are being called upon by the hippocampus that might perpetuate a trauma response or send me into a relaxed, “I am safe” state? How powerful to know I can be my own “compassionate observer” and choose to activate present moment awareness and shift my state of being. I can reprogram my wiring, my thoughts and responses. I can record new memories over the old patterned firing and choose to go into the “high road circuit”, leaving the “low road circuit” for when I am really in a near-death situation.
This toolbox has given me a way to make meaning and create a new story about what is happening within me. I can marvel at how beautifully I am made…. I have a new vantage point from which to learn more about myself as I gain understanding on the flow of energy and information that sifts through my mind. I am an emergent being, able to create a new mythic image for myself. My brain’s ability to create new pathways, to activate change, allows me to see, hear, and integrate parts of myself that have important information to share and served me well when needed. Like the “loyal soldier”, I can thank these parts for their amazing service of keeping me safe and secure. I can welcome them home and let them know that they are valuable members of the system. An now they can rest.
As I move into a new “Ceremony of Self”, I can tune “my attention to my intention”, and activate my PFC through Nature-based and somatic Practices. I can invite creative juices (literally) to bathe my brain as I tune into the Earth’s natural Theta and Alpha frequencies for healing and alignment. I can enter into deep resonance with all Creation, remembering that I am Nature too. I can see and understand symbol and metaphor. My Soul speaks and gives me a vision of a third way–a new mythic story. With the power of ritual, I can sistematically connect my new mythic way of being to daily, repetitive actions/mantras/thoughts/affirmations/ in order to bring back the images and feelings associated with this new emerging pathway and strengthen it. Ritual merges “behaviors with ideas” through rhythm and meaning connecting movement with a new belief. Ritual helps us become the new myth. Transformation occurs.
We are beautifully made. How hopeful. How powerful. When I share this information with clients, their eyes light up, they get quietly intent, they begin see the possibilities for themselves as REAL.
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Hi Friends, I’d love your feedback on this infographic I created today. It was a really helpful way to review and consolidate the information on the brain. I’m thinking I’ll make one on the change process as well. Here is the link to the document: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cT5jtn16QMQckbh_ggrz9atI6bxK4MxB/view?usp=sharing
Maria
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Gina, Thanks for the question you posed! Some challenges that come up for me in using the new concepts stem from lack of confidence (a LOT to read in one sitting!) and so much information to hold. I look forward to going back through the reading materials in more detail. I’m also thinking of creating a little one pager for clients that explains both neuroplasticity and brain function and change theory. I am finding a high level of interest in current clients and prospective clients when I mention our brain’s amazing ability to heal. It offers hope.
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Hi Gina,
It seems that you had a very satisfying session with your client–and how patient you need to be with her right now. You gave her some great tools for her to become aware of her own internal experience while detaching herself from the triggers. What a powerful self-realization she came to “she’s recognizing how much tension she has in her body, particularly when she wants to be right, or disagree with someone.” Big stuff! Your own self-observation “While I recognize I could be discussing more about the process of change, and Neuro networking, and perhaps even addressing the question of what control brings the client. I am simply just meeting the client right where she is, and she even stated, she felt good and want to continue the journaling for now and pay attention to her body and how it feels when she is triggered.” feels generous and spacious–allowing the client to have their experience and holding space for them as they work through what they need to work through and giving them the space to connect with their own wisdom. So powerful, my friend! Thank you so much for sharing. This is what we are all trying to learn. I am curious about what connections you see between her growing body awareness and her path to greater self-awareness? How did you know that body awareness is what she needed to practice?
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James, Thanks for your post. I read it last week but was out backpacking and could not respond. Wow, what a sacred space you and your client are working in. I can imagine how beautifully you support her as she moves forward in her holy quest. How lovely to shift from a goal oriented mindset to the spaciousness you offered her at the end of your session–“Instead of ending a powerful session with goals, benchmarks, targets, etc., I can now continue to hold the sacredness of the session through the ritual creation and to the end.” I am curious if your internal shift affected your client? What happened? What did you notice?
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@david.fontaine2
Hi David,
Sorry for my slow reply. I was out of town backpacking last week in Wyoming. It was awesome inspite of the smoke rolling in on day 4!Thanks for taking the time to respond so thoughtfully to my question. Compassionately holding your own self-observations while coaching is such a wise skill to cultivate. I think that we want to have an agenda because it gives us something to hold on to and helps us feel more confident. Its so hard to let go and completely trust the process–and trust the client’s wisdom when we think we see the right direction. Your insight about your desire for a plan and goal: “I would say there is definitely a part of me that likes to follow a plan and execute, keep moving forward in the progress, almost a rigidity that doesn’t allow for a lot of sway off the course”; and letting that go: “let’s stay where she’s at, we don’t need to have a desired destination” is an act of trust–trusting the process, trusting the unknown territory, and trusting the client’s own process/wisdom. Its so much about staying in a state of wonder and curiosity….
As far as your question for me “I’m curious what you identified as the myth in her story for this session.” I think she is still trying to figure out what her myth is. She is stuck in her old story “My parents never taught me how to be organized” which leads her to her own attitude of “organizing is boring and lonely”. Her myth right now seems to be “I don’t have any control over this behavior/attitude/belief. I inherited this trait. I can’t help it, therefore this is how I am.” She wants to move right into action (strategies, plans, methods, action) but continues to be stuck. It seems that first she must create a new mythic image for herself that shatters the old story in order to truly be able to move forward in a sustainable and new way–establishing new neural pathways that lead to new behaviors/attitudes/beliefs about herself and how she wants to be in the world. I do believe that more knowledge about change theory and neuroplasticity will give her more tools to support her transformation. I will remain curious to what’s ahead and actively participate in her own self-discovery and whatever path she creates for herself.
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@deanna.falge
I loved reading about your session with your young client. It is so useful to learn from your and David’s sessions! I feel like I am gaining such insight. I loved how your threaded the “alpha wave state” and were so self aware of your own state as you worked with your client. Wow. How wonderful to be able to hold so much in a state of compassionate awareness–for your client and for yourself. Deep wisdom! Thank you for reflecting your experience of self-awareness. “I notice major shifts in my brain, mind, body, and state of being during sessions; I am much more calm, aware, open, embodied, mindful, attentive, and curious. My entire body goes into an ultra relaxed, open state, and my mind quiets down, which all allows for the session to flow. According to brain science, I can name this state of being as an alpha wave state or parasympathetic state. I could also say that spirit is flowing through my body. I really appreciate that I have the scientific information and language to explain some of the human states of being, spiritual concepts, and phases of change.”–Beautiful, friend! -
@david.fontaine2
Hi David,
Thanks for the post. I really appreciate the detailed description of how you were able to identify where your client was in her process. What a huge shift your client experienced. How wonderful for you to also identify your tendency to want to move your client to the planning/action stage. How did you experience that shift in yourself? What did you notice within yourself that helped you identify this tendency?Again, thanks for posting! I found your post to be extremely helpful!
Maria