Can You Self-Brainspot?
Lost in the Clouds
Have you ever found yourself staring off into space, or worse, has anyone else ever caught you doing that? It can be embarrassing to notice that you completely lost track of what was going on around you, especially if someone else sees you. Aside from feeling embarrassed, have you ever wondered what is happening in your brain when you stare off like that? When staring off into space you probably feel like you’re in a bit of a trance-like state. You kind of lose yourself to your thoughts and disconnect from what is going on around you. You really do get lost in your thoughts. People around you might assume that you’ve “gone blank” and nothing is happening, but that could not be farther from the truth. You are actually working through things deep in your brain.
If you have ever caught yourself starting off, zoning out, daydreaming, or lost in LaLa Land, you have actually been self-brainspotting. What is happening in your brain when you stare off is similar to what happens in a Brainsotting session. You see, our brains are amazing. They do so much for us every single moment of every day. We can think conscious thoughts, like when we wonder what we are going to eat for lunch or think about how to respond to what our co-worker is telling us. These operations are very important, but there is much more to what our brains do for us, and much of it is outside of our conscious awareness. So, even when we stare off into space and it seems like everything just sort of pauses, our brain is still hard at work.
What’s Going On?
Zoning out gives our brains the chance to process information and memories that may have been “piling up.” Our brains are constantly receiving information from our nervous system about what we are experiencing. Information is taken in, categorized, and then stored and responded to. Normally all of this happens without a hitch, but at times we do not have the chance to fully process events. As a result, some things may pile up a bit, unprocessed. Our brains have not yet decided where these things belong, and on top of that, we may be stuck in the response that came from our brain’s first reaction. Like that time when you just knew your new coworker said, “nice shirt” not as a genuine compliment but as a remark on your outdated fashion sense….until they showed up in the same shirt a few days later. You had been on your guard around them, fearing whatever other comment they might make, until that day when you realized they just wanted to see if you could be friends.
So, even if you are not specifically thinking about things when you are zoning out, you are giving your brain the chance to finish processing things. Giving your brain the time and space to detox from all of those partially-processed experiences. This allows our brains to properly categorize things and turn off any responses that may have been left stuck “on.” These detoxes can also lead to an increase in creativity. We create best when we are safe and our needs are met. If we feel the need to be on the lookout for possible danger and reserve our strength to respond to said danger, our brains cannot devote energy to the processes needed for creativity. Freeing up our brains from that stress response cycle gives us the power to create.
Why go to Therapy for Brainspotting?
If you can let your brain process things and tap into your creativity just by staring off into space, why go to therapy for Brainspotting? Giving your brain the opportunity to process outside of therapy can be a wonderful thing. We can make so much progress this way. However, the power of Brainspotting is not in the staring off, it is in the attunement that happens between the client and therapist while the client is processing. The way I like to think about attunement is an adult holding a baby. It is a natural reaction for the adult to reflect back to the baby the expression they see on the baby's face and then take care of any needs they learn of. Think of a parent smiling back at their happy baby and saying things like, “look at how happy you are!” And when the parent notices the baby startle from a loud noise nearby, the parent makes a startled face back at their baby to show that they noticed and quickly smiles again and tells the baby they are safe. This is attunement. The reflection of our own state back to us and the safety that comes from the relationship.
Attunement happens in therapy when your therapist creates and holds a feeling of safety and is aware of and pays close attention to your reactions and your needs during the session. This is a very important part of Brainspotting because attunement is healing. No matter how loving our parents or caregivers were, or how happy our childhoods were, we have all experienced times when we felt overwhelmed and alone. This is a common element of traumatic experiences, and it is also an element of things like depression and anxiety. Our brains have come to expect that we are alone, and processing while experiencing healthy attunement disrupts that. We can face the scary hard things, be seen in those moments, and be reminded that we are cared for and we are safe now. This is something we cannot get from staring off into space.
Processing with attunement is especially important when we have experienced being overwhelmed. Feeling overwhelmed disrupts normal processing by categorizing the experiences that led to that feeling state as trauma and leaving us stuck in fight, flight, freeze, or fawn responses. Trauma happens when we experience anything that overwhelms our ability to cope, to feel safe. It results in a loss of connection to others and to our full selves. Everyone has experienced traumas in their life, but when we continue to stay disconnected from safety and from others we become stuck in our trauma. We can finish processing day-to-day experiences by zoning out, but we cannot rebuild a sense of safety and connection outside of attunement. If we have been through trauma we need to finish processing what happened with someone safe. Experiencing safety and attunement as we process these experiences signals to our brains that the danger is finally over.
What Next?
So, if you have been particularly busy lately and just need a bit of time to let your brain do its thing, or if you want to tap into your creative side, don’t be afraid to stare off a bit. It can do wonders for your brain. If you sense that you might need to process some things with the power of attunement, therapy can be the space for that. Contact me today about getting started. I can’t wait to hear from you!
