Cultivating an Inner Implicit Holding Environment Practicing - PDF document

The Roles of Mindfulness Cultivating an Inner Implicit Holding Environment • Practicing Therapist • Mindfulness Informed Psychotherapy • Mindfulness Based Vallecitos Mountain Retreat Center Psychotherapy Explicit How It Works Fly Overwhelmed? Capacity to Intensity of experience bear experience 1

The Thinking Disease How Does Mindfulness Help? • Reinforces experiential approach • Review past pleasure and pain • Helps free us from believing in our thoughts • Reduces narcissistic orientation • Try to maximize future pleasure and • Connects us to the world beyond our avoid future pain personal pleasure and pain Decisions, Decisions 1. Which skills to emphasize? 2. Formal or informal practice? 3. Which objects of attention? 4. Religious or secular practices? 5. Narrative or experiencing mode? 6. Relative or absolute truth? 7. Turning toward safety or sharp points? Focused Attention vs. Core Practice Skills Open Monitoring • Concentration (FA) 1. Concentration (focused attention)  Choose an object and follow it closely 2. Mindfulness per se (open monitoring) • Mindfulness (OM)  Attend to whatever 3. Acceptance and Compassion object rises to forefront of consciousness 2

Not Knowing Beginner’s Mind Acceptance Loving-kindness Practice • “Metta” practices  May I be happy, peaceful, free from suffering  May my loved ones be happy. . .  May all beings be happy. . . Motivational Systems Objects of Attention Drive, excitement, vitality Contentment, safety, connection . Course Affiliative Seeking pleasure Soothing/safety • Feet touching ground Achieving and Well-being • Sights and sounds of nature Activating • Taste of food • Sound of bell Threat-focused Protection & • Breath in belly Safety Seeking • Mantra Activating/Inhibiting • Air at tip of nose Anger, anxiety, disgust Subtle 3

Turning toward Safety I Timing is Everything • Outer or distal focus  Walking Meditation  Listening Meditation  Nature Meditation  Eating Meditation  Open eye practices Turning Toward the Sharp Turning toward Safety II Points • Moving toward anything • Inner focus unwanted or avoided  Mountain Meditation  Guided Imagery • How is it experienced in  Metta Practice the body?  DBT techniques  Pain, fear, sadness, anger  Unwanted images or memories  Urges toward compulsive behaviors When Mindfulness of Inner Different Strokes Experience Can Be Harmful • Need for frequent adjustment of • When overwhelmed exercises by traumatic memories • Elicit feedback about the experience • When terrified of disintegration, loss  Both during and after practice of sense of self • When suffering from • Titrate between Safety and Sharp psychosis Points 4

Relative Truth Life Preservers • Human story  Success & Failure • Concentration Practices  Pleasure & Pain  Stepping out of the  Longing thought stream  Hurt  Anger • Eyes open, external sensory focus  Envy  Ground, trees, sky,  Joy wind, sounds  Pride Absolute Truth Processing Trauma 1. Open to painful emotions • Anicca (impermanence) 2. Explore the facts of trauma • Dukkha (unsatisfactoriness) 3. See it through lens of • Anatta (no enduring, dependent origination separate self) 4. Develop compassion The Problem With Selfing Anatta 5

Therapeutic Benefits of Glimpsing Anatta 3) Freedom from • Increased affect tolerance Self-Esteem Concerns • Radical acceptance of parts • Freedom from self-esteem concerns • Deeper connection to others What Defines Me? Lake Wobegon • Physical beauty • Athletic talent Where all the women are strong, all the • Financial status men are good looking, and all the • Artistic creativity children are above average. • Academic degree • Designer outfit • Alma matter Wrong Wall? The Failure of Success • The pain of I, me, me, mine • Narcissistic recalibration • Impossibility of winning consistently 6

Narcissistic Personality It’s Getting Worse Inventory • I just want to be reasonably happy • I want to amount to something in the eyes of the world • If I ruled the world it would be a better place • The thought of ruling the world scares the hell out of me • I am much like everybody else • I am an extraordinary person • I always know what I’m doing • Sometimes I’m not sure of what I’m doing Egos Inflating Over Time: A Cross ‐ Temporal Meta ‐ Analysis of the Narcissistic Personality Inventory He’s just an ordinary kid. -- Barry Magid ( Ordinary Mind ) Journal of Personality, Volume 76, Issue 4 Self-Esteem Autobiography I get my money from Mommy. 7

Connecting to Others Life in a Space Suit • Defenses against Love Self-Esteem pain insulate us from one another • We imagine they keep us safe, but they leave us more vulnerable Judgments “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” It’s not just a commandment, but a law of nature. 8

It’s About Other People Make a connection, not an impression. Service Embracing Insignificance Poor Prognosis 9

King of England, 1387 Wat Tham Sua Tiger Cave Temple Krabi, Thailand Therapeutic Progress Why Are You Unhappy? Not about me Not about me Because 99.9% of everything you think, and everything you do, is ”mine” for yourself. And there isn’t one. about me ”mine” about me -- Wei Wu Wei about me -- Adapted from Engler & Fulton 10