Note to the Reader

The two areas I am exploring for the next segment of this blog are:

1) Creativity and how cultivating creativity in our lives can help heal us.

2) A new (for me) form of therapy for BPD patients: Mentalization-based Therapy, developed by Anthony Bateman and Peter Fonagy of the UK.

We are having an early spring, here where I live, so I'm venturing out to the garden more--which usually curtails my blog posting for the season.

Thank you for bearing with me while I research and garden.  Thank you for following my blog.

Emotions - Conclusion

There is much more to be written about emotions; how to regulate them, how to process them, how to begin to even feel them. 

(For myself, I often experience my emotions, long after an incident is over.  During the actual event, I'm often quite frozen.)

No doubt I will return to Emotions in a future segment of this blog; but for now, I'd like to move on to other topics.

To summarize:

Emotions are perhaps the bedrock of our human experience.  They serve a very useful purpose in motivating us and helping us make decisions.  They guide us in what we are attracted to, and what we avoid.

If we haven't been validated in our emotions during our lives; if emotional regulation hasn't been modelled; if we haven't found or developed healthy ways of expressing emotions, they can become problematic.  Life-threatening, in fact.  To the point where we want to harm ourselves or die, just so as not to feel them.

Furthermore, understanding how the brain works can help us understand the "seat" of our emotions.  It is good to know that parts of the brain may, in fact, work against us, in seeking out and remembering threats more than positive experiences.

It is also good to know, that we can challenge some of these thoughts and perceptions, and begin to "rewire" the brain towards a more life-affirming reality.  In fact, we can utilize the brain's response to smells and music to our benefit.

With repetition and practice, we can change ourselves, our brains, and our emotional responses to life.

Music and the Brain III

'Hope you found the videos in my previous posting informative. I encourage anyone interested in Music and the Brain to google this topic.  There is some incredible research going on in this area.  Research, which I believe can help us in a therapeutic sense.

Music activates many areas of the brain, differently, depending on whether one is actually playing an instrument, imagining a tune, or listening to a piece of music.

Certainly, even before MRIs, we have been aware of music contributing to long term memory.  If you hear a piece of music popular from when you were in high school, it will take you back.  I can accurately recall exactly where I was sitting (the basement rec room) how I felt (sad) what I was eating (Triscuits) listening to "I'm not in love" by 10cc:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mo40aTe_3JM

(I think I ate the whole box of Triscuits.)

It is thought that music may serve a pre-language function in our evolution as humans, thus explaining its huge impact in our lives: it is part of our basic  wiring.

I believe we can use music to "re-wire" our brains.  Example:  For months, I have been using a particular CD (nature sounds mixed with New Age music) to help me settle down and go to sleep.

Lately, I have used this CD to help calm myself when I feel hyper or agitated.  I put it on and lie down, or even doing the dishes, I can feel myself stop vibrating inside.  My breathing slows and becomes deeper.

My body "knows" that when it hears this music, I am supposed to be calming down and going to sleep.

Now, this technique doesn't always work.  When I am really upset about something, I may have to try something else, like a vigorous walk, journaling, a hot bath, etc.  But it works often enough that this particular CD has become a "tool" in my toolbox of coping with life.

The key for this to be a useful tool is repetition.  It is only because I have used this particular set of sounds as a soporific for months, that I can now draw on that neural pathway response to calm myself.