What Shape Do You Give Your Phobic Response?

These two videos are based around Exposure Therapy - which is simply another term for describing what goes on in systematic de-sensitisation but is much easier to say!  Please watch both videos and then go read the rest of the post below them (don't read the rest of the post before watching the videos as that would be cheating!).

While watching the two videos I want you to think about what 'shape' the two people involved see their emotional response as. What are their unconscious minds 'seeing'? Watch the videos - and then read further down.

Exposure Therapy: Behavior

Intensive Exposure Therapy

I want you to imagine that in your unconscious mind there are only two serious questions:  Am I the predator or is it the predator?  When we see predators what do they look like?  I sometimes ask people who are suffering with depression what shape their emotional response has - does it appear to be overwhelming to them and they fear that when they go in they will never come out?  If so their unconscious has identified the emotional response as a predator eating them.  Then I ask them to describe what actually happens and every time they tell me they go into the response kicking and screaming -  and come out a few days later feeling still terrible about the lack of control they have.  But even though they eventually came out they still 'see' themselves being eaten and digested by the experience.

Then I ask them: what if you see the experience as something you go into, and you eat it, and then come out, and every time you go in that predator you actually eat it from the inside out - what if that predator is really just a pile of food and you're just meant to finish the meal?

In their unconscious minds people with anxiety disorders have registered these situations as predators preparing to eat them - by going into the elevators and coming out again they're showing the unconscious they are still alive (therefore they are not entering a predator's mouth) but also they are able to show their unconscious they actually have more control over the situation than their unconscious believed they had.

The unconscious has to be 'shown' with visual patterns and physical actions (visual patterns alone can be effective but take longer to work).

Other people being involved in their initially painful adventures reinforces the unconscious mind's motivation to keep going but it also helps in 'normalising' the situation. Anxiety disorders are 'normal' conditions - they're not desirable, but they are normal, and they can be eliminated as long as we keep doing the work.

By repeatedly entering 'the mouth of the predator' our unconscious changes it's viewpoint of the shape of the situation from one of being engulfed in the jaws of a predator to one where we ourselves are the predator and have control. Did you see how delighted the lady was to show off how safe she felt now? Her unconscious believes she just ate the elevator.

When you enter an emotional response what shape do you give the process? Please leave comments below or email me at carl@managemesystems.com.

Regards - Carl

PS tomorrow I'm going to post about three different intensity levels of de-sensitisation process - two of which we do all the time.