Gloria Arenson

I have been listening to some speakers on Energy Psychology Cafe; there are many very effective variations in how Energy Psychology is presented.

Today it is Gloria Arenson, a therapist and EFT practitioner.  She introduces what she calls "Narrative Tapping."  This technique helps you explore a range of related issues, and is especially helpful when you're not sure what is at the root of your dissatisfaction, unease, or procrastination.  Basically you use the EFT "basic recipe," (or the WHEE technique I present in a brief video at peacequestenergetics.com/WHEE.html) and just chat as though you are talking to a trusted friend.  Your narrative may follow a meandering path, covering a range of seemingly unrelated issues, and you may find you are uncovering the meta-issue that is behind it all.

If you want to try EFT or WHEE but you're not sure where to start, you are welcome to book a session with me through my website, peacequestenergetics.com.  Energy Psychology can be really helpful when you perform it alone, but you may find that working with a coach or counselor trained in the methods, may help you release deeper and more profound issues more rapidly.

Blessings and Light!

You ask about CBT: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

I had a query today from a former client, whose adult son is now being treated for anxiety with an antidepressant medication.  She wanted to know whether she should encourage her son to enter Cognitive Behavioral Therapy instead of, or in addition to, his medication.  She wanted to know if I know about CBT.

I do, in fact, know about CBT: both its possibilities and its limitations. One thing I know is that CBT is the most well-accepted mainstream treatment for depression and anxiety, and that according to reports, it has an efficacy equal to medication (and without side-effect), when practiced faithfully and supported by a competent therapist.

I have, myself, used CBT as part of an array of tools for addressing multiple problems.  Every group treatment project I have been a part of, whether it was for victims of violent offences, or for the offenders, has relied heavily on CBT.   It is very effective, just as medication is very effective - depending on compliance.

The conventional wisdom in the professions of psychiatry and psychology, is that together, CBT and meds are very helpful.  I have seen people's engagement with the world change rapidly using these methods in sync.  People do, generally, feel better quickly - within a matter of days to weeks.  So yes, if CBT is an option available to you because there is a government-sponsored program, or because it is the treatment your health plan will pay for; then go ahead.  If you engage with the learning, follow through on the homework exercises, and are vigilant and dedicated, you will feel better.


For a while.


Neither medicine nor CBT is curative. In my experience, the effectiveness of both of these standard interventions tends to diminish over time. They are ways of managing a condition you accept as part of yourself, something you have to cope with like diabetes or short stature or a birth defect.  They do not offer integral change, nor do they support the release of the problem.   

The statistics seem to support that CBT is the treatment of choice, and if your treatment needs to be kick-started or supported with prescription drugs, then that choice is also is supported by statistics. 

A few things to keep in mind:

• The studies are paid for by the manufacturers of the medications.
• It is in therapists' best interests for you to need long-term help.
• The studies tend to track success in the short term, in order to support the drug industry.  Long term success is not as well studied.

Medication and CBT are not part of a wellness program.  In order to benefit from meds, you have to see yourself as unwell, so it is impossible to become 'well' while taking them. Ironic, no?


Similarly, in order to benefit from CBT, you have to be continually vigilant; old habits of thinking keep welling back up the moment you let yourself be vulnerable. So, you have to continue seeing yourself as "needy and weak" in order to be strong. Also, ironic.


The work I am doing now IS curative; through Energy Psychology and/or bodywork it is possible to expel the old patterns entirely, leaving them only a memory. It is the most powerful and natural way I know of to heal from trauma or to permanently and rapidly release fears and phobias. The methods are easy to learn, and learning them provides you with a set of skills that enables you to deal confidently with new issues as they arise.  Professionals who work in what I call "energetic interventions" are dedicated to "working themselves out of a job."


Through EI's, you tap into the wellness within, and restore flow and balance so the bunched-up knots of energetic attachments release and the residue of their influence is expelled.  Can I prove it?  Can I prove that this is what happens?  No; I'll leave that to others while I get busy helping YOU to experience that release.  Your experience of energetic interventions will definitely convince you; I don't have to prove anything.


There are other wellness products that will help.  A naturopathic doctor can prescribe a range of supplements that will assist you to establish balance and flow.  Exercise is pretty much free, and if you can tolerate it, it is a wonderful healer; I suspect it works in much the same way as bodywork, by loosening the residue so it can be expelled.  Donna Eden offers dozens of "Energy Medicine" techniques that work very well in tandem with Energy Psychology to establish renewed balance and wellness.


What I know how to do is to help you use your body-mind to restore the flow of spirit.  This is a wholistic, permanent solution that CBT and medicine cannot be compared to.  Meridian-based, wholistic energetic interventions are a cure, not just a way to manage disease.

Zotero

I have just installed Zotero and also bought an app (less than $2) that lets me catalogue my books by scanning the ISBN bar codes.  The app then locates the book and uploads it to my Zotero bibliography.  SO SO COOL!!!

Here is the text for my Zotero profile:

My professional background includes both counselling and program coordination in the field of education.  I am interested in personal, community and global healing and the linkages between these. 

My educational background includes a BA in Literature and Women's Studies from Deakin University, a Graduate Certificate in Leadership from Royal Roads University, and Graduate Certification in Sexual Abuse Intervention from the Justice Institute of BC.  I have also studied Conflict Resolution with the J.I. (Vancouver, BC, Canada.)

Just now I am looking for an appropriate Master's Program that will help me consolidate the various knowledges I have collected through both formal education and wide reading.

I am also interested in commonalities and linkages in the fields of Spirituality, Religion, Energy Healing, Art and Play Therapy and Psychology. 

Within Psychology I am most interested in Narrative Therapy (Michael White's revolutionary work), Solution Focused Therapy (Insoo Kim Berg) and Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (Marsha Linehan).

Within Philosophy I am interested in Michele Le Doeuff and her eloquent critique of the male rational model; and thus I am interested in diverse "Ways of Knowing" and ways of reconciling, interpreting and honouring them.  For this, intercultural knowledges are key.  These may include intuition, revelation, shamanism, rationality, energy work and others; and until we can honour the value and validity of these various ways of knowing, we cannot understand one another in a way that will lead to World Peace.

If I were to write a book it would be about "ways of knowing;' it would be interdisciplinary; it would link knowledges from a range of sources not usually brought together; it would have a practical application for therapists and community workers; and it would be filled with passion and awe, a sense of the numinous, and humility before those who have explored these themes in literature, poetry, healing, philosophy, spirituality and service.

Whenever I contemplate the task, I am somewhat overwhelmed, so I am hoping Zotero will be an effective tool helping me to organize my thinking about the texts I enter and store here.

Writing from out of somewhere

In another vein, have you read Paulo Coehlo, The Alchemist?  That is what I am reading just now and I think you would appreciate the book greatly.  Also The Witch of Portobello, but that one more from an entertainment point of view.  I also read By the River Piedra I sat down and Wept, but didn't get as much from it although it is also a good book to read.

Another book I have on the go is by Desmond Tutu, God is Not a Christian . . . and other provocations.  Pretty cool insights from an old guy in a traditional church.

I am also in the middle of reading Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children. which is written in such elegant prose that it makes me want to write again.  Perhaps when I return from Africa I will have a book in me.  

My sister Heather has now published three books and has two more submitted to publishers.  They are rather editorial rather than works of scholarship or fiction, and I prefer her poetry, actually.  One of her books is Partners in Spirit; it is accounts of working, satisfying marriages with commentary / speculation about the secret.  Another is about the faith experiences of youth, and the third is a collection of letters from elders on their experiences with faith.  The books all have Baha'i content, but the contributors are not all Baha'is.

My book, if I were ever to write one, would be rather different.  

One I have percolating in my mind would be called "Julie's dream" and would be a story where a child falls asleep while fishing and then has a surreal undersea adventure - I would illustrate it with polymer clay creatures, photographed and photoshopped.  I hope it would capture the personality and creativity of my quirky niece Juliette, her sporty sister Angelica, who is always jumping up from accidents without getting hurt, and talking about boogers; and also her sweet sister Sarah, who in real life loves all the breeds of dogs, and in the dreamscape would be followed everywhere in her scuba gear by dogfish that resemble dalmations, poodles, yorkies and of course dachshunds.  So not so sublime, maybe, as my sister's works, but way more fun.  Hopefully I can move from ideas / dreams to the "doing the work" stage.

Another book is one I would write from the edge of crazy, a place I have been at times when stress has been way too much.  I have stayed away from writing with that voice for many years, because although the writing is quite elegant, if cryptic, from that voice, I don't enjoy going to the black place that feeds that voice.

Now that I am getting healthier in body and spirit, perhaps I can tolerate it long enough to do the writing, and be able to come back out when I choose to.

Estrogen dominance syndrome

My medical history includes several bouts with cervical dysplasia requiring medical treatment three times over the years.  I started gaining weight and experiencing depression and anxiety at age 11.  In my teens and twenties I had severe acne, premenstrual dysphoric disorder, extreme cramps with periods to the point that the pain made me vomit, heavy periods, and increasing generalized muscle pain combined with extremely flexible ligaments.  First diagnosis of fibromyalgia was at age 34; confirmed by a rheumatologist in my 40's, by which time I had developed osteoarthritis as well.  My only times of relative wellness were during my five pregnancies.  I had easy pregnancies where fatigue was the only challenge; I lost weight from my body while pregnant and regained it while nursing.  I have very large breasts but had difficulty breastfeeding, although I persisted until my last child was born during a bout of bronchitis and I just couldn't.  So it's not hard to sell me on the benefits of progesterone.


So now I am gonna get me some and see if it doesn't really help me with the remaining weight and fatigue issues.

Wellness

Spent a half hour on the phone with Jon Liv Jaque, (Blast from the Past), who grew up on the street we lived on in Fort Smith NWT.

Jon has introduced me to Max GXL, a product that supports the development of glutathion in the body.  Glutathion is involved in more metabolic processes than any other amino acid, so its plentifulness may be responsible for health in many many areas, and certainly in energy production.

Some more energy would be very welcome, so I am trying it.

The other day (Thursday) I had tried it for 2 days already when we went to Tai Chi for the first time in 3 weeks. I did all the stretches and stayed with the Tai Chi through three slow rounds of the entire form, without feeling like giving up.  If you have ever done the form through, you will know that slower is harder.  I had sweat dripping from my nose.

So that, to me, is an indicator tha Max GXL may be one really important component on my road to health.

Blessings and Light to all my "followers" . . .

Laurel

Hit a new milestone; SHAME rears its head

20 kg loss.  OK, it has taken nearly a year but today I have hit this important milestone.  LOST 20 KG!!  And finally it does seem easier to carry my weary body around.

So I am half way to my goal weight - which I will not divulge since I still feel a lot of shame, somehow, about how very heavy I had been.

In many ways, the weight I have carried has been the weight of shame.  I want to think about this some more and speak to it soon.