In this presentation, we’ll examine the notion of “connection” and its correlation with mental health. When we feel disconnected from our inner life, we suffer; when we are disconnected relationally—from people and nature—we can become anxious, depressed, despondent. What is this powerful “connection” actually made of, what is it, and how can we take the science of connection and inform the practice of psychotherapy? In many ways, the experience of a separate, solo-self may underly the many challenges we face, from racism and social injustice to environmental destruction. The field of mental health can play a pivotal role in how we help our human family move toward a new way of living on Earth by addressing the modern cultural excessive focus on individuality in the separate sense of self.
Mindfulness isn't a therapy in its own right, but its capacity for improving the quality of people's lives has received substantial empirical support as a class of meaningful interventions, particularly when embedded in a substantive therapeutic framework. Guided mindfulness meditation as a focusing strategy shares some key characteristics with clinical hypnosis, guided imagery, positive psychology, and other such focus-related approaches, but usually has a different aim in its application. This speech explores these overlaps when mindfulness is applied to a goal-oriented treatment process. This is NOT a speech about spiritual exploration with mindfulness. Rather, the focus is entirely on clinical applications of key aspects of mindfulness by deconstructing the hypnotic elements of such processes. We will identify the therapeutically relevant components of guided meditations, and how we can construct more meaningful interventions by incorporating them in novel ways.
The process of contracting for change in the initial session will be described and discussed. Methods of targeting goals will be compared and contrasted.
Every therapist needs a method to work with post-traumatic stress disorder. Fundamental techniques will be discussed. Neurological considerations will be offered.
The underlying principles of couples therapy differ from individual therapy for both assessment and treatment. The panelist will discuss and contrast their models.
Clients generally understand what they need but fail to comply with their own directives and those of the therapists. Resistance will be analyzed from three different therapeutic models.
"As advances are made in better understanding the power of focus in shaping one's subjective perceptions and even one's physiology, the field of clinical hypnosis has played an especially important role in this ongoing process of discovery. Despite too many clinicians' terribly misinformed dismissal of hypnosis as little more than a gimmick, in fact hypnosis has evolved a strong scientific basis arising from its insights into neuroscience, cognition, suggestive language and information processing, placebo and nocebo responses, the therapeutic alliance, and more.
Just as there are many different models of psychotherapy, each with different foundational philosophies and methods, there are many different models of hypnosis, each with a different emphasis and utilizing different approaches. The highly innovative work of Milton Erickson in particular is widely acknowledged by therapists who may or may not use hypnosis but are definitely influenced by his strategic methods.