Where You Look Affects How You Feel.

Brainspotting (BSP) is a relatively new type of therapy designed to help people access, process, and overcome trauma, negative emotions, and pain, including psychologically induced physical pain. It combines body-based approaches, the power of the therapeutic relationship and brain-based processing. It is based on the premise that “where you look affects how you feel” and finds that eye positions correlate with unconscious, emotional experiences.

It reaches parts of the brain that are not generally accessed through traditional talk therapy approaches and most other types of therapy.

This type of therapy was discovered in 2003 by David Grand, PhD, as an advancement of his work in Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) therapy. Grand had observed a client getting “stuck” in one spot. While staying in this one spot, Grand observed her going deeper than ever before and Brainspotting was born.

Brainspotting works on the theory that feelings from trauma can become stuck in the body, leading to both physical and mental ailments. It is believed that the brain’s memory of a particular trauma or incident is “reset” in the body and brain through Brainspotting.

This “stuckness” can be described as “frozen maladaptive homeostasis.” Our bodies are generally meant to be in a state of homeostasis, attempting to maintain a stable environment, but this particular kind of homeostasis is not helpful. Brainspotting accesses this and attempts to integrate this interrupted processing of the trauma.

It is one of a few types of emerging therapies focusing on the brain-body connection, including Somatic Experiencing and EMDR.

Traditional talk therapy is known as a “top-down” therapy. That is, traditional therapy tries to solve problems with the conscious mind. These brain-body therapies are known as “bottom up” therapy, which aims to release the physical stress in the body, thereby leading to release the emotional stress in the body as well.

While a therapist may attempt to access both the physical and emotional “locations” of negative emotions, brainspotting therapists use something called “dual attunement,” a process through which the therapist simultaneously attunes to the therapeutic relationship as well as the brain-body response of the person in therapy.

Brainspotting therapy works on the limbic system and midbrain, which controls a collection of brain structures that play a role in emotion, long-term memory, cognition, motivation, impulse control, and several other psychological factors that can affect well-being. When trauma occurs, this part of the brain typically goes into freeze mode to conserve resources for the body to be in defense mode.