From: peterson_at_d...
Date: 2001-04-18 03:36:56
--- In buildcheapeeg_at_yahoogroups.com, "Rob Sacks" <editor_at_realization.org> wrote:
> > It would take a lot of neurofeedback to match the
> > results of 30 years
> > of meditation.
>
> Well, some folks spend a lot of years thinking they are
> meditating, when in reality, they are only daydreaming
> or thinking -- they may not realize they never really
> understood the idea. I reprinted an article on my
> website a few months ago by a guy who did that for
> years, and then finally learned to meditate effectively
> with neurofeedback. That's one of the appealing things
> to me about this whole business -- NF could be a way
> to "show" people how to meditate. (The article is at
> http://www.realization.org/page/doc0/doc0073.htm .)
>
> > Alpha is usually stronger than theta, especially in a wakeful,
eyes-
> > closed state. Therefore, to get to crossover, all you probably
> > really need to do is train theta.
>
> I tried training theta four or five times, and every time,
> I fell asleep after fifteen or twenty minutes. It made
> me incredibly drowsy. I had to tear off the electrodes
> and stumble into bed. It was like a powerful drug.
> Any suggestions? And, what's the best electrode
> location for boosting theta?
>
If your equipment permits it, maybe you should set the bandwidth to a
range of 6 to 8 Hz so you're training only _high_ theta.
I generally use O1 (that should be subscript-1). O1 is the site Elmer
Green used, as did Peniston in his addictions and PTSD work. If
you're not familiar with the international 10-20 EEG reference system
"O" stands for Occipital lobe. All odd numbers are on the left, all
even numbers are on the right, so to locate O1 you find your inion,
which is the bump at the very back of your skull, near the bottom
where your neck joins your head. Then from the inion you move up
about 3 cm and then to the left 3 cm so you are now maybe 4 cm due
"northwest" of the inion. That is O1. If you were to find the
symmetrically matching point on the right side of the head, that
would be O2. The point directly between them is Oz. Everything on
the centerline is designated with a "z", so Cz is the point at the
very top of the head, Pz (parietal-z) is halfway back from there to
the inion. Fz (frontal-z) is halfway from Cz to the nasion (the bump
above your nose and getween your eyebrows), etc. You have to learn
all that stuff for your BCIA EEG certification, and then you forget
everything except the particular sites you use a lot on clients. Boy
was that a long-winded answer to a simple question. I think I'm
developing a fairly serious case of hypergraphia.
> > If this happened to a patient of mine, I
> > would possibly do EMDR starting from the feeling, and might be
able
> > to pop the whole thing into consciousness so we could process it
> > through.
>
> What's EMDR?
Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing. A relatively new
technique for helping people process various psychological
materials. Its first major use was for post-traumatic stress
disorder, but the field has been mushrooming as people find different
ways of using it. It's really too complex to describe fully here.
Try searching on EMDRIA to get the page of the international
organization of therapists who do it, and you will find a lot of
information there. Probably more than you want to know.
> People at Synchronicity talk about this stuff in terms of
> "catharsis." They make it a verb, as in, "Back in the old
> days, nobody here was clear yet, and we were all
> catharting all over the place. It was wild."
>
> Is this idea of theta->catharsis sort of standard or
> common among any group of psychotherapists today?
> I'm curious because I had thought (probably in total
> ignorance) that catharsis was a nineteenth century idea
> that had mostly gone out of fashion, and here it was
> holding hands with modern technology.
Yup. People still talk about catharsis. The term was mostly only
used by psychodynamic (e.g. Freudian) types for a long time, but is
coming back into more widespread use now that we have better methods
for helping people through the process. You will also sometimes hear
people talking about "abreactions," by which they mean surfaced
memories, feelings, etc. (like the incident you described, in fact).
But only if the abreacted materials are fully processed and thereby
"cleansed" are they truly catharted. You had an abreaction but not a
catharsis, I guess, and I was talking about using EMDR to complete
the catharsis.
>
> > They should have some purpose in
> > mind, such as an intention to install an affirmation or to find a
> > creative solution to a specific problem. They don't have to try
to
> > stay focused on the goal--I guarantee you can't stay focused on
> > anything in theta--but setting the original purpose tends to
organize
> > the experience and keep your unconscious away from
psychologically
> > unsafe areas.
>
> That's very interesting. I think it's probably relevant
> to the problem of seeking a result without making
> an effort in meditation, which is something I'm very
> interested in at the moment.
>
> Regards,
>
> Rob
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