I think I know who I am and take pretty good care of myself, so why do I keep on making the same mistakes, resorting to old patterns, having these recurrent and/or ‘strange’ medical conditions or accidents?
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Resociative Medicine takes some old philosophical ideas and throws in a handful of existentialist hope: i.e. that whilst we are some way fated by inherited genes, accidents, illness and other experiences, as well as transgenerational traumas and cultural norms, with help we can still shape our (embodied) destiny. The process is about developing neuro-emotional resilience and capacity at the deepest level, and so permanently changing the way one responds to situations, physically, mentally and/or emotionally, even under the most challenging of conditions. It is about regulating disordered systems and re-integrating dissociated selves or parts of self. Resociative Medicine is based on the understanding that the sum of our knowldege is not contained in our (head) brain, and that there is a distinction between knowing oneself and being ‘fixed’, versus the creative wisdom of being ‘healed’. The journey to healing is an embodiment process and working with all the cumulated emotional charge and memory in the tissues: charge that lies behind undesirable reactivity when threatened (not only emotional and behavioural but also physical, such as inflammatory or unstable immune processes). Without this journey, one ‘coping’ or ‘survival' strategy may simply be shifted to another body system or behaviour, reflecting the fact that most ‘unhealthy’ patterns are simply attempts by a person/body (consciously or subconsciously) to protect themselves and feel safe. Thus there is often considerable resistance to, and fear of, change, or even fear of the fear of change, despite clear evidence that change would be beneficial. Hence the need to work with both the conscious and unconscious/embodied selves simultaneously when resolving deeply ingrained and injurious patterns. For it is the case that soley cognitive approaches, invasive procedures and/or some medications may risk issues emerging in an even more challenging way in the future (by virtue of suppression or pushing the underlying dysregulation/charge to another part of the self). Recognising however that value of standard approaches in initially bringing awareness to a problem and/or stabilising the system. The core ‘physiological’ awareness of Resociative Medicine rests on how dysregulated or dysfunctional autonomic nervous systems, or parts there-of, can feed into disruption of the immune and inflammation systems on the one hand, and behaviours and emotional filtering on the other. Thus Resociative Medicine takes a truly holistic bio-psycho-social-spiritual approach, where spirituality can simply be interpreted as the capacity to really feel and connect with self and other. Whilst time is a great healer, in some cases it simply isn’t enough. This is especially true if there is shame or charge from other strongly emotive events in the mix (including ‘positive’ events). The charge of these emotions, and their links with identity and self-esteem, can be overwhelming. Hence Resociative medicine works directly with these in a safe and paced manner, to avoid overwhelm and retraumatisation. It can also simply speed up Time. |
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