CetrariaOkay, got a truly niche question for you, hive mind!
How would you suggest someone who doesn't have mental images (#aphantsia #aphant) create a safe space in their mind to go to while doing #emdrtherapy #EMDR
Cavedale Rhônes@Cetraria Maybe count your breaths? It’s a zen meditation. Count to 10 and start over.
MeganDepending on what senses you do tend to imagine in, I’d create there. A space with textures, comforting sounds, smells. I don’t think visually but have a strong sense of proprioception, so could imagine my body in a space that felt safe, that I would “know” without needing visuals.
@Athenalindia that's fascinating, having a strong mental sense of proprioception! I can imagine that being very intense.
I think sound, specifically music, is my strongest internal sense. But I am struggling to think of a song that makes me feel safe. Or that I could necessarily conjure if I felt overwhelmed.
Mar@Cetraria @Athenalindia I was also going to suggest a soundscape!
Creating different sensory-scapes sounds fascinating.
Nathan Lowell (he/him) 📎Tap memory of physical sensations instead of images?
Like remembering the feeling of drinking a long, cool glass of water on a hot day? The smell of bread baking?
Any kind of "how did it feel...?" question over "How did it look...?"
I don't know. I'm spitballing here, trying to think what might work for me. I have a terrible time envisioning something but remember the scent of lilacs.
@nlowell this includes something I'd thought about experimenting with. Like having a little vial of essential oil that takes me to a happy time.
I can conjure sounds in my mind's ear, but that doesn't necessarily make me feel safe. And it's still pretty diffuse, even as my strongest mental sense. Something I could sort of flood a sense with like smell seems like it might have potential.
PJ "Vote Green" CoffeyI have no special expertise but scent is well-known to be powerful. The nerves go straight to the brain. And it's always worth including one as part of a grounding exercise.
Had you considered attempting to create a good association? Pick a pleasant and unusual scent and then make your surroundings as relaxing as possible? I think scented candles are good for that sort of thing.
I'd love to hear of what works and what doesn't.
@Homebrewandhacking @nlowell This is along the lines of what I have in mind - something that can act as a cue to remember to go blank.
@Homebrewandhacking @nlowell My main concern is the power of negative thoughts versus positive. Getting caught up in a negative thought, I can get very overwhelmed. I haven't figured out a way to conjure a positive mental state that's more powerful than saying "a positive mental state", if that makes sense.
Even thinking about my cat or my garden or my family or the mountains or whatever doesn't have much of an emotional charge for me. Like thinking "I'm thinking about my cat".
I'd prefer to go straight from negative to positive, but I feel like I might have to start with interrupting the negative until I can see if there's any way to bring up a genuinely positive association.
Yeah, I think with emotions we have a very strange approach. Framing them as "negative" and "positive".
Emotions aren't in our control. They just happen. It's how we think about them and how we act on them that matters.
Say you're crossing the road and a car almost hits you. There's a burst of fear, then anger. If the anger compels you to huck a brick at the car, that's negative! If it drives you to campaign for a safe crossing point? That's positive. 1/
So, to me, I guess I'm not listening properly. Sorry. 😞
Because moving from thinking about distressing things which are overwhelming to thinking of a pleasant experience is a kind of neutrality. A retreat from the overwhelm seems like a good and useful goal.
I guess it would be bringing out the associated feeling? As in your example, thinking about your cat is a thought. Concentrating on how you feel about your cat when they lie on you purring and rest their head on you.
@Homebrewandhacking @nlowell Thank you for offering suggestions! Bringing out the associated feeling is the hard part. I can think about my cat sitting on me (he is, as I speak) but I can't access the warm, fuzzy feeling I think most people feel. I've been struggling to access warm and fuzzy for years now, which is part of why I'm doing this. Just keeping myself out of overwhelm seems like it would be a relief.
avuko@Cetraria @Homebrewandhacking @nlowell for me, I usually counter a negative narrative, thought or feeling with a neutral sensation of direct experience, not a positive one.
It works because I don’t have to create or go look for anything, and the difference between negative vs normal/ past&future vs now is large enough.
I use bodily feedback, as in feeling a part of my body. The best for me is feeling the soles of my feet, because those are as far away from my head as possible, taking me away from between my ears.
@avuko @Homebrewandhacking @nlowell That's really helpful! I can definitely experiment with focusing my awareness on my feet. They're usually far from pain, and pretty emotionally neutral.
Alison Wilder@Cetraria I have aphantasia too. I I can usually pretty much keep a blank mind, no matter what's happening.
But if that doesn't work for you, can you imagine a song you really love? Like, imagine it in detail, as close as you can to how it really sounds.
Or maybe the voice of someone you really love.
@alisynthesis A blank mind is an interesting idea! I can pretty consistently blank my mind. I wonder if I could do it during therapy.
@Cetraria I think it's a superpower that comes from aphantasia! :)
@alisynthesis it certainly seems like!
@Cetraria Perhaps you can start focusing on the sense of safety and see what (if) anything comes up, a sound, a memory, an idea.. and then develop little by little a sensory-scape around it.
I had trouble imagining a safe space. I started by trying to imagine places and then seeing if I felt safe. I wasn't getting anywhere, until I remembered a story: that seeds of plants and moss and the such survived Mt. Saint Helens explosions in nooks under the rocks.
@Cetraria you mentioned not being able to find songs that make you feel safe. I personally find songs too emotionally charged. If you want to try a soundscape, I'd start much smaller... a few notes in a favorite instrument, the sound of a tuning fork or a meditation ball, a bird call.
Then, if you are having trouble retrieving it, you can go to the idea first (ex. the concept of "bird call").
Then, if you are having trouble retrieving it, you can go to the idea first (ex. the concept of "bird call").
@marsiposa Yeah, I don't know that I've ever experienced feeling safe. Or at least not in so long that I can remember. More like "less unsafe". I'm not sure what a sense of safety feels like. It sounds like that was a challenge for you too.
Did you imagine yourself as the seed? Or just the concept that life survived in the midst of all that destruction?
Minds are wild things, they can vary so much in functionality!
@Cetraria yeah, I was thinking on those lines: beyond imagining a place, the difficult thing is to feel "safety".
I think I focused on the existence of a safe place for *something*. I thought about the moss being safe (I like moss). I don't want to be too dramatic, but I think I identified easier with the desolated landscape than with the safe space (LOL, don't tell my therapist). Edit: in retrospective, perhaps it was important that the safe space was within the desolated landscape.
@Cetraria
With time, though, I started imagining a very small part of myself that could fit in there with the moss. Then I started imagining there was actually a whole dark and mossy forest where I could fit. Then the forest was able to come outside to the desolated landscape. Now that I think about it, there were a lot of colors in the process (ex. "green = safe").
With time, though, I started imagining a very small part of myself that could fit in there with the moss. Then I started imagining there was actually a whole dark and mossy forest where I could fit. Then the forest was able to come outside to the desolated landscape. Now that I think about it, there were a lot of colors in the process (ex. "green = safe").
@marsiposa That's such a cool progression! That's really hopeful for me to hear.
Colors are weirdly very important for me too, given that my mental images don't exactly store that info even when I dream.
The last two places I lived, I painted deep, vibrant purple and teal, and blue or green. This latest place has a lot of purple and teal, but I'm finding myself strongly drawn to dark, mossy greens in a way I haven't since I was a teenager. I'm starting to feel like dark green is my sanctuary color.
@marsiposa Moss is the secret message in my username 😄
For 20 or so years, my handle was Moss. It's still kinda my internal name for myself.
When that username quit being quite so easy to get, being a four-letter word, I had to get crafty. Cetraria is the genus of something commonly called Icelandic "moss", which is actually a lichen. But it rolls off the tongue better than the moss genuses around me.
Which is to say, moss is very homey to me too. I'm definitely feeling the desolate landscape, or maybe just a deeply weedy and disturbed field these days. But a mossy enclave is my goal.
@Cetraria oh, that's so nice! Great choice of username! Plus lichens are pretty cool too 
Mossy places are so beautiful ... and safe 🙂
WearyBonnie@Cetraria
Hmm I am only mostly aphantasic, but the rest of my mental senses are also each pretty weak, so I think I would try to combine them all as much as I can and try to create a sort of.. not a mental imagery but a mental zone?
Like I might think of my favourite place (which doesn't mean "seeing" it in my head, just.. remembering it non-visually) & then think through.. I can hear birds calling, I can feel breeze on my face, I'm touching my dog's fur, what can I smell? if that makes sense?
Hmm I am only mostly aphantasic, but the rest of my mental senses are also each pretty weak, so I think I would try to combine them all as much as I can and try to create a sort of.. not a mental imagery but a mental zone?
Like I might think of my favourite place (which doesn't mean "seeing" it in my head, just.. remembering it non-visually) & then think through.. I can hear birds calling, I can feel breeze on my face, I'm touching my dog's fur, what can I smell? if that makes sense?
@3TomatoesShort I think it does. Does it bring a positive feeling for you, or more like a different or perhaps not-negatively-charged feeling?
@Cetraria
So for me it kinda feels like getting my body into the same nervous system state (super relaxed and positive) that it would be in, if I could go to that place. But I should stress that I only do this kinda activity when I'm doing guided meditations - it's a wholly positive situation with no negative challenges (except whatever my body is doing at the time I guess!) so it may be completely irrelevant to your situation!
So for me it kinda feels like getting my body into the same nervous system state (super relaxed and positive) that it would be in, if I could go to that place. But I should stress that I only do this kinda activity when I'm doing guided meditations - it's a wholly positive situation with no negative challenges (except whatever my body is doing at the time I guess!) so it may be completely irrelevant to your situation!
@3TomatoesShort it's all new to me, so I have no idea! I do know that during guided meditation I struggle with cooking up with those cozy, relaxed feels.
That's part of my concern with this. Is it possible to do this if I can't make myself feel cozy or relaxed under the best of circumstances? What happens if someone is so "broken" that they can't use the common tools? Am I just going to feel like this forever? I know the therapist is who needs to answer this... I feel like I need to do some looking on my own first, so the questions feel less scary to ask.
@Cetraria
Hmm well.. I first learned to meditate back when I had IBS and also my neck/shoulder/back pain was much worse, and it was like.. a VERY slow process. At first whenever I tried, the only thing that happened was that my pain got infinitely worse, because I was kinda letting myself feel my bodystate, instead of smooshing it away from my consciousness. It has been a long time to get from "well hey, at least my left big toe isn't actively hurting" to an actually relaxed nervous system 💚
Hmm well.. I first learned to meditate back when I had IBS and also my neck/shoulder/back pain was much worse, and it was like.. a VERY slow process. At first whenever I tried, the only thing that happened was that my pain got infinitely worse, because I was kinda letting myself feel my bodystate, instead of smooshing it away from my consciousness. It has been a long time to get from "well hey, at least my left big toe isn't actively hurting" to an actually relaxed nervous system 💚
@3TomatoesShort Focusing on the absence of pain in a toe is kinda how I'm thinking about this. I can't get to identifying feeling good, but I can get to focusing on the absence of pain somewhere. Just enough to stop feeling overwhelmed for a little while.
@Cetraria
Yeah, I think it's definitely all you can aim for sometimes. Maybe things will improve from there but even if they don't, I think it's potentially (I don't want to say always because I only have my own experiences to draw on, I don't want to erase anyone else's) a positive experience for the nervous system if you can focus on an absence of pain somewhere.
Yeah, I think it's definitely all you can aim for sometimes. Maybe things will improve from there but even if they don't, I think it's potentially (I don't want to say always because I only have my own experiences to draw on, I don't want to erase anyone else's) a positive experience for the nervous system if you can focus on an absence of pain somewhere.
@Cetraria adding my thoughts to this thread: at first, I did not really felt cozy and relaxed in the safe space. It was safe, but not cozy nor relaxed. That came with time. Like, if you are on a ship in a storm, holding onto the mast, you're as safe as you can be, but no cozy nor relaxed.
Perhaps, thinking of a situation where "a being" is "as safe as possible given the circumstances", might be a start. I don't think you need to see the images in your mind. I think the concept might suffice.
@marsiposa That makes sense. Not getting tossed around by the storm for starters seems feasible!
Analog AI@Cetraria
Things that work for me (though I can form partial images):
Imagine being wrapped in a blanket -- not how it looks, but how it feels.
Or think about a relationship that makes you feel safe.
Lyndsay Barwell@Cetraria agree with focusing on anything that isn't in pain or senses that aren't visual. But I don't really know about emdr beyond the basic definition. My ability to visualise exists but is poor. I do better with body scanning. But I can "hear" music in my head quite clearly.
Dr Ro Smith@treehugger @Cetraria I hope you'll forgive me as someone who doesn't have aphantasia, but is doing EMDR, stepping in to say: my therapist was unable to get the safe space thing to work because I don't feel safe anywhere and I struggled to keep an imaginary safe space present while watching the ball. I would have kept on trying, but he wanted to move on, so now at the end of the session he just tells me to watch the ball and try not to think of anything. It seems to work for me 🤷♀️
@treehugger @Cetraria EMDR has been a real blessing. It's been the only thing that worked for me after CBT was foisted on me multiple times and was actively damaging. I would hate for anyone to feel they can't do EMDR just because they can't visualize a safe space. It's completely not necessary.
@treehugger @Cetraria and if you struggle not to think of anything (as I do) watching the ball does help, as it gives you something to do, and when I'm really struggling to quiet intrusive thoughts I just think 'Ball, ball, ball, watch the ball,' in my head, and that helps.
@Rhube @treehugger Oh, watching a physical ball? That seems like it'd be helpful too. I can't visualize anything, safe or otherwise, but watching a physical object sounds like it'd be potentially very effective.
@Cetraria @treehugger Well, a blue ball that goes back and forth on a screen. That's the main part of EMDR - either a physical object, like the therapist's finger or a blue ball on a computer screen, or sometimes a sound first on your left, then your right, while you think of the traumatic stuff - for me it's on a screen because I'm not well enough to physically go to the therapist. Then at the end to help settle anything that's gotten stirred up, I watch the blue ball again and just try not>
@Cetraria @treehugger >to think of anything. If I'd done better with the safe space I'd have been picturing that, but if you can't picture that, I find just focusing on the ball is enough to help.
@Cetraria @treehugger Visualising really shouldn't be central to the therapy itself.
@Rhube @treehugger I'm in the same spot of not being well enough to be going into the office either. A sound going back and forth sounds really nice too. Sounds grab my attention like nothing else
@Cetraria @treehugger yeah, I have the ball and the sounds, but the first session was trying a bunch of stuff to see what worked best for me.