[spiritual_emergency]

Another thought-provoking article, courtesy of Rufus May's site.

“How do we identify, acknowledge and work with difficult emotions represented by challenging voices?”

Below are some notes from a workshop I ran at last years Intervoice meeting in Perth, Australia.

Challenging or difficult voices can be messengers about difficult emotions that we are disconnected from and the life events that relate to this. Challenging voices can tell us clues about relationships we have had.

For example, domineering or manipulative voices may represent domineering or manipulative relationships we have experienced. If voices are controlling this may also reflect not being able to assert one’s needs in relationships with other people. Critical voices and threatening voices often are messengers about experiences of being bullied or abused in some way. Voices that try to make us feel guilty may symbolically point to times we have blamed ourself and kept silent about injustices we have experienced (e.g. as a survival strategy). Angry voices sometimes represent repressed feelings of anger the person has towards themselves or others (or both). Anger is often made up of other feelings such as outrage, shame, hurt, frustration, fear and self doubt.

Thus voices often represent complex feelings we have stored away. If we deal with the feelings represented by the voices by acknowledging them and calming them and or expressing them- then difficult voices will have less power over us.

Difficult emotions and difficult voices may be like ‘demons’ we need to understand and negotiate with. Our ‘demons’ may sometimes hold the key to turning points in our lives which we may need to revisit and change the contract we previously signed up to! What do people think of this idea?

- Is developing a nonjudgmental attitude helpful towards voices helpful? Do we need to deal with our difficult feelings first?

- What are the different ways we can identify and acknowledge our emotions?

- How do we listen deeply to ourselves and our voices?

- What are helpful ways to calm emotions (e.g. mindfulness, walking in nature, yoga, music, emotional freedom techniques etc)?

- What are helpful ways to express emotions (e.g. dancing, singing, martial arts, creativity, developing a social justice mission)?

- Can dissociation from emotions be helpful sometimes?

-On our journeys of self understanding how can we slowly become more aware of our hidden parts and emotions and be gentle with ourselves?

- Can working with our dreams help us with difficult voices (and emotions)? What are people’s experiences of this?

- How do we become more compassionate towards ourselves?

- How can groups be helpful in generating this understanding approach to ourselves?

- How can helping others be helpful in being with and transforming our own pain (not just as a distraction from it)?

- How can we work with perpetrator voices and use their difficult messages to strengthen and heal the wounded parts of ourselves?

- How do we develop courage and bravery to face and process difficult emotions?

- Is accepting suffering an important aspect of this work - what practices can make this beareable?

- Can body work be a way to work with emotions where words are not available/helpful?

Source: Working with emotions linked to challenging voices

[Tinaleigh]

This is a very interesting article. It had never occured to me that my voices could be linked to a past relationship or current one. Because my voices are so disturbing and challenging, I tend to avoid the topic with my therapist. So reading this article is somewhat of a revelation. Thank you

[vrba44070]

I've experienced a lot of trauma in the past & my psychotic episodes seem to be reflective of that. One problem is they are so intense that all I want to do is escape them. This often leads to thoughts of suicide. I need to learn how to tolerate these episodes somehow. My new therapist is trying Dialectical Behavioral Therapy w/ me because it's a therapy that teaches clients how to tolerate distress. I hope it works. I know my psychosis is rooted in trauma & ego boundaries & not to bad chemistry.

[spiritual_emergency]

vrba: I've experienced a lot of trauma in the past & my psychotic episodes seem to be reflective of that.

Have you read Models of Madness vrba? It might contain some helpful information for you. Here's a brief introduction to the underlying concepts...

Cause: Trauma

Schizophrenia and PTSD Connection
The psychiatric establishment is about to experience an earthquake that will shake its intellectual foundations. When it has absorbed the juddering contents of the latest edition of one of its leading journals, Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, it will have to rethink many of its most cherished assumptions. Not since the publication of RD Laing's book Sanity, Madness and the Family, in 1964, has there been such a significant challenge to their contention that genes are the main cause of schizophrenia and that drugs should be the automatic treatment of choice.

With his colleagues, guest editor John Read (whose name I shall use as a generic term for this body of evidence), a leading New Zealand psychologist, slays these sacred biological cows. The fact that some two-thirds of people diagnosed as schizophrenic have suffered physical or sexual abuse is shown to be a major, if not the major, cause of the illness. Proving the connection between the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder and schizophrenia, Read shows that many schizophrenic symptoms are directly caused by trauma.

The cornerstone of Read's tectonic plate-shifting evidence is the 40 studies that reveal childhood or adulthood sexual or physical abuse in the history of the majority of psychiatric patients (see, also, Read's book, Models of Madness). A review of 13 studies of schizophrenics found rates varying from 51% at the lowest to 97% at the highest.

Source: The Guardian

We need to remember that trauma experiences are subjective and personal. What one person finds to be traumatic may not be to another. I've noted elsewhere that among the "schizophrenics" I've spoken with there is nearly always an event (or series of events) preceding the psychotic episode that seriously challenges their sense of self-identity. Although this event might not appear to be traumatic to others, if it's explored fully, the full extent of the impact and meaning often becomes clear.

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