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Founding principles (chapter 1)
Far from wanting to re-write the entire fist book Understanding One's Emotions, it seems vital to remember the guidelines to explain how the results, which will be referred to and explained in detail further on, were obtained.
This process is called "Tipi" for Technique for the Identification of Unconscious Fears (Technique d'Identification des Peurs Inconscientes). It considers fears to be at the heart of emotional distress, knowing that these fears most strongly condition the reflexes of defense: escape, inhibition, aggressiveness, and, more unexpectedly, seizure of power1. Furthermore, for these fears to exist, one must admit that at first an unpleasant event has been experienced. It is this first experience which must be found in order to deactivate the behaviors it produces. Without absolute certainty about the biological mechanism, the results obtained on a great number of people show that, once a situation which is at the origin of the fears is remembered and relived, the fears are dismantled, provided this "relived" experience is a real emotional, sensory reality, not an intellectual projection. In other words, it is through its physical, not intellectual, feeling that the origin of the fears must be sought. And it is often where the difficulty lies, as we are so used to thinking rather than feeling. Yet, this is the only way one can go back to track the most ancient of fears, which in most cases are decisive. In a very simple way, it is possible to reconnect to the multiple events experienced during birth and even in the mother's womb.
A number of therapeutic practices have already to some extent engaged in this direction. Indeed, it seems that the success of Tipi results from the combination of four key principles.
Fear
Fear is defined as an emotion felt in the presence or the perspective of some danger. In its primary forms, fear shows itself in two types of manifestations: passive fear, characterized by the phenomenon of inhibition, paralysis; and active fear, marked by verbal or motor panic. The reactions linked to a potential danger can have different influences and aspects: apprehension, stress, fear, worry, anxiety, anguish. They all relate to a feeling of powerlessness towards the dangers of a world perceived as threatening. The term "danger" must be understood in the strong sense of the word, namely as a confrontation with death. This confrontation can be direct (physical death) or indirect (material or relational losses which can diminish the chances of survival).
In this process, this notion of confrontation with death is decisive. Through the manifestation of fear, the aim is to find the danger that generated it. In cases of serious pathologies and all phobias, as we will show further on, this search leads you to the prenatal period or birth and it always is a direct confrontation with one's own death, which is identified as the cause of the distress. Be it a lack of oxygen, or an insufficient nourishment, poisoning or an outside element creating distress or physical sensations which are extremely difficult to overcome, it is indeed at this very elementary stage of survival that fears appear resulting in extremely tenacious emotional sufferings.
Of course, the initial "danger" responsible for this fear can be linked to the traumatic event that most therapists are looking for, but this search generally has a psychological connotation, which leads to an essentially relational perspective of the event. For example, if a fetus has coexisted with a twin that did not survive, the traumatism, if identified, will essentially be analyzed within the relational implications (feeling of distress, solitude or abandonment, overly close relationships with the circle of friends and family, failure to have lasting relationships, or, on the contrary, failure to cope with break-ups, etc.) For example, if you approach the event in terms of the manifestations of fear, it can lead you to relive the loss of consciousness caused by the extremely strong procedure of suction that accompanies the evacuation of the twin fetus. If you approach the repellant sensations caused by the situation, it is the physical risk undergone by the person that is being highlighted, while analyzing it from a psychological point of view, it is the affective relationship of the person with his or her environment that is being emphasized. From a physical point of view, the disappearance of the twin seems like a violent event threatening the physical survival of the remaining one. From a psychological point of view, this disappearance is mainly considered as an affective absence which is very difficult to overcome. In fact, it seems evident that it is the physical sensations felt during such an unpleasant event which induces these undesirable psychological repercussions. Subsequently, when the introspection stops at the psychological impact, it does not reach the heart of the physical suffering which remains active in the sensory memory. Certainly, we are evidently more at ease within a psychological approach; but if we talk about healing, focusing on the physical feeling seems to lead to a much more advantageous result.
The physical feeling
Searching for the origin of trauma through the manifestations of fear allows us to base ourselves on very specific, very easily identifiable physical sensations.
A person who is uncomfortable around fire, can very easily describe what they feel in their body at that moment. For instance, they will be surprised, when "listening" to their body, and feel a pungent pain on the shoulder and arm, as if somebody were violently pulling them out of balance backwards. This feeling may then lead the person to identify a situation in which fire is not at all responsible for this person's fear: as an infant most probably they were grabbed very strongly to avoid burning, and since then, what this person fears when approaching fire is not the fear of burning, but to be grabbed aggressively and thrown out of balance. Obviously, another person will describe some totally different feelings born from a different but just as personal situation.
Furthermore, the example about the fear of fire shows very well how fear anchors itself in our bodies during an unpleasant event: the physical sensation felt during the first encounter is memorized as it is, ready to surface. From then on, it manifests identically in all the situations perceived as similar, often unconsciously. It is precisely these sensory traces which allow us to go back to the original event reliably and with precision. To get there, we need to allow ourselves to be carried by this sensory memory: everybody naturally knows how to "remember" with their bodies. In Mali, for instance, the people who participate in this research immediately went into a "feeling" mode without any request to do so, they allowed themselves to be taken by their bodies and fears.
In Western countries, most people confronted with their fears unfortunately resort to their intellect rather than "listen" to their bodies. It is then necessary to put their analytical mode on hold in order to allow the sensations to rule. Several techniques already exist to reach this state. Tipi, the technique chosen here, has the advantage of being very simple and fast to apply (it takes hold with natural conversation) and does not produce any kind of dependence (people remain completely awake and never lose their free will).
This "physical reconnection" to the original event is decisive: all the cases studied clearly show that this is the essential condition for deactivating fears. The intellectual approach does not bring about any change. If a person has a lump in their throat and this person lacks air and feels held back every time they need to overcome what is considered an obstacle, to the point they make a great effort in order to avoid the feeling, it is not just by learning that they were born with the umbilical cord around the neck (making birth quite difficult) that they will be healed. Whereas even if this person does not manage to intellectually identify the originating event, the mere fact of re-experiencing the sensations felt during those critical moments are generally sufficient to dismantle their fears. In other words, understanding without re-experiencing the sensations does not stop the suffering. It is absolutely necessary to keep this truth in mind. Even if it is very tempting, in numerous cases, to write a list of psychological profiles or behavioral standards depending on the type of event suffered by different people, this intellectual exercise is useless in terms of healing. Indeed, it can even be dangerous: each path is unique and neglecting the individual sensations in favor of a stereotypical explanation often leads to false interpretations.
Passivity
Within a sensory approach, the main difficulty to overcome is the unwillingness to accept this passivity. There is nothing to do, to want, to understand; just physically feel and allow oneself to be carried away by that feeling. It is about being a spectator and letting go of oneself to follow our sensations wherever they may take us, without a precise objective or preconceived ideas about the images, sounds, textures, smells and flavors which left their retraceable marks on us.
Passivity also applies to those who possibly are trying to help. Indeed, with the approach which I propose in this book, the only help one can offer is to accompany the person and allow the suffering person to connect with and then stay attuned to their feelings. Habitually, the therapist takes charge of the people in distress. It is the therapist who knows and who heals. Thus, the results mainly rely on the therapist's knowledge and personal skills in applying this knowledge. Here, on the contrary, it is about letting each person find their own way. To be content with merely witnessing, not wanting anything, not knowing anything, are the key conditions to allow the fragile thread of our feelings to unroll. During a session it is not unusual that after a short initial commencement, no words are exchanged until the end. To be completely clear, the only skill required for the person helping is, if necessary, to disconnect the most resilient intellectual preconceptions. No medical skills are required. In this sense, the use of this technique is not even a therapy, but rather looks like training on how to use our sensory memory. But contrary to what one can suppose at first sight, the simplicity of the approach does not necessarily mean it is easy to do. Indeed, it is not so easy to not give oneself the main role, to accept the fact of not knowing, to be content with being a mere transmitter allowing each person to explore themselves until the healing.
Passivity is also present in the healing itself because, again, it is about letting it happen. It seems that the mere fact of consciously reconnecting your feelings with the origin of the suffering is enough to deactivate the suffering. No special treatment or cure, no psychological conditioning, no symbolic acts. It is just preferable to avoid intellectualizing the sensations felt during the session in order not to stop or slow down natural and spontaneous healing.
The healing
The healing is complete. There is no middle way: you are either healed or not. The fear disappears as soon as the sensory source has been revisited. Nevertheless, if a fear remains after a first introspection, it is used as a support to go further into the feeling. Indeed, starting from the original event which created the fear, numerous similar situations generally follow and intensify this original fear. To go back to the original fear, it may be necessary to peel back the successive layers and skins. In a nutshell, one knows one has reached the destination when fear no longer manifests itself. And when fear disappears, all the types of behavior the fear created also cease.
Yet, this systematic healing, at this stage of our approach, has its limitations. Indeed, the disappearance of the suffering becomes very random when it is accompanied by physical disorders or compulsive behavior (anorexia, stammering, obsessive-compulsive disorders). In this case, from the both emotional and physical points of view, sometimes the results can be spectacular and sometimes, without really understanding why, the approach does not work. Furthermore, only the emotional sufferings not accompanied by physical complications have been taken into account in this book: phobias, chronic depression, inhibitions, irritability, anxiety and obsessions.
