PSTEC IN THE TRENCHES - INTRODUCTION

PSTEC in the Trenches is full of practical information on how to get the best out of PSTEC. It can be equally useful for self-helpers and those therapists who are thinking of using it but have yet to take the final plunge. I believe that one of the most useful aspects of the work is the fact that I use many real life case studies. Not only will this really help to concretise your understand of the model of the mind on which PSTEC is based on but also will demonstrate the best way of applying these tools together for a large range of problems. I cover topics such as grief, stress, PTSD, complex phobias, Tourettes, Aspergers, low self-esteem, severe anxiety and depression, suicidal thoughts and much more. In addition I give a great deal of troubleshooting tips and how I get around what seem to be big obstacles to a client moving forward. I have had many emails thanking me for providing clarity on pitfalls to avoid and I hope that you too will gain extra insight from this work. Here are a couple of excerpts from PSTEC in the Trenches which will give you a feel for what you will find inside. This first excerpt is about some advice on helping those who struggle to bring up emotion: Sometimes people have difficulty bringing on the emotion on demand. I often find that a few minutes chatting about the issue and related topics often brings up the necessary emotion. Lets say that a person experiences anxiety when in meetings at work. On occasion I have asked them if they could generate that same feeling of anxiety by focusing on any other context. If they can, they can generate the emotion via the other context then just as the Click Track begins, they can shift the context back again and imagine they are in a meeting room. I have used this technique successfully a few times with individuals having this difficulty though it is a good idea to PSTEC the other event also if still required after the click track.

For a personal consultation with Peter Owen please visit http://www.themindengineer.com

Another useful approach in these situations is to consider what the earliest memory they recall experiencing this emotion is which can sometimes unblock the ability to bring the emotion up on demand. There are occasions in which it just isnt possible. In these cases go through the click track process anyway, whilst focusing on the presenting issue because effective work can still be done despite the lack of emotion. Give yourself easy access to the click tracks as the emotion might swell up unexpectedly at some point which would be an ideal opportunity to go through the process. To those who claim that they can still feel no emotion, they have most likely become so used to the feeling that it is almost invisible (though still affecting day to day life). If you can feel no emotion really focus on and pay attention to what you do feel on the inside. You may just need a little practice. An unusual technique that I have found effective is to ask an individual who is struggling with this to close their eyes and go inwards. Next they are to say a statement that is the opposite of reality. Lets say for example someone lost their pet dog recently but are unable to generate emotion about this despite them clearly suffering from the loss. An example statement in this instance could be: I am glad my dog has died, I never liked him anyway. Just the thought of saying this is likely to induce some emotion and even more if it is said out loud. This is often enough to allow someone who is somewhat dissociated from their emotions to notice an internal change and learn that these changes are actually their emotional response to the situation. As a matter of fact this last strategy is now something that I use whenever I come across a situation in which an individual is struggling to bring up an emotion on demand and it works extremely well. I truly believe this tip alone could make a therapists life much easier.

For a personal consultation with Peter Owen please visit http://www.themindengineer.com

Here is an excerpt about how I help those suffering from intense grief. I have found PSTEC to be extremely effective at quickly removing grief. However there are certain cultural and individual beliefs that may get in the way of this or cause a person to feel guilt at the thought of removing the pain. This is purely my perception but I have found the way I present the situation quickly dissolves any barriers to removing the pain: I would like to briefly discuss the use of PSTEC on grief as this is a special situation. Whether to utilise PSTEC on the pain of grief is a completely personal matter and should be decided by the individual. People experience grief in different ways and some suffer far more than others. For those who find the suffering completely intolerable, I can think of no reason not to utilise PSTEC to help manage the feelings so that you can get on with day to day life without having to resort to drugs. Some people believe that they would be cheating the person who died if they removed the pain and that they would feel guilty if they did so. Again we each perceive death and grief in our own unique ways but here is my perspective. If you died would you like your loved ones to suffer greatly? Or if they had a tool which didnt involve drugs which would ease their suffering would you like them to utilise it to help them deal with things better? I am guessing the answer would be a yes. Its as if some people equate the level of suffering to the degree of love they felt for the person and that if you remove the suffering it also in some way suggests that you didnt love them so much in life. In my experience by removing or decreasing the emotional pain, space is created in which you can feel the love and recall with fondness all aspects of that person and the memories you shared. When I help people in situations in which grief is involved I always ask Can you think of any reason to hold onto this pain? and the answer so far has always been no, especially after I present my perspective to them.

For a personal consultation with Peter Owen please visit http://www.themindengineer.com

Whatever you decide, if there is a particular aspect surrounding the death that was very traumatic maybe a specific image or something that was said I would recommend utilising PSTEC on that specifically. It is often specific images that stop a person from going through the natural grieving process and PSTEC can often remove this block. These are my personal views on dealing with grief and you can feel free to dismiss or take them onboard as you see fit. Finally here is an excerpt on how I dealt with a complex flying phobia. The intense phobia turned out to be unrelated to flying as you will soon see: I helped a client overseas recently who had a severe flying phobia and was due to make a 12 hour flight across the Atlantic. He had independently tried EFT and the basic free tracks of PSTEC and achieved a slight decrease in anxiety but not enough to give him confidence about the flight. In these situations a person is either not following instructions correctly or there are additional factors involved, of which an apparent flying phobia is but one facet. It was clear he was using the tracks correctly focusing on the phobic event, rating it on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the highest possible anxiety and trying to maintain the anxiety whilst following the clicks and tones and focusing on flying. Delving deeper it became clear that one of his first flying experiences involved leaving his mother at the airport and not knowing whether he was going to see her again as a young child. He actually was going to see her again but his young childs mind interpreted the situation differently. This was coupled with the fact that his father was there who was intolerant of any displays of emotion. As a young child he was basically being taught to repress his emotions by parents who wouldnt have known of the detrimental effect this can have. This, in addition to the intense separation anxiety he felt about leaving his mother and everything happening at the airport, led the subconscious mind to form a link between the airports/flying and panic. Of course on the surface it appears to be a simple flying phobia, when in actual fact flying is just one problem context which initiates the emotions, the cause of which he had no conscious awareness of until our discussion.
For a personal consultation with Peter Owen please visit http://www.themindengineer.com

My client had a huge fear of making a fool of himself in public by losing himself to emotion. In a plane where he was highly anxious anyway, this fear was increased because he had nowhere to hide if he did have a panic attack or show his fear. Moreover this particular trip was to see his sister whom he hadnt seen for a decade and he feared crying or otherwise showing his emotions when they first met up. My advice to him was run PSTEC on the following: The memory and fear of leaving his mother as a child (this took several minutes of introspection to generate emotion as he imagined himself as a child once more feeling those feelings) The imaginary scenario of losing control of his emotions in front of his father as a child. The imaginary scenario of losing control of his emotions on the plane in the present day and all the other passengers laughing at him. Crying in front of his sister and all the associated emotions linked to that.

Running PSTEC on all of the above until each emotional intensity rating became zero, followed by running PSTEC once more on the flying phobia completely removed all fear of flying and he took a pleasant trip to see his sister and had a great time. * We actually employed a tool called PSTEC positive in addition to this which focuses on beliefs but I shall discuss this independently later. Here is an example of how an emotion can represent a belief caused by a previous life experience. He believed that people shouldnt show emotion in front of other people. Only when probed did he realise that the fact was he only felt this belief was correct. Once he realised that this feeling was based upon an experience he had as a child, coupled with the fact that he only applied the rule to himself and not others did he realise that his life was better off without it. A great deal of talking therapy may have helped in this instance but simply removing the emotion from the problem event did all this work for him.

For a personal consultation with Peter Owen please visit http://www.themindengineer.com

I hope the above examples will give you an insight not only into dealing with phobias but also how intricately linked emotions are to beliefs, how they can be formed and how quickly and easily our life experience can change once bad emotion is removed from our body. I will discuss a few more important case studies before going on to talk about how to utilise the basic PSTEC click tracks along with other techniques and principles. In my view the more practical applications and examples you have of how PSTEC has been utilised and why it works, the more likely you are to have success with this procedure. I hope these excerpts help you to make a decision on whether you think this work will be beneficial to you. PETER OWEN http://www.themindengineer.com [email protected]

For a personal consultation with Peter Owen please visit http://www.themindengineer.com