A103 Principles of Change from the New Brain Science

Our theories of how change happens are being transformed by the breakthroughs in neuroscience. And while we can opt to pull the blankets over our heads and do therapy as usual, the findings of brain science are opening doors to exciting, positive ways to change our own lives and those of our clients. This course explores in depth the principles of change that are coming out of the latest understanding of how our brains work, and how they confirm some traditional clinical beliefs and practices and challenge others. This course explores the importance of such brain-changing principles as novelty, repeated experience, emotional attachment, physical activation, affective intensity, and limbic resonance. It also examines how to create "corrective encounters," involving experiences of flow, altruism, and genuine remorse. In addition to looking at what neuroscience can tell us about our roles as therapists, it investigates what it can tell us about how to lead more meaningful and satisfying lives away from our consulting rooms.

Meet The Instructor

Pat Love, Ed.D., is a licensed marriage and family therapist, approved supervisor for AAMFT, and charter member of the Imago Institute for Relationship Therapy. She's a former distinguished graduate faculty of Texas A & M University, Commerce, and founder of the Austin Family Institute. Her books include Hot Monogamy and The Truth about Love. She's cohosted two videotape series, Living Love and Parenting with the Experts, and has created her own relationship video entitled Everlasting Love.

Course Contents

Session 1: Neuroscientific Information as Therapy • The relationship between experience and perception • Explicit vs implicit memory • Why you can't always trust your feelings • The draw of the familiar • Techniques indicated and contraindicated by neuroscience

Session 2: The Role of Hormones and Neurotransmitters • Serotonin--anger and irritiability • Dopamine--pleasure, craving, addiction and compulsion • Progesterone--mood regulation • Testosterone--libido, life energy • Estrogen--communication, sensitivity, memory • Norepinephrine--energy and motivation • Oxytocin--nurturing and bonding • Diet, exercise and lifestyle changes

Session 3: Principles of Neuroplasticity • What changes your brain • How new brain cells and pathways are made • Neurogenesis and second order change
Limbic resonance • The importance of repetition • Making therapy last past your office door.

Session 4: A Therapeutic Protocol for the Brain-Savvy Therapist • Assessment
Stress level • Anxiety and depression • Close relationships • Work life • General life satisfaction • Common client profiles • Interventions • Psychopharmacology • Cognitive restructuring • Anger management • Stress management • Self care

Session 5: Corrective Encounters • Experiences that re-wire the brain • Attunement • Non-complementarity • Cultivating antidotes • Making the implicit explicit • Gratitude • Compassion • Techniques for inviting ownership, vulnerability, and compassion

Session 6: Uncommon Approaches • Physical activity • Novelty • Enrichment • Lessons from Chaos Science • Passion as panacea • The importance of ritual and celebration

Learning Objectives:

-Participants will be able to:
1. Differentiate between implicit and explicit memory.
2. Describe one clinical technique contraindicated by the new brain science.
3. Define neurogenesis.
4. Contrast the effect of complementary and non-complementary responses on neural circuitry.
5. Discuss the relationship between antidotes and emotional regulation.
6. Explain the role of attunement in brain development.