The Instinct to Heal by David Servan-Schreiber

Depression and anxiety seem to be the new defining diseases of our age, especially in the West. These disorders, and even severe stress, can affect our health as much as smoking or obesity.

 French psychiatrist David Servan-Schreiber notes that drugs and talk therapy are not especially effective, though the side-effects can be serious. The operating theory behind antidepressant drugs may simply be wrong.

 Dr. Servan-Schreiber suggests we look elsewhere for solutions to depression. The roots of depression are in the emotional brain, rather than the thinking brain, the body and the interaction between them.

 Our brain is layered, an as you go deeper inward, you get to older structures similar to other life forms: first those similar to other primates, then to mammals and finally to reptiles. The wordy, analytical, thinking part of the brain is the newest outer layer, the neocortex. Anxiety and depression are more strongly linked to the inner parts of the brain, which is emotional, image-oriented and much more closely linked to the operations of the body.

 One aspect of the brain-body connection is the heart. The heart has a bundle of nerves associated with it that are practically a simple brain itself, and this heart-brain has a direct connection to the emotional brain in the head. Our emotional and physical states are closely tied this way. Servan-Schreiber discusses techniques related to heart coherence, the variation of heart rate in a regular patter, that can be calming to the heart and brain and put is in a relaxed, restorative mode. His book includes instructions on a type of meditation for increasing heart coherence.

 He also talks about a technique that uses eye movements similar to those that occur while we dream to help the emotional brain process trauma, called eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR). This therapy will require a trip to a psychiatrist or psychologist, but for the right patients it can provide quick results.

 There is the suggestion that some cases of depression can be a symptom of disease or other issues in the body, especially inflammation. One of the things one can do deal with this type of depression is to get more Omega-3 fatty acids. These can help improve the function of the brain by improving the coating on brain cells. Depression seems to be more prevalent in countries where the typical diet is lower in Omega-3. Exercise can also improve depression and anxiety, especially when it is done regularly; three times a week for 20 minutes is enough to see a benefit.

 In addition, relationships and community are important to mental health and a sense of wellbeing. The quality of ones relationships can have a great impact on physical and mental health. Over the last few decades, people have come to have fewer and shallower relationships and less connections to community and purpose. Servan-Schreiber’s advice on this particularly focuses on ways to communicate that resolve conflicts and build empathy.

 Depression and anxiety are complex. Servan-Schreiber provides a suite of options for treating it. One of these may be helpful along, and some may need to use various ones in combination. In any case, there are things you can do, especially with the aid of a physician or psychologist, to make things better.

 If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Anxious for Nothing by Max Lucado

The Beethoven Factor by Paul Pearsall

Change Your Brain Change Your Body by Daniel G. Amen

The Last Self-Help Book You'll Ever Need by Paul Pearsall

The Mindful Way through Depression by Mark Williams, John Teasdale, Zindal Segal & Joh Kabat-Zinn

Overwhelmed by Brigid Schulte

The Relaxation Response by Herbert Benson with Miriam Z. Klipper

Rewire Your Anxious Brain by Catherine M. Pittman & Elizabeth M. Karle

The Solution by Lucinda Bassett

Switch on Your Brain by Caroline Leaf

Timeless Healing by Herbert Benson with Marg Stark

 Servan-Schreiber, David. The Instinct to Heal: Curing Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Without Drugs and Without Talk Therapy. New York: Rodale, 2003.

It's Not Always Depression by Hilary Jacobs Hendel

Depression and anxiety can be tough to handle and treat. Drugs may treat symptoms, but they do not cure depression and they typically do not work for long or require ever increasing doses. Talk based therapies can be helpful, but sometime it take a long time to get a helpful breakthrough.

Some forms of treatment aim to be more active. One such is accelerated experiential dynamic psychotherapy, or AEDP. This form of therapy is the basis of the methods described by therapist Hilary Jacobs Hendel in It’s Not Always Depression.

In a nutshell, AEDP sees maladaptive behaviors (defenses) and stressful emotions such as anxiety (inhibitory emotions) as ways to suppress potent core emotions. This can be useful to help us get along in social situations, maintain relationships and keep ourselves from being carried away by strong emotions. This is especially true when we are children and may not have the maturity or power to choose another path. However, we can become stuck in this behavior, never dealing properly with our core emotions, and our inhibitory emotions and defenses can become maladaptive, keeping us from the life and relationships we want and need.

Hendel organizes these items into an equilateral triangle setting on point. Defenses sit at the upper left corner, inhibitory emotions at the upper right, and core emotions at the bottom. Beneath the core emotions is your authentic self, which Hendel calls an openhearted state, in which one feels calm, confident and clear-headed.

Working the triangle is getting in touch with core emotions by finding how our defenses and inhibitory emotions are protecting us from them and the consequences of expressing them. Hendel draws examples from her therapy practice, but the fact that this is a book for a popular audience suggests that this is a technique that people could use on their own as well as in a more formal therapeutic setting. When we acknowledge our core emotions, name them, let ourselves feel them (they will pass) and express them in safe ways (sometimes through fantasy), they lose their potency and move on. By doing this repeatedly we learn that we can handle our emotions in ways that are safe and constructive; we have alternatives to our old defenses and inhibitory emotions and we can let them go. From here we can relax into an openhearted state.

“[W]e cannot  think our way through a core emotion; it must be experienced viscerally to be processed,” Hilary Jacobs Hendel, It’s Not Always Depression

Because defenses and inhibitory emotions protect us from core emotions, it can be difficult to know what we are feeling. Emotions are felt in the body, and Hendel describes was of slowing down to scan the body, assess our sensations and use this information to uncover our core emotions.

I’m not a therapist, but I can see the benefit of the framework. It gives someone a way to identify what they are doing and feeling. It can give one words to describe what one is experiencing and a process for exploring that experience. Its ultimate aim is to retrain the brain so one can let go of behaviors that are no longer helpful an embrace new ways of coping that allow for one to feel emotions and at the same time have the calm and clear mind to deal with situations constructively.

It is hard to do justice to these ideas in a few paragraphs. If you are looking for a way to deal with depression and anxiety, this book may be helpful. Even so, if your issues are severe, you should not abandon professional help from a physician or therapist. You may need a guide to help you through the process. There is no shame in that. We all need help when we are learning something new.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Mindful Way through Depression by Mark Williams et al

The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck

Hendel, Hilary Jacobs. It’s Not Always Depression: Working the Change Triangle to Listen to the Body, Discover Core Emotions, and Connect to Your Authentic Self. New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2018.

The Highly Sensitive Person by Elaine N. Aron

At the end of sixth grade, my English teacher, Mrs. Lumsden, gave out “unusual awards.”  I was awarded “Best Observer.”    It is one of the signs that I am a highly sensitive person, and it is one of the happier memories related to my trait.

Research psychologist Elaine N. Aron describes highly sensitive people, or HSPs, in her book The Highly Sensitive Person.  HSPs, which make up about 15 to 20 percent of the population, are people with more responsive nervous system, who notice smaller stimuli and react more strongly to stimuli.

Aron is careful to distinguish the physiological trait of high sensitivity from inhibition, introversion, and shyness.  Okay, HSPs are often, or appear to be, introverted and shy.  Aron reframes HSP behavior as a response to overstimulation.  Everyone has an optimal level of arousal, and because HSPs are aroused more by smaller stimuli, which are abundant and can even include our own emotional responses to experiences, they are more easily aroused more than is optimum for them.  Everyone withdraws (is shy) when faced with too much arousal, and everyone needs time to quietly process (introversion).

Let me give you an example from my own life.  When I was a young child, I was very emotional.  I was easily overwhelmed, to the point of losing self-control, by my own emotions and the experiences that triggered them.  When I was in fifth grade, I found a model for managing it: Mr. Spock of Star Trek.  He was person (or Vulcan or half-Vulcan) with intense emotions that used various practices of logical thinking, meditation, art and study to discipline himself and control his own behavior.  Yes, at that age it meant repressing my emotions and withdrawing from others to some degree.  I gained a sense of self-control and space to think.  It was a little patch of high ground above the flood.  As a kid on the verge of puberty, it was precious to me.

That challenge hasn’t diminished as an adult.  How can I enjoy the sensory and emotional richness I can experience without being carried away by it?  How can I take notice of the little things that make me pause without getting jumpy?  How can I pursue the challenging and meaningful work that attracts me without being exhausted by distractions and the social demands organizations?  These are questions all HSPs must answer.

Aron doesn’t always give a simple answer, but she does show readers how to find the answers for themselves.  Relationships and work present all manner of highly arousing situations that can drain an HSP.  Aron provides information on how to approach these challenges in ways that acknowledge your trait of high sensitivity, with its weakness and the many strengths that can be brought to bear on the problem.

These problems can be exacerbated for HSPs who had rough childhoods, which is all too common.  (I’m fortunate that I had accepting and tolerant parents.  I suspect there are several HSPs scattered in my extended family, which fits with high sensitivity generally being inherited.)  Therapy can be very helpful for HSPs who need to deal with these issues.  Aron provides recommendations on what kind of therapies may be most useful to HSPs.

I suspect most of the readers of this book will be HSPs.  If you’re not an HSP, you probably know one.  If you think your spouse, close friend, or employee is an HSP, it may be worthwhile to read this book.  HSPs have a lot of strengths they would happily bring to your relationship or business if they are given the opportunity and a little quiet space in which to thrive.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Quiet by Susan Cain

Aron, Elaine N.  The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You.  1996.  New York: Broadway, 1998.

Keenan is on Google Plus.

Stop Whining, Start Living by Dr. Laura

Schlessinger, Laura.  Stop Whining, Start Living.  New York: HarperCollins, 2008.

We make ourselves crazy.  We can stop doing it.  That is the message Laura Schlessinger, popularly known as Dr. Laura, present in her book Stop Whining, Start Living.

So much of how we make ourselves miserable is how we look at things.  Life is difficult, for some people more than others.  If we focus on difficulties, problems, and situations we don’t like, we’ll feel the weight of them.  If instead we focus on the things in life we enjoy, that encourage us, and the people we love and who love use, we’ll feel the lightness of it.  Perspective doesn’t make problems go away, but a good point of view can keep us from ignoring the good things in our lives.

Relating to this is the need for action.  Our complaints don’t change the situations we complain about.  Action, especially acts that help others, make the world better and help us feel better.  As Schlessinger puts it, “ultimate meaning fullness in our lives comes from fulfilling our obligations to others.”

Stop Whining, Start Living presents variations on these two themes, focusing on different areas of life, especially relationships.  She devotes a chapter to marriage.  Even here, a happy marriage is largely a matter of looking at the things you love about your spouse and not accentuating the negative.  Act lovingly toward your spouse.

As the title “doctor” implies, Schlessinger has academic training and is licensed in marriage and family therapy.  Her book is not academic or professional in tone.  She is conversational.

Schlessinger draws many examples from communication she had with listeners of her radio program.  Sometimes she refers to difficult and emotionally charged situations.  These examples make her advice more powerful and approachable.

On that radio program, Schlessinger developed a reputation for being confrontational.  It comes through in this book, too.  I don’t think this comes from meanness.  She’s out to expose the thinking that underlays complaining and present an alternative.  Even in the nicest exchange, that is a little confrontational.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The 4:8 Principle by Tommy Newberry

It’s Not About Me by Max Lucado

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Happiness is a Choice by Frank B. Minirth and Paul D Meier

I’ve been reading a lot about anxiety and depression lately, and it has led me to some older books, such as Happiness is a Choice by psychiatrists Frank B. Minirth and Paul D. Meier. The book appears to be written for a mixed audience of therapists who may be treating patients with depression and people who may pick up the book as a self-help guide. If depression is affecting your life, I recommend you talk to your physician or reach out for appropriate counseling; there are effective therapies and in some cases drugs may be appropropriate.

The book may be broken into three major parts. The first deals with the symptoms of depression. Though it is fairly widely know now (thanks largely to drug advertising), it was probably less known in 1978 when this book was published, that there are physical symptoms to depression. Feeling bad emotionally can make us feel bad physically and vice-versa.

The second part deals with the causes of depression. These are particularly stress and trauma. We all face trauma in life, and it does not have to be “major” to result in depression. We all grieve losses, get angry over the way we or others are mistreated, face dysfunction in relationships and countless other stresses and traumas. Any of us may suffer a blow that leads to depression.

“Who gets depressed? At some period of life, nearly everyone does!” Frank B. Minirth and Paul D. Meier, Happiness is a Choice

Finally, they deal with the treatment of depression. Much of Minirth and Meier’s advice deals with thinking and relationships. Therapy may occur at a counselor’s office, but healing takes place in everyday life, thoughts and relationships.

The book also contains appendices that deal with things that may be of more interest to therapist. These include a few very brief case studies, a short chapter on the biology of depression and additional information on various types of treatment.

Minirth and Meier are known as Christian counselors who discuss faith alongside medicine. This book is no exception. The authors reference the Bible and draw lessons from it. Though many may find useful advice in this book, I think it would especially appeal to Christian who are seeking help that is consistent with their faith. Their advice on overcoming depression and anxiety is rooted in their religion.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Anxious for Nothing by Max Lucado

The Mindful Way through Depression by Mark Williams, John Teasdale, Zindal Segal & Joh Kabat-Zinn

Rewire Your Anxious Brain by Catherine M. Pittman & Elizabeth M. Karle

The Solution by Lucinda Bassett

Think 4:8 by Tommy Newberry & Lyn Smith

12 “Christian” Beliefs That Can Drive You Crazy by Henry Cloud & John Townsend

Minirth, Frank B., and Paul D. Meier. Happiness is a Choice: A Manual on the Symptoms, Causes and Cures of Depression. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker House, 1978.