ARTIGO
Neurociência valida a Gestalt-terapia
Neuroscience validates Gestalt Therapy
Serge Ginger
Resumo
Gestalt-terapia
é validada por importantes descobertas na área de neurociências.
Qualquer contacto ou movimento mobiliza o hemisfério direito, diretamente
conectada ao cérebro límbico, emocional, através da "via
perfurante". Toda a emoção é acompanhada por uma produção
de neurotransmissores, que circula no cérebro e em seguida no interior
do corpo, mas também no exterior (feromônios). Estes feromônios
são analisadas pelo Órgão Vomero-nasal (OVN), que não
tem nenhuma ligação com as zonas cortical e, portanto, está
totalmente inconsciente. Em 1920, Freud escreveu: Biologia é um domínio
com possibilidades ilimitadas, não podemos imaginar a resposta que vai
dar dentro de algumas décadas - o que poderia destruir todo o edifício
artificial de nossas hipóteses psicanalíticas. "Várias
décadas" passaram: onde estamos hoje? Sabemos, por exemplo, que
a mielinização dos lobos frontais (permitindo a tomada de decisão)
não é alcançado antes de 25 anos - o que poderia explicar
o comportamento de adolescentes e personalidades incertas. Psicoterapia é
uma "quimioterapia" insuspeita? Não há mais oposição
entre a quimioterapia e a psicoterapia, nem associação complementar,
mas uma identidade de um processo com duas faces. A bioquímica sutil
e personalizado: um micrograma de ocitocina induz a um comportamento maternal.
A testosterona é responsável tanto pela agressividade e desejo
sexual (também em mulheres). Nós conduzimos uma entrevista terapêutica
como dirigimos um carro: constantemente pisando no freio e os pedais do acelerador
(serotonina e dopamina). A matéria age sobre a mente ea mente age sobre
o assunto. Herdadas e adquiridas: não nascemos como iguais. Nosso caráter
é 1/3 herdada, 1/3 congênita (gravidez) e 1/3 adquirida após
o nascimento. As predisposições genéticas podem ser desenvolvidos
ou inibidos pela educação ou psicoterapia (expressão de
gene). A plasticidade cerebral perdura toda a nossa vida. O sonho permite a
individualização da personalidade, que é a soma do (programa
genético) inato e o adquirido: é uma integração
de minha memória individual com a nossa memória coletiva da espécie.
O cérebro da mulher é preparado, através da seleção
natural, para o intercâmbio verbal, comunicação e empatia,
enquanto os homens estão focados na ação e da concorrência.
A produção de espermatozóides foi reduzido a metade em
30 anos.
Palavras-chave: Neurociência; neurotransmissores; oxitocina;
serotonina; testosterona; expressão do gene; plasticidade cerebral; sonho.
Abstract
Gestalt therapy
is validated by important discoveries in the area of neurosciences. All contact
or movement mobilizes the right hemisphere, directly connected to the limbic
emotional brain, through the “perforant pathway”. All emotion is
accompanied by a production of neurotransmitters, circulating inside the brain
and then body, but also outside (pheromones). These pheromones are analyzed
by the Vomero-Nasal Organ (VNO), which has no connection with the cortical zones
and therefore is totally unconscious. In 1920, Freud wrote: Biology is a domain
with unlimited possibilities; we cannot imagine the answers it will give within
a few decades – which could destroy the whole artificial building of our
psychoanalytical hypotheses. “Several decades” have passed: where
are we today? We know, for instance, that the myelination of the frontal lobes
(allowing decision making) is not achieved before 25 years – which could
explain the behavior of adolescents and borderline personalities. Is psychotherapy
an unsuspected “chemotherapy”? No more opposition between chemotherapy
and psychotherapy, neither complementary association, but an identity of a process
with two faces. A subtle and personalized biochemistry: a microgram of oxytocin
induces a maternal behavior. Testosterone is responsible for both aggressiveness
and sexual desire (also in women). We lead a therapeutic interview like we drive
a car: constantly stepping the brake and the accelerator pedals (serotonin and
dopamine). The matter acts over the mind and the mind acts over the matter.
Inherited and acquired: we are not born as equals. Our character is 1/3 inherited,
1/3 congenital (during pregnancy) and 1/3 acquired after birth. The genetic
predispositions can be developed or inhibited by education or psychotherapy
(gene’s expression). The brain plasticity endures our whole life. The
dream allow the individuation of the personality, which is the sum of the innate
(genetic program) and the acquired: it’s an integration of my individual
memory with our collective memory of the species. The woman brain is prepared,
through natural selection, to verbal interchange, communication and empathy,
while men are focused in action and competition. The spermatozoid production
has been reduced one half in 30 years.
Keywords: Neuroscience, neurotransmitters, oxytocin, testosterone,
serotonin, gene’s expression, brain plasticity, dream.
Introduction
I have one hour to convince you that the brilliant intuitions of the founders of body therapies – and particularly Gestalt Therapy – are currently confirmed and validated by important discoveries in the area of the neurosciences over that past twenty years. Usually, I teach neurosciences applied to psychotherapy during 32 hours, but one hour (representing 3 % of my usual course) is enough time to develop this evidence – even though it is still often unknown![1]
We will see why the body therapies are found to be
more profound, faster and more efficient than psychotherapies
which are essentially verbal – such as psychoanalysis,
tradi¬tional transactional analysis, or NLP…
In fact, all contact or movement of the body mobilizes
the right hemisphere of the brain, which is directly
connected to the profound limbic zones of the emotional
brain – through the “perforant pathway”, an original
synaptic connection — which has no equivalent in the left brain (which
is verbal and rational).
All emotion is accompanied by the production of specific neuro¬transmitters
which modulate mood and thought. Most of the neurotransmitters
circulate within the brain and inside the body of
each person, but some of them are diffused outside,
into the environment of the organism, and thus they
“touch” those nearby, especially the psychotherapist: I am speaking
about the famous pheromones – which constitute our very real “6th
sense,” the chemical sense –
one of the elements of what we so often call “intuition”.
Our 6th sensory organ, the VNO (VomeroNasal Organ)
is invisible to the naked eye; it is situated deep within the nose; it is responsible
for receiving these pheromones (which translate our deep moods); it is totally
separate from the olfactory channels, it is odorless, and has no
direct connection with the cortical zones of our conscious
brain. Its information is therefore totally unconscious
and directly touches our profound non-verbal sensitivities.
I will also stress the importance and the role of the a posteriori
verbalization of the senses – which allows the cerebral
registration (« engramming ») of the lived
experiences, and therefore their later opportunity to make the most of them.
It’s a bit similar to the importance of giving a title
to a document, once we have finished working on our computer, in order to keep
a trace and to be able to find it again to continue
working on it. In the same way, verbal work is not in itself
a therapeutic work, but a point of reference, a type of labeling.
Certainly, speech may trigger an emotion, and therefore the neuronal modifications: the sprouting of dendrites, new synaptic connections, production of neurotransmitters or hormones…
In this case, we may say that “The Word was made Flesh”: the word has been incarnated and has produced an effect which is potentially lasting. But most of the time, in everyday experience, the process is opposite: it’s the emotion which appears spontaneously first; this becomes conscious and is verbally expressed only later.
In fact, in our body and consciousness functioning, everything is circular and systemic; biological, psychological and social interrelationships are permanent, and operate in both directions: appetite makes me salivate… and the saliva sharpens my appetite; a caress or a massage stimulates the production of oxytocin… and oxytocin develops my need for attachment, tenderness, trust and love.
Freud himself wrote, as early as 1920:
Biology is truly a domain with unlimited possibilities: we can expect to receive the most surprising information from it, and we cannot imagine all the answers it will give within a few decades to the questions we ask. It is possible that these answers will totally destroy the whole artificial building of our psychoanalytical hypotheses!” (Freud 1920).
We should remember, in passing, that the first psychoanalysts were mostly medical
doctors, trained in biology.
Several decades have passed: where are we today?
I will now enter a bit more into detail regarding contemporary research, using especially the resources of MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging), which permits us to see in the scanner the activity of different regions of the brain, in real time; and I will quote several concrete examples to illustrate the value of the study of the neuroscience for an optimal exploitation of psychotherapeutic techniques.
These research studies have revealed a number of aspects regarding the functioning
of the brain, which were hardly known before, although often intuited
by several forerunners, such as Freud, Fenichel, Ferenczi, Reich, Navarro or
Perls – who proposed a global, holistic
approach, integrating the five main dimensions of
the human being: physical, emotional, cognitive, social and spiritual.
I will mention, for example, the fact that the myelination
of the connecting circuits of the frontal lobes –
which allows the integration of information about the internal
state of the organism and of its environment, and
therefore, an appropriate decision-making, is not
completely developed before around 25 years, contrary
to what we had previously supposed. This would explain the somewhat impulsive
behavior of adolescents, whose (limbic) emotions
are not sufficiently controlled by the cortical-frontal level (conscious
and voluntary).
We encounter the same type of immaturity or neuronal dysfunction in
autistics, and even in cases of borderline
personalities: their amygdala is hypersensitive to
all stress, while their frontal connections are, on
the other hand, inhibited – not allowing for a healthy management
of mood, and leading to acting-out behavior.
Psychocorporal treatment, which directly
mobilizes the limbic sub-cortical structures, has proven to be particularly
effective, especially with these categories of clients (adolescent and borderline).
Is Psychotherapy an unsuspected « chemical-therapy »?
Recent studies in the neurosciences allow us to realize that in fact,
all learning – or all psychotherapy – acts directly
on the synaptic circuits and modifies the internal biochemistry of the brain:
the production of hormones and neurotransmitters
(especially dopamine, serotonin, adrenalin, noradrenalin, melatonin, endorphins,
testosterone, estrogens…). This is particularly true for psychotherapy
using body and emotion-based techniques – such as Gestalt Therapy…
but this is under the condition that they are followed by
a period of verbal integration
– without which, the misplaced activation of emotions, or a strong
catharsis triggered by clumsy “debriefing”
techniques, on the contrary, could maintain or even increase previous
remnants of trauma, through a negative neuronal conditioning.
Three historical stages
Several years ago, we opposed chemotherapy and psychotherapy: traditional psychiatrists smiled condescendingly at the claims of psychoanalysts and psychotherapists, and considered their methods to be “popular distractions”; they trusted only medicines, which had been properly authorized by the laboratories after “double-blind” tests, and comparison to placebos.
After the revolution of antibiotics in infectious medicine, came the
neuroleptic revolution
in brain medicine: finally, a series of molecules, which act directly
on the brain and affect behavior (tranquilizers, antidepressants,
antipsychotic or neuroleptics), were discovered. In 1952, the
French Pr Henri Laborit introduced a new psychotropic
product: largactil (chlorpromazine), which permitted
the progressive suppression of the straightjacket in psychiatric hospitals,
replacing it with what is called (not without some exaggeration) “the
chemical straightjacket.”
We know that France now holds the very sad world
record for the use of psychotropic medicine
(we currently consume 3 times more than our close neighbors: Germany,
England, Italy or Spain): 1.5 million of our fellow citizens today consume Prozac.
These new drugs, as efficient as they may be, are not free from regrettable
secondary effects: drowsiness, loss of initiative,
memory lapses, important lowering of the libido… even suicide
– notably in the case of unplanned interruption of a treatment
by a young person (whose frontal circuits of control are still immature.)
In a second stage, instead of opposing chemotherapy
and psychotherapy, they were associated: psychotherapy
in fact allows for a lengthening and expanding effect of a medical
treatment and a progressive diminishing of the dosage; on the other hand, chemotherapy
allows for a preparation, accompaniment or lengthening of a psychological
approach, by calming the anxiety or stopping the delirium.
But today, we are entering into a third phase: no
longer opposition, nor a simple complementary association,
but the identity of a process with two faces:
we are realizing that finally certain psychotherapies are unsuspected
“chemotherapies”. In fact, their action stimulates neurophysiologic
and biochemical modifications, both rapid and lasting.
With the major advantage that they are strictly personalized and
dosed spontaneously by the organism – and this, sometimes
within a microgram, just as our organism endlessly
controls the level of sugar in the blood, vitamins or Omega 3, or even iron
or zinc (without which we would have no sense of smell).
A subtle and personalized biochemistry
Thus, for example, the injection of a microgram of oxytocin (the hormone that helps the milk arise, which has been baptized as the hormone of attachment – even, of love) is enough to instantly induce a maternal behavior in a female (rat or sheep)[2] . We know today that this oxytocin is produced not only during childbirth, but also at each physical contact, and especially during a psycho-corporal session, a massage, during the caress of a baby, or of course, during a love relationship.
No administration of an external drug can possibly adapt to
the subtle and permanent variations of hormone doses
of each patient: each meal, and even each emotion, modifies this balance. Let
us remember, for example, that all success (love,
sports, social or intellectual) may instantly double the amount of
testosterone in the blood; whereas an orgasm
multiplies… by four times the amount of testosterone and endorphin[3]
! This sudden influx of testosterone explains the behavior – sometimes
quite surprising – of football players who score
a goal, and who “jump” upon each other, in a spontaneous, erotic
burst of enthusiasm, or even more, the winners of the Formula 1
automobile race, who, in their sexual excitement, open a bottle
of Champagne… to “ejaculate” it rather than to drink!
Let’s remember that testosterone is the responsible
for both aggressiveness and sexual
desire – also in women. That is why I call it the “conquest
hormone” in both senses, love conquest and military
conquest. These two basic life impulses (survival
of the individual and survival of the species) are very linked,
they brush each other at the hypothalamus; they are just separated by some millimeters…
between the aggressiveness area and the sexuality area is the area where pleasure
is managed! In Gestalt Therapy this proximity is sometimes used, for instance,
to develop a weakened sexuality through ludic aggressiveness – easier
to manage within the respect to professional ethics!
And now, two little experiments…
And now, we can do a little bit of practice: …
I invite you to elevate my testosterone rate!…
(… Silence… expecting applause)… Thank You!
Now is my turn to propose you a self-injection (painless) of dopamine… (Silence)… Now it is done!
My silence — unexpected — has stimulated your curiosity, and during
this fraction of a second of waiting and surprise, you have produced dopamine,
the wake up, awareness, and awakening neurotransmitter.
But now, we reach the moment to be calm!
Actually I just gave you a new shot; but this time is about serotonin,
the neurotransmitter which give back the order –
lead by the rational explanations that I am giving you.
In conclusion, we lead a therapeutic interview like we drive a car:
constantly stepping the brake and the accelerator pedals (serotonin
and dopamine).
Today there have been isolated around one hundred of these neurotransmitters
and neuromodulators; for example, every desire (hunger,
thirst, sex) and every pleasure (artistic or intellectual
included) is related with three neurotransmitters:
• the
dopamine, associated to the desire’s tension;
• the noradrenaline, related to the stimulation of the shared
pleasure;
• the endorphins, that entails wellbeing and rest.
If we do two blood tests — one of them after 5 minutes
of optimistic fantasy (positive visualization) — we check an average elevation
of… 53% of the immune system!
Recently in the United States, they have succeeded to film, with different techniques
of brain imagery, modifications – visible and lasting – of the neural
circuits trough the repeated stimulation of the neural network (the “sprouting”)
caused by a psychotherapy with patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder.
We see a similar effect after a chemotherapeutic treatment.
So, both of these approaches aren’t concurrent but complementary;
so to say interchangeable, the matter acts over the mind,
and the mind acts over the matter, in a systemic and circular
way.
Now, I have 20 minutes left to say some words about three topics:
• inherited
and acquired (the part of heredity);
• neurophysiology of dreams;
• sex and the brain (gender identity).
Inherited and acquired (genetics and plasticity)
It happens the same with the eternal false problem of the innate and the acquired — that is directly concerned to us, as psychotherapists: what is the sense in making efforts in order to develop aptitudes or to modify behaviors or feelings, if everything is predetermined by our hereditary aptitudes?
In spite of all the democratic ideologies, it is unquestionable that
we are not born as equals: there are tall and shorts,
blondes and dark haired, blacks and whites, and persons more intelligent than
others, for mathematics, sports or music.
So then, is everything determined in birth?
Fortunately, No! We are neither prisoners of our genes…
nor completely free!
Approximately, the researchers actually consider that our personality can be
divided in three thirds basically:
• 1/3
inherited: chromosomes from the cell’s nucleus (our DNA);
• 1/3 acquired: cultural immersion, education, exercise
or training, fortuitous events… or psychotherapy;
• 1/3 congenital, so to say, acquired during the first
weeks or months of the intrauterine live; so as an example, the embryo is feminine
during the first days[4] , and masculinity is a slow hormonal conquest, continued
through educative and social action. In reality, the girl is not a boy
that has lost his penis (as Freud had supposed), but
the boy is a girl that has obtained a penis. (the “penis
envy” is a hypothesis not verified by the experience: so, among transsexuals,
are found today… three more times men desiring
to become women, than women desiring to become men! The “envy of an uterus”
is much higher than the envy of a penis!).
During a war, the rate of masculine homosexuality doubles itself (due to the
mother’s stress that perturbs her hormone’s balance during pregnancy)[5]
.
The inherited and congenital parts seem quite important: so
as an example, in the real twin children (homocigotics), if one of them is homosexual,
the other twin also is homosexual in 60 % of the cases, in the false twin children
(heterocigotics), it only happens in 30 % of the cases, so it is half as frequent
(although 5 more times than in general population).
For many aptitudes or predispositions – as intelligence, talents for music,
sports, and even optimism[6] – we again find this three thirds (inherited,
acquired in the uterus, and acquired during life), in slightly different proportions.
So, in a same event, each one of us “sees the bottle half full or half
empty”…
In any case, they are only predispositions, that can
be either developed or inhibited by education or by
psychotherapy – which favor or neutralize the gene´s
expression (as Eric Kandel discovered, being a Nobel Price, professor
of the New York University; at his eighty, he is still researching… as
I am doing, too!… but without a Nobel Price!). Therefore, heredity is
not a fate!
It is important to highlight that a growth of 20 % would eventually transform
a normal size man (1,85 m) in to a giant (2,20 m), or a good runner into a real
champion. Psychotherapy can also help to transform a deep depressive person
into a slightly depressive… or even, into a happy man!
This fundamental plasticity of the brain endures our whole life, until an advanced age: it has been recently confirmed throughout brain image techniques, that the cortex’ surface representative of the left hand usually keeps on growing in the violinist, and special orientation areas grow twice as big in the London’s taxi drivers. (London is famous for the complexity of its traffic).
Among the new therapies, the EMDR, exploits directly this plasticity, modifying
very fast certain neural networks and the neurotransmitters’ production.
Neurophysiology of the dream
The psychoanalytic approach was the dominant one between 1900 and 1960, but it is no longer that way actually, most of all after the research of the French Professor Michel Jouvet.
Today we know that Freud was partially wrong: the fetus
starts having dreams in the uterus, after the seventh month of pregnancy;
therefore, a lot before having any conscious memories to repress, “censured”
by the Super Ego, as it was Freud´s old hypothesis.
In this way, the newborn continues to construct his brain during 60 % of the
time. On the other hand, the pregnant woman doubles her dreams time
in order to “accompany” the neurogenesis of her child. It is not
excluded that one part of these dreams allows the unconscious transmission of
her emotional experiences thanks to a precocious registering during the long
periods of shared dreams (Ginger, 1987).
Not only has the fetus dreamed, but all superior animals too. The cold blooded
animals (fishes, reptiles) never dream, but their nervous system regenerates
during their life. There is a permanent neurogenesis, renewing the
neurons, as the other more “vulgar” cells of its organism. This
way they remain reduced to the innate instincts, and aren´t able to acquire
or accomplish complex learnings.
During the dream time, the animal is particularly vulnerable: it is transitory
blind, almost deaf and paralyzed. No wonder then, that dreams first need a sense
of security: cows dream even three more times
in the stable than in the fields! And big predators, secure about themselves,
allow themselves to dream during 40 % of the time they spend sleeping, while
the poor persecuted animals, only dare to consecrate 5 % of its sleep time to
dreams.
Men and women dream as an average, during 20 % of the time they remain asleep
(which places us between the predators and the victims!); so to say,
around 100 minutes each night, and this, whether we remember it or
not. It is known that everybody dreams… but eight minutes after
being awake, 95 % of the dreams content is already forgotten!
Dreaming is different from sleeping and from wakefulness, and implies a great
brain activity: during dreams, we consume the same
amount of glucose than in the wakeness state… what explains that we can
lose weight when we dream (as much as when we practice jogging!).
In fact, 2/3 of the right brain is mobilized, at a hypothalamic level
of needs, limbic level of feelings and memory, cortical level
of images and frontal level of synthesis, projects, visions; the communication
with the left brain (logical critic) is cutted. On the contrary, the communication
between both hemispheres remains while we are asleep without dreaming.
The dreams have been baptized as “the umbilical cord of the specie”:
it transmits the fundamental behavior that are necessary for our survival;
they enrich and actualize them by registering the acquisitions of the experience
of every day, allowing in this way “the individuation”
and the construction of the personality, which is the sum of the
innate and the acquired.
It is during the dream process that our memories are fixated
— not only the information that I am giving to you now, but most of all
the memories that are filled with emotions, the important experiences, positive
or negative of our lifes… and specially the therapy sessions
.
A rat that is not able to have dreams loses most of its capacity of learning.
It happens the same with patients that are treated over long periods of time
with neuroleptics or antidepressants, that diminish — and sometimes suppress
— the time of dreams.
A long term deprivation of dreams usually helps the apparition of compensatory delirious, with sexual[7] or aggressive aspects, and bulimic tendencies.
So dreams accomplish two opposite — while complementary — functions:
• As an “umbilical cord of the species”, the dreams nourish our origin, examine every night our genetic program and evaluate the survival functions (sexuality and aggressiveness): cats dream with hunting and attacks, while mousses dream with escapes and little holes!… And men (and also women) dream with the sexuality.
The dreams therefore play a role of “shield against culture” —
while our education is opposed to this two vital drives!
• But dreams are, at the same time, an important “individuation” factor (what makes me different from the others), because they consider my original experience.
As a result, dreams will allow the integration of my individual
memory with our collective memory, assuring therefore an essential
function of synthesis between the innate and the acquired.
The Sex and the Brain
Social neurosciences have underlined that natural selection progressively “sculpted” our genome, in order to make it sensitive to the contact and relationships with our pairs.
Empathy exists already in the mammals: rats are predisposed since they
are born to feel the sadness of their partners, and modulate their behavior
in order to protect their congeners. This attention to the other is more developed
on the females[8] .
You know, that it has been proven that men and monkey
share a genetic patrimony of 98 % in common, what
only leaves us 2 % of difference… against approximately 5
% of genetic difference between woman and men. So, a
human male is psychologically closer to a monkey male, than to a woman!…
(and of course, women are closer to monkey females!).
Actually all of the neurosciences researchers agree in considering that:
• The left brain (which is logic, scientific, and most of all verbal) is more developed in women, as well as the hippocampus (that allows memorization)
• And the right brain (analogic, artistic and emotional) is more developed in men — against what is believed by the general opinion (some of the present therapists included!). And this happens under the direct influence of testosterone. In the same way, the amygdala of the males is more important and reactive to strong emotions, like fear and rage.
The right hemisphere deals with the space, the here
and now and the group´s membership, so valuable in body therapies; while
the left hemisphere deals with linear time (past and
future), the separation from the environment and the Ego boundaries,
studied more in verbal therapies.
So, women are more prepared to verbal interchange,
communication, collaboration, and empathy, while
men are focused in competition and
action. This of course is only valid on the statistic point of view,
because there are some exceptions, even in this room! There are, of course,
tall women and short men! But is not a general reality! These differences are
related to social education and to biology, and they
have been developed step by step, over the two million years of natural
selection, since the prehistoric men ran in silence in hunting,
while women remained in the cave, educating children, and talking with them!
At nine years old, girls, represent as an average, 18 months of verbal advantage
over boys. In adults, women talk around 20 minutes per telephone call…
compared to 6 minutes of men! The woman needs to share her ideas,
her feelings, her emotions, while man controls and retains them:
he transmits information, and is looking for solutions very fast…
And then woman feels “unheard”!
As a summary, the woman is less emotional than man,
but expresses more each one of her emotions, while
the man is really more emotional, but doesn’t
express his emotions, and this is very important not to forget
about, in private life and in psychotherapy!
• The fashion of the “new fathers”, who put on the diapers to the babies, leads them to produce a lot more of oxitocyn (which makes them sweeter persons… but reduces 33 % their rate of testosterone! Today we are witnessing a fast de-masculinization of men, under the combined influences from biological, ecological, cultural and social factors. On top of that, chemical pollution, and most of all, the invasion of plastic materials, stimulates the estrogens[9] . As a conclusion the spermatozoid production has been reduced… one half in 30 years!
Let us remember, to end this brief explanation, that:
The “engrammation” of a memory (it’s inscription in the neural circuits) implies a “warming-up” of the limbic system trough an emotion: therefore the effectiveness of the emotional and body psychotherapies.
• The remembrance of a scene, real or imaginary, shows the same brain location, and generates the same mental process in both cases. In reality, every memory is re-build partially and unconsciously in each one of its evocations, from desires or fears, not always conscious. This leads us to deal with a lot of prudence the sexual abuse memories on the first part of childhood, very often awakened by the body approaches that allow a physical contact: today it is estimated around 40 % of false memories!
The end
It is a shame, but I have to finish now: time has come inexorable! So I am going to end with a commercial advertising: there have been published more than two-hundred books about neurosciences, and hundreds of articles, during the last years, especially since “the brain decade” (1990-2000).
As you won´t have the time, nor the courage, to read them, I have done
it for you, and I have summarized, in my books named: “Gestalt, The
Art of Contact, in 40 pages, 40 000 pages of studies
about the brain, (200 books of 200 pages); so, each
page of my book summarizes around…1,000
pages of erudite texts, written in a simple and accessible language,
and illustrated with metaphors.
This will allow you to continue and to digest this lecture… at your own
rhythm…
And now, time has come for my second dose of testosterone…
1 - This lecture has been
given in Madrid, on May 1st, 2009 (in English and Spanish), at the International
Congress of Gestalt Therapy (700 participants from 25 countries).
2 - But if a sheep gives birth under the influence of an epidural, it will not be interested in its offspring (Michel Odent, 2008) — which is not the case for a woman, who compensates for the anesthesia by her mental interest.
3 - Neurotransmitters of well-being and self-anesthesia.
4 - MAGRE S.
et VIGIER B. (2001) MAGRE S. et VIGIER B. (2001) Développement et différenciation
sexuelle de l’appareil génital, in La reproduction chez les mammifères
et l’homme. Paris : Ellipses. L’émergence du mâle débute
vers la 7e semaine.
« La forme fondamentale de l’espèce, c’est la femelle
» in DURDEN-SMITH J. & DESIMONE D. (1983). Sex and the Brain.
5 - DURDEEN (1983) y LE VAY (1994).
6 - Cfr. A well known study about twins and the Works of LYKKEN y TELLEGEN (Minnesota University).
7 - Actually we know that physiology sexual excitement go before every dream (about 2 minutes) and it any age, both sex and independently of dream content…
8 - A rat presses a pedal to obtain food. When she realizes that it is producing electric shocks in a cell partner, she prefers not to eat, instead of making her partner suffer.
9 - (Tsutsumi,
2005 ; Welshons, 2006 ; Lucy Vincent, 2007).
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Serge Ginger
E-mail : s.ginger@noos.fr
Recebido em:
20/10/2010.
Aprovado em: 01/11/2010.