A common question I often hear is: how does Brainspotting compare to EMDR? Dr. David Grand who discovered Brainspotting in 2003 was a well-known and published EMDR practitioner at the time. EMDR was discovered by Francine Shapiro in 1980’s, so it has been around longer, is more established and better known in the mental health community. Here are some similarities and some differences:
Similarities between Brainspotting and EMDR
- Clients are not required to talk in-depth about the details of their trauma.
- Clients process unresolved trauma and emotionally triggering memories.
- Clients access information located in the deep, limbic (mammalian) or emotional part of the brain that has no language and, therefore, cannot be accessed verbally.
- Clients often experience lasting, positive results in a relatively short period of time.
- Bilateral sound stimulation is used to engage right and left sides of the brain and help with trauma processing.
- If the client feels uncomfortable or overstimulated, there is an option of slowing down the rate of processing.
Differences between Brainspotting and EMDR
- The manner in which trauma is processed in EMDR can be overstimulating for some clients. Brainspotting reduces the risk of overstimulation, resulting in a gentle, yet powerful experience.
- Brainspotting encourages the therapist to use intuition and flexibility, continuously adjusting to client’s experience to help promote healing. EMDR requires therapists to adhere to a very specific treatment protocol.
- In Brainspotting the client chooses which issue to focus on, with the therapist following the client’s lead during brain processing, whereas EMDR begins sequentially with the oldest trauma first.
- During Brainspotting, the client keeps the eye focus on one point, whereas EMDR uses back-and-forth rapid eye movements with added tactile stimulation, or tapping. Brainspotting makes use of fixed eye gaze on relevant eye positions. EMDR uses eye movements (smooth pursuit, not saccades). Eye fixation and eye movements are opposites.
- Brainspotting’s relevant eye positions are established with high attunement; EMDR’s eye movements are not.
- In EMDR, the treatment sequence includes frequent interruptions in which the client checks in with the therapist (with regards to his or her level of distress). In Brainspotting, the processing flow naturally with as few interruptions as possible.
- Brainspotting is articulated as using relational attunement, EMDR does not.
- The foundation of Brainspotting therapy is the Uncertainty Principle which does not exist in EMDR.
- Brainspotting is frame-based: the frame is what the client brings into the session – their own unique thoughts, feelings, memories, and histories impacting them at the time of the session. The therapist “holds” the frame with the client; and they develop it further together. This frame becomes a co-joint space that enables the client to move innately and intuitively from emotional dysregulation to regulation. EMDR on the other hand is protocol-based.
- Brainspotting attempts to bypass the neocortex to directly access the subcortex. EMDR accesses the neocortex with its cognitions (negative and positive) and cognitive interweaves.
- EMDR is an AIP (Adaptive Information Processing) model; Brainspotting is not.
- Brainspotting is articulated by the Neuroexperiential Model; EMDR is not.
- Brainspotting is a developmental model (generational, intrauterine, birth, preverbal); EMDR is explicitly not.
Brainspotting Therapy with Elaine Korngold
I am a Certified Brainspotting Therapist and an Approved Consultant and would be happy to talk to you about Brainspotting. Brainspotting therapy accesses the genius of our deeper emotional brain. During the healing process I am fortunate to observe how intelligent, inventive, and intuitive all human beings are. Creativity is revealed through their resilience, survival, and recovery. The processing that occurs with clients focused on a Brainspot is deep, rapid, and unpredictable. During each session I wait for the surprise and I am rarely disappointed.
With your focused vision and my attuned presence and verbal guidance, emotional Brainspots can be released in a gentle and non-invasive way. There is no need to be in chronic emotional pain. Please text or email me if you have more questions or to schedule your free 20-minute phone consultation.