Bringing the Body back into Psychotherapy.
Crying
Crying. Oh, it's been maligned. And make no mistake about it, it's been genderized and pathologized. Let's see if we can find another way with it. Crying is a release of emotion that let's the person know quite clearly that their body can't hold this feeling in any more. It's a catharsis unlike any other that relieves the body of intense pressure and pain and HEALS in so many different w...
Labels
One of the fundamental qualities about language is the ability to label an event or an object with a word. There is also the dimension that the word and the thing eventually become cohabiters of the same level of importance in the mind. Assigned meanings are essential for a human to build subsets of realities and to build complex realities based on experience. Eventually, you have to become aware ...
Who is that in the mirror
The visual field for human beings is the only place where they find a relatively unfiltered reflection of themselves. Mirrors for many people are a place to connect with themselves, though it's not always a good connection and it can be hard to look in the mirror for any length of time without being accused of being a narcissist. But, let's not get too far ahead of ourselves. What we think ...
What’s in your Name
Your name is a word that you've heard many times. It was imprinted and anchored to you by your parents, teachers, and friends for years and years. How it's been said throughout your life often shapes how you respond to it. There have been people in your life who may have said your name sweetly and when someone new says it that way it brings back a taste of that sugar. Think back to a time when ...
Pulling Life into You-Rows
This is part of the Somatics in the Gym blogs. A bit of context first. The back on mammals is a vulnerable place, it's the part that is exposed during an attack.  So as a result the animal is constantly trying to keep things in front of it if it senses danger. The belly is protected by the curling of the body. This is great if you walk on four legs. For us humans, because we walk on two leg...

Labels

Posted By: Kurt in Featured, Mindfulness - Comments: Comments Off

One of the fundamental qualities about language is the ability to label an event or an object with a word. There is also the dimension that the word and the thing eventually become cohabiters of the same level of importance in the mind. Assigned meanings are essential for a human to build subsets of realities and to build complex realities based on experience. Eventually, you have to become aware of the pervasiveness of this labeling, and then start to redirect and become conscious about assigning both meaning and value to life.

Labels are found in almost every aspect of human behavior and human environments. Communication- talking especially, being in relationship, daily life, and interacting with people will lead to countless assignments.

In everyday speech we are constantly languaging things and events to suite the mental image of our experience or what we would like to be our experience. It often falls to conditioned word choices, which also then function as a recursive loop. One says a word because it is basically next in the hopper ready to come out of the mouth, then it chooses the next word that has been associated or assigned to that position reflexively.

The act of falling in love is made up of intense feelings that are continuously assigned meaning during the process of “falling”. A prime example is a couple during this phase of relating hears a song that soon becomes “their song”. The song acquired meaning through intense projection through the lyrics and a shared mutual experience. These events, songs, etc. rapidly take on a life of their own and are soon sublimated from normal consciousness and continuously work on the person’s mentations.

As you go about your day your mind is constantly being reminded of things that have assigned names to them. Each of these things will continually flood the brain and synapses with information and regurgitate it subconsciously as you are exposed to your life. The simple acts of washing the dishes, brushing your teeth, putting on your clothes, getting in a vehicle, walking down the street, and almost any other event you can think of, continually pull your mental state back into the logical, linear, and ordered world.

Everything has a name on it; the toothpaste tube has the name of the product, the company name, the logo, the ingredient list, and the instructions. To paraphrase Aldous Huxley from his book, Seeing Without Glasses, the human being is lazily taking in vast amounts of information.  These bits of information are lost to the conscious mind, but the unconscious is constantly sorting, finding pattern matches, and otherwise keeping a large part of your reality busy with mundane garbage. The big question is, “Are your content to accumulate such flotsam and jetsam in your head?”

Contact Me

Oak Creek Counseling Center
999 Sutter Street
San Francisco, CA 94109
1-888-637-7404 Ext. 55

Kurt Wagner, M.A.
Marriage Family Therapist Intern #61754
Supervised by:
Stephen Polin, M.A., MFT License #7861

Email Kurt

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