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INDIVIDUAL
PSYCHOTHERAPY
AND
COUPLES THERAPY
FOR
COMPREHENSIVE WELL-BEING,
HAPPINESS AND HUMAN DIGNITY
(HOME PAGE)
WELCOME !
Natural psychotherapy,
developed by New York Drs. Eric and Miriam Riss is a therapy
focused not only on good results, but on results that last.
It is an alternative holistic
treatment that helps people of all ages
deal constructively with personal problems, relationship
difficulties and "mental illness" issues such as depression,
anxiety, panic attacks, bipolar disorders, etc.
This
natural treatment
does not use psychiatric diagnosis and labeling,
psychiatric drugging, psychiatric electro-shocking, psychiatric
trans-cranial magnetic tinkering, or any of the negative, risky, and
unproven ideas and practices of
psychiatry. (Please
see FAQs #1, #2, and #3, below)
Instead, in this
positive natural therapy - whether individual holistic therapy,
couples therapy, couples counseling, or marriage counseling - something truly beneficial occurs:
Women and men of all ages and backgrounds
learn how to acquire the
necessary practical skills for new and creative problem solving, effective stress management, and
the maintenance of a life of psychological balance and human
dignity!
* * * * *
And then what
happens?
What
significant benefits occur when depression, anxiety, and panic
are understood and treated naturally and holistically
without
drugs or so-called "medications"?
Two important
results take place when you start using this alternative
and comprehensive
highly effective therapy, treatment and help for depression,
panic attacks, anxiety disorder, bipolar disorder, post-traumatic
stress disorder - PTSD, attention deficit disorder - ADD,
ADHD, obsessive-compulsive disorder - OCD, phobias, schizophrenia,
communication and relationship problems, sex problems, trust issues,
postpartum depression, eating disorders
- anorexia, bulimia, etc., sleep disorders, career issues,
creative blocks, spiritual problems, etc.
1. The
first thing that happens in this safe, solution-focused therapy is that you start feeling better!
2. And secondly, what
is even more significant then occurs: You discover and learn
practical new ways not only to
get better, but actually to stay better!
* * * * *
CLICK HERE for CONTACT INFORMATION
and learn
how you can actually
acquire the information and techniques to overcome
depression, anxiety and panic naturally; how you can develop
fulfilling relationships
and really thrive in your personal life!
* * * * *
Find out how, in this complex world of so
much stress, conflict, and suffering one can attain and
maintain a constructive life style and comprehensive
well-being.
And, most importantly, also discover how you can clarify where you are in life,
where you want to go, and how you can actually get there!
* * * * *
AVAILABILITY
Local and
World-Wide:
HOLISTIC
HEALING is available at
The Psychotherapy Center of New York and in every state of the U.S.A. and every
country in the world.
Local:
This
holistic, alternative treatment is
available locally in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx,
Staten Island, Connecticut, and New Jersey by means of in-office
personal therapy, couples counseling, and marriage
counseling.
World-Wide:
And
throughout the U.S. and
internationally, this effective healing process is offered
on a global, world-wide basis via special e-mail and
telephone sessions.
* * *
NEW YORK CITY
MANHATTAN
OFFICE HOURS: Mon.- Fri., Days and Evenings (By
Appointment Only)
* * *
NEW YORK CITY LOCATION
for effective problem-solving
techniques:
The
Holistic Psychotherapy Center
174 East
73rd Street
NYC, NY
10021
TO
M A K E
A N
A P P O I N T M E N T
FOR
NATURAL PSYCHOTHERAPY,
COUNSELING, OR
COACHING,
PLEASE CLICK
HERE
L E A R N
H O W T O G E T
T H E R E S U L T S
Y O U R E A L L Y W A N T
* * * * *
DISCOVER
how
you can
successfully treat, heal, and cure
any
psychological problem as well as any of the
so-called "biochemical mental disorders"
without
psychiatric interventions!
* * * * *
Learn how
"TO BECOME"
Learn how
"TO BE"
BY
FINDING OUT HOW YOU CAN ATTAIN and MAINTAIN EACH OF THE
FOLLOWING
P R E S C R I P T I O N S
FOR LASTING WELL-BEING :
*being positive*
*being curious* *letting the truth make you free*
*being loving,
humane and
kind to
yourself and others*
*being
ethical to yourself and others*
*being logical and
thinking clearly*
*having a healthy life
style*
*doing work you love*
*staying focused*
*staying relaxed*
*being bold*
*thriving*
* * * * *
J U S T C L I C K H E R E
TO GET STARTED ON A MORE SATISFYING AND MUCH BETTER LIFE !
* * * * *
FAQ - FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS:
1.
Which
problems, "mental illness" issues and symptoms does this holistic, natural therapy help resolve and how
does it accomplish that?
2. * In what specific ways is natural
psychotherapy, counseling and coaching mind-freeing and self-empowering?
3.
How does a natural treatment differ from a psychiatric
one?
4.
What are
the main aims of natural holistic psychotherapy?
5. *How does
this holistic natural
therapy actually work? 6.
How are medical problems
dealt with constructively in a natural therapy and
natural treatment approach?
7.
How are chemical imbalances regarded in relation to life problems?
8.
How
does holistic natural psychotherapy view mind-altering drugs?
9.
What is it best to do if one has become habituated to mind-altering
street drugs or prescription drugs?
10.
What are some specific benefits of holistic, natural
psychotherapy?
Top of page
FOR CONTACT INFORMATION please click HERE
Answers to FAQ: 1-10
1.WHAT
TYPES OF
PROBLEMS, SYMPTOMS, AND ISSUES DOES THIS ALTERNATIVE NATURAL TREATMENT AND THERAPY HELP RESOLVE?
1 A - The "mental illness" issues natural therapy helps resolve:
If you are feeling
excessively depressed, anxious, angry, bored, "in a fog" or emotionally overwhelmed,
this practical, solution-oriented
talk-therapy and effective non-drug treatment
and healing can be of definite help.
Yes, you can definitely learn ways to
treat and cure depression, panic, anxiety
and the large variety of emotional problems listed below, with no
medication and no drugs.
Yes,
natural holistic psychotherapy is the best depression treatment,
the best anger treatment, and the best anxiety and
panic
treatment!
This natural
treatment will help
you develop and maintain a healthy and satisfying life style.
Holistic psychotherapy is a cure
that works!
It is the road
to well-being, happiness and human dignity.
* * * **
As the
list below illustrates, natural therapy and holistic
healing consist of alternative, holistic treatments without
medication and drugs that can successfully resolve
and cure issues and
problems such as the following:
troubled
relationships, emotional stress, and poor
communication, as well as more complex issues such as
panic attacks,
bipolar disorders, post-traumatic stress, conflicts in identity,
and even, treatment-resistant depression, and
treatment-resistant
schizophrenia.
* * * * *
FOR FULL LIST OF THE ISSUES THAT
CAN BE HELPED AND PROBLEMS THAT CAN BE SOLVED, OVERCOME
AND CURED PLEASE SEE THE COMPREHENSIVE LIST BELOW
DISCOVER HOW
Holistic Natural Psychotherapy
and its NATURAL REMEDIES AND CURES can enable you to benefit from effective,
no-drugs, no medication, no psychiatric hospitalization
approaches.
FOR CONTACT INFORMATION just click HERE
WHAT IS OFFERED
At the Natural Therapy Center in New York
City, and also World-Wide on a global international basis, each of the
following is offered:
Holistic natural therapy, treatment,
life coaching and effective problem-solving for any issue
and symptom of the (so-called) "mental
illnesses."
Holistic, natural, alternative drug-free
help, therapy
and cure for any emotional
problem, stress, or crisis.
Facts and information
about alternative treatment, therapy and cure for depression
and also for treatment-resistant clinical depression.
Information about treatments for
depression and treatments for bipolar disorders that bring consistent and positive results.
What makes Natural
Therapy's depression
treatments or bipolar treatments truly effective is
being holistic, solution-focused, positive and thoroughly constructive.
Holistic
depression therapy,
depression treatment,
and
bipolar therapy are highly
effective when the treatment for depression or the
treatment for bipolar disorders is holistic
and without any
drugs or so-called "medications."
Holistic counseling,
psychotherapy and treatment for depression consistently works.
It works for mild, moderate, or severe depression, seasonal depression, holiday depression, holiday blues,
recurrent depression, postpartum depression, major clinical depression, bipolar disorder,
or any mood disorder or emotional ups and downs.
Comprehensive holistic psychotherapy and
life coaching for positive and lasting resolution of couples problems, and marital and
family anger management.
Sex therapy for sexual addiction problems,
sex coaching and sex counseling for ways to increase love, intimacy,
erotic excitement, spiritual closeness, honesty, commitment, responsibility, trust,
and joyful interaction.
In-depth holistic, cognitive
therapy and natural treatment of fears, anxiety disorders,
panic attacks, depression, panic disorders, fear of panic
attacks, confusion,
conflict and guilt issues, as well as issues of spiritual and
religious conflicts, for people of all ages - children, adolescents, young adults, adults, seniors, and the
elderly.
Therapy, treatment, life coaching and
executive coaching for personal, spiritual, situational
and financial stresses and panic
reactions.
Comprehensive
(step-by-step) learning
of positive, constructive and realistic communication and
relationship patterns.
Information and
treatment for depression,
including
information, therapy
and effective healing and cures of bipolar disorder, general
mood-swings, seasonal depression, manic states, hypomania, racing thoughts,
euphoria, impulsivity, and "socially inappropriate" acting out.
Focus on learning how to heal, how to thrive, how to
develop positive ways toward self-empowerment, self-confidence, self-reliance, self-direction, self-fulfillment
and self-growth in one's relationships, ones career and one's work.
Learning to deal constructively with issues of personal
identity, identity conflicts, independence, self definition, self actualization
and satisfying psychological balance by
means of role-playing and creative, holistic educational approaches.
Holistic, natural therapy of excessive
introversion, social withdrawal, and Asperger's Syndrome.
Holistic guidance, counseling
and coaching in
constructive role-playing and the learning of comprehensive ways to
move in the direction you want to so you can bring more
joy and purpose into your relationships and into your life.
Natural treatment, psychotherapy and cure for attention deficit, ADHD,
ADD, impulsiveness and
hyperactivity
patterns.
In-depth holistic
treatment, therapy, and remedies for catastrophic
disasters, post-traumatic stress
and current emotional stress reactions related to
experiences and situations of pain, suffering, abuse (abuse and
trauma in
one's early or later family life while growing up, general
other abuse, emotional abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse,
etc.), exploitation, cruelty, injustice, financial hardships
and financial crises, poverty, hunger,
starvation, deceptions, oppression, serious accident,
disease, natural and other disasters, catastrophic events, terror, crime, war,
bombings, kidnapping, torture, mutilation, and other
trauma or horrors of life.
Holistic therapy, counseling and
spiritual coaching for feelings
of psychological and emotional distress,
hopelessness, self-doubt,
insecurity,
fears, phobias,
spiritual despair and
panic reactions.
Comprehensive holistic guidance, role-playing,
and educational counseling and coaching for postpartum depression and postpartum stresses, parenting problems, child development
issues and issues of child confidence, child competence, and
child happiness.
Natural therapy and holistic role-playing
for excessive
fault-finding and habits of blaming and being impatient
with oneself and others.
Learning how to balance creativity,
work and
career issues and stresses
with one's spiritual well-being and personal happiness in
natural and constructive ways.
Natural therapy, stress
management and holistic executive coaching for difficulties in concentration,
organization and focus.
Natural integrative, cognitive therapy and in-depth
natural treatment and natural therapy for impulsive behavior and
actions.
Constructive natural treatment, therapy,
and relationship coaching for burnout and exhaustion - for taking on too much or putting
oneself last.
Natural therapy, executive coaching,
stress management, and workable
solutions for outbursts of temper, reactions of anger and
rage and especially for lack of
effective anger management.
Holistic and
comprehensive natural treatment with no medication and no
drugs for reactions of religious and spiritual emptiness,
alienation,
loneliness, boredom,
withdrawal and lack of goals and lack of purpose in life
Natural therapies and
alternative treatment and cure for chronic fatigue,
immune, allergic and somatic reactions.
Holistic
and in-depth natural treatment and therapy for panic attacks:
mild, moderate or severe panic reactions and panic disorders.
Natural therapy, holistic counseling and
lasting healing for reactions of grief, as well as
for complicated grief and unremitting grief and feeling of
hopelessness and despair.
Comprehensive alternative natural treatment
and psychotherapy for obsessive and compulsive reactions
and patterns and behaviors labeled as OCD.
Intensive psycho-social,
integrative, cognitive
and in-depth natural treatments and life style changes for psychotic reactions,
behavior, habits, patterns and
symptoms.
Intensive, alternative,
non-psychiatric, psychosocial, natural
in-depth treatment and therapy for schizophrenia and all types of
so-called schizophrenic
and paranoid
reactions and issues.
Holistic and psychosocial, non-psychiatric, in-depth
alternative natural
treatments for current reactions or long-term habits and patterns of delusions
or hallucinations
Comprehensive and in-depth
holistic and psycho-social therapy, treatment, cures and
constructive changes in life-style for drug addiction,
alcoholism patterns, problem drinking,
cigarette smoking and computer addictions.
Constructive holistic
treatment, psychotherapy, and life-style changes for eating and weight problems,
"eating disorders," anorexia,
bulimia, binge eating,
obesity, weight
preoccupation and patterns of unhealthy or
damaging food intake habits.
Holistic coaching and therapy and effective
help for lacks in overall, comprehensive
well-being - physically, emotionally and spiritually.
Immediate and long-term constructive stress management and stress reduction with no psychiatric
drugs.
Natural sex therapy and holistic
sex coaching and sex counseling for issues of sexual satisfaction,
"too little" or "too much" sex and erotic excitement,
sexual addictions, paraphilias, compulsive, offensive, or
antisocial sexual
behavior and the varieties of sex problems people have.
In -depth coaching and
natural therapy for love,
love-hate and intimacy and anger issues.
In-depth natural
treatment and therapy for altered states, confusions of identity,
conflicts in identity, and dissociation
responses.
Natural therapy, holistic role-playing, educational coaching
and real help for toxic and harmful interpersonal relationships,
such as abuse, deception, exploitation etc.
Holistic counseling, treatment and
intensive, creative role-playing for passivity and passive-aggressive reactions.
Learning to deal constructively,
positively and creatively with problems arising out of conscious and
unconscious self-defeating, harmful and destructive
life-styles and daily life stresses.
Comprehensive therapy and very practical
guidance, coaching and compassionate help for family relationship issues
involving troubling and upsetting past,
present and possible future family interactions.
In-depth cognitive and integrative treatment, creative role playing,
very practical guidance, coaching and the learning of original,
truly helpful, bold
psycho-social techniques to deal constructively with generalized feelings of
inadequacy, inferiority and
powerlessness or "delusions of inadequacy" related to
negative, unloving, disrespectful and abusive treatment in
the present and in the past, by
parents and other family members, peers, friends, the school system,
work environment, and/or one's culture or society.
Natural psychotherapy,
symbolic clarification, and effective insight therapy for nightmares.
Natural therapy and
non-psychiatric, holistic coaching and help for sleep problems, sleep
disorders, occasional
insomnia, chronic insomnia, sleep deprivation, early awakening
and excessive tiredness.
Natural therapy, stress
management and
constructive holistic guidance and practical coaching and help for
eating problems, eating disorders, anorexia, bulimia, digestive problems
and irritable bowel symptoms and responses.
* * * * *
FOR CONTACT INFORMATION please click HERE
Top of page
1 B - How natural
therapy resolves the issues and stresses listed:
As this evidence-based
alternative Web site will show you,
every
issue or problem listed above, actually is not - as
psychiatry claims - a mental illness or
mental disorder.
Rather, they are all very real
psychosocial problems, but not "psychiatric disorders" or
"mental diseases."
As Thomas Szasz M.D.,
demonstrated long ago, the idea of mental illness is a myth.
Depression is
not a medical disease.
Anxiety is not a medical
disease; a bipolar pattern is not; schizophrenia is
not; nor are any of the
other problems and issues listed.
Rather, what the
scientific evidence shows is that each listed issue is
a problem in living - an understandable (though sometimes self-defeating) natural
bio-psycho-social and spiritual reaction to a problematic, painful, depressing or emotion-arousing situation.
YES, your problems and issues
are learned emotional reactions, but not permanent conditions.
YES, the so-called mental
illnesses are all psychological reactions and
emotional difficulties which you can
modify by means of this holistic, alternative therapy.
NO, your stresses and problems in life are not permanent
biological, medical illnesses or medical conditions.
As you will see on this Web-site, your
stresses and problems (no matter how severe) are not conditions for which you "need" to be drugged,
electro shocked, or worse.
In sharp contrast with
psychiatric drugging or electro-shocking or magnetic tinkering
for the so-called psychiatric treatment of mental illness, the focus of this alternative, natural
and positive treatment is
always on
truly new self-understanding and the constructive resolution
of personal and
relationship
issues.
In natural psychotherapy you gain natural and holistic prescriptions for
constructive
change. For positive changes that last!
By following natural
therapy's constructive prescriptions for change you learn, specifically,
how to find your self; how
to really heal in body and soul, how to achieve
well-being and happiness by alternative, natural means.
Natural therapy thus is a
drug-free way to
search for, to find, and to maintain a state of natural
happiness and natural well-being - on a regular basis!
* * *
If you want more specific clarification, please go to READINGS AND REFERENCES
Carefully examine the strong evidence behind the
questioning of the prevalent psychiatric treatment of so
called mental illness presented by Mary
Boyle, Ph.D., Paula
Caplan, Ph.D., Peter Breggin, M.D., Grace Jackson, M.D., Lucy Johnstone,
Ph.D., B.P.Karon, Ph.D., Lauren Mosher, M.D., Thomas Szasz, M.D.,
Robert Whitaker and others.
* * *
And most
important: The incontrovertible
hard scientific fact is that
not one of the problematic
reactions listed is a permanent "mental illness"!
The facts
actually show that all the troubling aspects of
a so-called mental illness are learned patterns and behaviors
rather than physical genetic illnesses.
They
were learned and with natural holistic psychotherapy they can all be unlearned!
The so-called
mental illnesses are all transitional reactions to stress.
And
they can all respond well to a solution-oriented, straightforward, natural psychotherapy
and treatment.
These reactions and
experiences of emotional distress require
exactly what natural therapy and counseling offer: a new perspective, and a new
in-depth understanding of oneself, one's relationships and the
complexities of one's situation.
1 C - What
natural therapy can do for you:
Your natural,
no-drugs therapist can show you specific ways to make constructive changes
in your life.
As you make these
changes you are enabled to really heal, to effectively relieve your pain and suffering by
learning
alternative, creative and new ways to resolve general or specific
psychological, social,
spiritual and
biosocial
issues and problems.
You learn
how to really
help yourself!
How, specifically?
First,
you talk your problems over with
your holistic therapist in a completely confidential, safe, problem-solving
environment.
In this
truly constructive setting your
holistic, natural therapist enables you to help
yourself to challenge your negative assumptions and negative ways of
thinking about yourself or your problems.
Your natural and
holistic therapist enables
you to think and talk
in positive solution oriented ways that help you actually
find the healing solutions that work for you.
Second, you practice the
actual daily giving up of any numbing negativism and
paralyzing pessimism you may have acquired in the past.
You learn how to rid yourself of any
delusions of inadequacy or hopelessness from which you may
have suffered.
Third, as you
give up your habits of negativism and pessimism,
you learn new ways to tap into your inborn, natural
creative abilities to heal and change for the
better.
And, most important, no matter how bad your past was, nor what
your age is today, natural therapy can now enable you to use and to experience the strengths and the
creativeness of your real self!
As a result of this integrated constructive talk
therapy and constructive action therapy you
become more self-reliant and more self-confident - on a daily
basis.
* * *
And how is
that accomplished in natural, holistic psychotherapy?
This is done by
means of comprehensive, eclectic, integrative
psychological treatments that include:
cognitive, psychodynamic, bio-social, eco-psychological, Zen
Buddhist, and humanistic concepts and practices.
And in addition,
in natural therapy there is an emphasis on finding new
directions in one's search for psychological health by means
of a variety of natural treatments.
What the variety
of natural treatments include:
These
natural and positive treatments include: relaxation therapy,
stress management, anger management, holistic and spiritual life
coaching, focused breathing,
financial planning and financial management, executive coaching, physical exercises, natural hypnotherapy,
nutritional guidance and positive life-style enhancement.
Each of these is always
useful in one's quest for comprehensive physical and
spiritual health and well-being.
In fact, these
natural, holistic and positive psychological ways can increase and promote the body's
natural abilities to heal neurological, circulatory,
endocrine, musculoskeletal and other body systems.
* * * * *
Top of page
1 D - What
is a NATURAL approach?
By means of natural therapy one can discover when and how it is
actually possible (and when it's not possible) to use the positive psychology of a natural approach.
And what
specifically is a NATURAL AND HOLISTIC POSITIVE THERAPY APPROACH ?
A NATURAL
HOLISTIC APPROACH is a
way of life in accordance with nature and "reality," without
falseness and artifice.
A
natural holistic approach is consistently focused on in-depth
understanding of what is going on in your situation in life.
And if you use
this holistic approach you find out that it always is
a constructive prescription for positive
actual changes.
Positive natural changes that can be relied on
to make your life better!
* * *
1 E
- How to become free and self-empowered:
By gaining in-depth understanding of
your self and your situation you
can learn to become free;
truly free
to get on - and stay on - roads of self-discovery and positive change!
You learn how to become free
and how to stay free to be responsible for the choices you make.
You realize how
you can empower yourself to actually
choose to
make positive or negative choices.
Your start to realize through
natural therapy, that it is you, in the end, who can learn
new approaches to
shape your life positively and to choose the roads on which you want to
travel.
Through actual practice in your therapy you find out how,
specifically, you can choose the roads that lead to
self-realization and the freedom to be your authentic self !
FOR CONTACT INFORMATION click HERE
* * * * *
2. DISCOVER
IN WHAT SPECIFIC WAYS NATURAL AND HOLISTIC
PSYCHOTHERAPY IS MIND-FREEING AND SELF-EMPOWERING?
2 a.
In
natural psychotherapy, counseling and coaching you can learn how
to take a variety of fresh, new roads
that lead to self-empowerment and freedom to become true to
your unique self.
These
natural roads to freedom
can
take you from a life of emotional distress, depression and anxiety
to an authentic,
self-assertive and productive life of well-being and joy.
And along these roads and ways, you
learn how to find, value and
cherish your uniqueness and your unique ways of interacting
with and benefiting from the natural world!
You
learn how to actually attain the positive
changes you
seek so that you achieve a greater degree of general well-being
and happiness.
* * * * *
You learn to attain a kind
of excellence!
As Aristotle so clearly said it:
"Excellence is an art
won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly
because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have
those because we have acted rightly. We are what we
repeatedly do. Excellence, then is not an act but a habit."
And in natural therapy one
learns that the habit of excellence can indeed be
acquired.
One comes to see that excellence is nothing more and
nothing less
than the habit of being truly alive!
* * * * *
In the words of
Howard Thurman,
"Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and
go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive."
* * * * *
Please
click here for
CONTACT INFORMATION and find out how natural therapy can help you "come alive."
Top of page
2 b.
THE SPECIFIC GOALS OF FREEDOM, AWARENESS and CREATIVE SOLUTIONS:
In this holistic, gentle and truth-seeking talk-therapy and positive action-therapy, you
learn to free your mind from stress and worry.
You develop the
freedom to examine your problems, issues and goals in alternative and creative new ways.
And at the same time, in this holistic and natural
psychotherapy, you start to practice to put your new insights into actual positive and
constructive actions.
You develop the ability to free yourself from stress by freeing yourself from
paralyzing inhibitions, negative attitudes, emotional
impulsiveness, self-destructive
behavior patterns, and conscious as well as unconscious
self-defeating actions and reactions.
You learn how to
become more aware of yourself, your current situation and
your past.
As a result, you start to
understand yourself better and integrate your thoughts, feelings
and actions in constructive and realistic ways.
You get to be more awake to reality!
And your new awareness brings new hope and new
formulations of all your issues.
You become free to see
how your real problems in life - even those which produce severe
emotional pain - can be treated constructively
and creatively - no matter how severe the emotional pain,
or how serious a catastrophic event in your life.
* * * * *
2 c.
The SEVEN STEPS TO BECOMING MORE AWAKE
TO REALITY:
First, you gain positive,
creative and constructive insights.
Second, you acquire
and develop abilities to perform positive acts based on these
insights.
Third, you gain the power to free
your mind from mind-altering medications or street drugs.
Fourth, you practice
to free yourself from
an array of distractions and ways
you may have acquired to "block out" reality.
Fifth, You learn to focus on practical plans to
do something positive and constructive for
yourself - every day.
Sixth, you start to focus on the here and now: not
on guilt or regret over a past that cannot be changed, nor on worry about a future
that is always unknown.
Seventh, you practice, practice and
practice the
skills you have acquired of giving up blame. Yes, you
practice performing
positive, alternative, constructive actions on a daily basis - 24/7.
And as you move away from practicing blame (of
yourself and others) you start to feel the freedom of being truly in the
constructive realm of choosing - and working for - a life
that is truly good for you.
A life of new ways of thinking, new hope,
new approaches.
A fresh and wholly better life!
And significantly, during this natural healing process you
acquire and consistently increase the power to free yourself from
the damaging influences of irresponsible, negative, harmful people.
You especially distance yourself from the propaganda of critical, fault-finding
family members, "friends" "authorities" and "experts." (See:
FREEDOM AND THE GOOD LIFE
)
* * * * *
2d.
And at the same time, you
acquire skills in better ways of relating to yourself, so that
you can can free
yourself from negative and destructive ways of relating to your
own self.
It, in fact, becomes especially
gratifying in natural therapy to learn how to free
yourself from all the negative ways of life you may have learned!
You learn creative
new ways to free yourself
from impulsive outbursts of anger or rage, passive-aggressive
patterns, unethical or harmful behaviors, automatic tendencies of withdrawal into depressing
passivity, paralyzing fearfulness, or self-defeating
unassertiveness.
* * *
2e.
In natural therapy
and counseling you can
learn how to
free yourself from ever being a victim of toxic
relationships
with others.
You learn to free yourself from becoming a
victim of destructive or irresponsible actions, toward yourself
or toward others, that you yourself may have acquired.
You acquire the skill to manage stress and anxiety so that
your focus can be on the active development of a positive and
truly satisfying life!
In this holistic therapy you
learn how to acquire the power to shape your life
constructively.
* * *
To truly become
free to be yourself, your unique self, you
learn how to regularly emancipate yourself from false ideas, from
ignorance, damaging preconceptions and prejudices,
superstitions, obfuscations, lies, unnecessary fears and
unresolved (but resolvable) conflicts and ways of inhibiting
yourself.
That may certainly feel like a tall assignment,
but it gets easier and easier once you get started.
You
start to welcome the truth and to appreciate that indeed the
truth does make you free.
You discover the benefits of focusing on the practice
of truth-seeking, self-emancipation and creative self-realization
on a regular (24/7) basis.
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* * *
2f.
In this comprehensive and holistic psychotherapy you
find out how to free yourself to discover and use your inner strengths and powers to actively shape your life in
positive ways.
You become skilled in both stress
management and stress reduction.
You practice
shaping your life in ways which really make sense to you,
which fit your sense of ethics, your personal
sense of right and wrong, and which you truly desire and
truly value.
You become open and willing to actually choose alternative, new, original and creative
ways to attain your goals and values.
* * *
2g.
You learn how to
exercise your capacity to choose, plan for, and actually bring about (what you consider to be) an over-all responsible, fulfilling and
truly productive way of life.
As a
result of living a productive, responsible and fulfilling lifestyle
you stop feeling "tired," "fatigued," or "hopeless."
Rather, to
your surprise, you start to
develop a much happier and emotionally exciting life for
yourself and others.
You start - and continue - to
experience the "natural highs" of comprehensive creative well-being!
FOR CONTACT INFORMATION please click HERE
3.
HOW DOES A
NATURAL HOLISTIC VIEW DIFFER FROM A PSYCHIATRIC ONE?
3a) Natural therapy is an alternative
treatment and therapy that
does not approach psychological problems as medical illnesses.
Natural psychotherapy is
a comprehensive and
effective treatment for the natural healing of life's problems and difficulties - from the
simplest to the most severe. It carefully avoids psychiatric theory and practice as carried out by the average biologically oriented
psychiatrist today.
Natural psychotherapy is,
in fact,
one of a growing number of creative, constructive and positive psychosocial
treatments that have completely and successfully resisted the medicalization of psychotherapy.
Natural therapy has successfully avoided
and actually has protected many from the
attempts of biological psychiatry to practice "mind control"
masquerading under the name of "psychiatric treatment" or
"medical treatment of mental illness."
* * *
HOW NATURAL PSYCHOTHERAPY
SUCCESSFULLY HEALS AND AVOIDS PSYCHIATRIC TREATMENT
Natural
holistic psychotherapy is a therapy of no psychiatric theory and
practice, no psychiatric labeling and none of psychiatry's risky
treatments:
No psychiatric
medication and drugs, no ECT
(electro-convulsive shock therapy), no surgical body implants,
no surgical brain implants, no magnetic
interferences with your brain, no
neurological and brain surgery, no laser brain surgery and
no forced psychiatric
hospitalization, falsely called
"psychiatric treatment."
What natural psychotherapy offers instead, is an
effective "psychological, creative talk and problem-solving
therapy."
Natural therapy is a treatment that shows you how to make
and sustain a choice of positive actions: Actions that enable
you to achieve positive results that last.
* * *
3b) In
this alternative holistic therapy at The Natural Psychotherapy
Center one is given Psychological Prescriptions for Constructive
Change: one learns how to become more curious, how to let
the truth make one free.
Instead of getting
psychiatric prescriptions of risky and hazardous psychiatric
medication and drugs, one gets psychological prescriptions for
constructive change.
Peter Breggin, M.D. contends
that in counseling and psychotherapy, one should "avoid starting
patients on medication or to referring them for medication
evaluation..."
As he puts it, "When people
are already feeling emotionally overwhelmed in the extreme, the
last thing they need is a big dose of brain dysfunction."
(Breggin, Peter. (2008). Practical Applications: 22
Guidelines for Counseling and Psychotherapy. Ethical Human
Psychology and Psychiatry, 10, 43-57.)
Therefore, in
natural psychotherapy one
finds out how to free oneself completely from the mistaken psychiatric
idea
that there is something biologically wrong with people who
have psychological problems or who behave in ways which others find
not acceptable.
One learns
the truth that distressing and troubling psychological reactions or
socially unacceptable behaviors are
not the
results of a mythical, non-existing brain disorder, chemical imbalance
or mental disease.
And as one makes progress in
natural psychotherapy, one gets
to see clearly that one's emotionally upsetting and disturbing
experiences are really transitional emotionally charged reactions to problems in
living or to self-defeating and damaging life styles.
*Again, please see the strong evidence supporting this view presented by
Mary Boyle, Ph.D., Paula
Caplan, Ph.D., Peter Breggin, M.D., Grace Jackson, M.D., Lucy Johnstone,
Ph.D., B.P.Karon, Ph.D., Lauren Mosher, M.D., Thomas Szasz, M.D.,
and Robert Whitaker
by clicking READINGS AND REFERENCES!
Of course, actual neurological,
physical, organic, medical problems that should be medically treated do exist.
And they should be diagnosed and treated with competent,
compassionate and suitable medical methods. But these
are not what modern psychiatry refers to in its mistaken view of
labeling social, psychological, and spiritual problems as
"mental disorders."
Real medical
conditions can, of course, actually be verified by physical,
neurological, physiological, and laboratory tests. And then such
actually verified medical conditions can be
treated and hopefully cured by appropriate medical procedures. But
the hard fact is that such
verification is not possible, for what psychiatrists label mental
illness.
The so-called mental illnesses are
not real medical
conditions.
What are they then?
They are:
psycho-social and spiritual crises that can be resolved
and cured by
appropriate natural and healing psychological methods!
* * *
The fact is that
none of psychiatry's so called mental illnesses can
be verified as biological diseases by means of any scientifically and medically valid procedures.
There exist no blood tests, no x-rays, no lab-tests, no physical
examinations to do this!
* * *
* * *
3c) Too many psychiatrists miss the
simple and obvious fact that human beings do indeed have
psychosocial problems and issues that
result in biological
disturbances, but are not caused by biological disturbances.
In fact, there are numerous
neurobiological and neuropsychological studies that demonstrate
that psychological cognitive processes selectively alter the
way the brain reacts to and uses emotional and
psychosocial stimuli. (e.g. Mario Beauregard: Evidence from
neuroimaging studies of emotional self-regulation,
psychotherapy, and placebo effect. Progress in
Neurobiology, 81, (2007), 218-236.
* * *
Each person is an ever-changing and
ever-growing
being who has complex feelings, thoughts and values, and who lives in
complex human situations and interactions.
And it is within these complex
human bio-psycho-social situations that these problems (whether called
depression, schizophrenia, etc.) have their origin and
maintain their current existence.
One always needs to look
carefully and compassionately at the
whole context of someone's psychological,
spiritual and social situation
before trying to "help" in any way.
Natural
therapy should, in fact be more accurately called
"wholistic" or holistic, since it always
considers the whole context and all the complexities of
one's situation, experiences and goals. That is the kind of respect and
realistic, truly scientific, understanding that every
person, and especially a troubled or upset person,
always needs!
What a trouble person does
not
need is to have her or his brain or body chemistry tinkered
with or assaulted by the reductive, mistaken theories and
harmful practices of current psychiatry.
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3d) The Psychiatric View is Reductive and Pathologizing:
* * *
Natural therapy regards
most of psychiatry's ideas and procedures of treating "mental illness"
as scientifically unsound, logically flawed, therapeutically harmful and
morally bankrupt.
* * *
Therefore, the natural therapist does
not
ever resort to psychiatry's damaging ways of "treating mental illness."
The natural psychotherapist does not
resort to the usual
psychiatric, unscientific, immoral, and pathologizing ways of regarding
and treating distressed and emotionally troubled people.
Instead, a natural
psychotherapist treats everyone with respect.
Troubled people are seen, and learn to see themselves,
as what they really are: basically healthy but often perplexed, frightened, or troubled human beings caught up in transitional or
long-standing emotional situations of suffering - situations and contexts that need
to be understood and dealt with constructively - not masked or hidden by psychiatric drugs.
* * *
In this
effective, evidence-based
holistic alternative to the disempowering methods of
psychiatry, people get to realize the
following:
One just
does not need to get endlessly, and too often forcefully and
brutally, labeled, drugged, electro-shocked, get devices
implanted into one's brain and body, get a variety of risky "patches," get the vagus nerve electrically stimulated,
be given magnetic brain stimulations, or
be subjected to destruction of vast numbers of brain cells by means of
lobotomies, brain implants or laser brain surgery. Especially since safe,
constructive and self-empowering natural methods are available,
and have been proven to work.
* * *
In natural therapy people
get to understand why the methods of biological psychiatry are
not only inhumane, but are also
unnecessary, outdated, and can be seriously damaging.
* * *
FOR CONTACT INFORMATION please click HERE
3e) A Psychosocial
Empowering Perspective Rather than a Psychiatric
Disabling One:
Besides making those who
are emotionally stressed feel even more disabled, helpless and hopeless, current
psychiatric practices too often are downright damaging!
Too often people undergoing such thoroughly inhumane "psychiatric treatments" are disabled for life.
3f) Why Upset and Troubled People are Never Classified With
Psychiatric Labels:
Why are persons
in natural therapy never stereotyped and classified by means of psychiatric
labels?
Because human beings are unique; their minds and spirits are much too
complex and individualistic for that kind of naive oversimplification.
Troubled human beings don't need to
be classified and labeled by a psychiatrist; they don't need to be
insulted and negated by being called "mad" or "crazy".
What people called "mad" are
actually
doing, is fighting control by others.
What they are seeking is power to control and
shape their own lives.
Often, however, they don't know how to get the
power they seek and feel frustrated and discouraged by that lack
of knowledge.
Because of this, they need to be encouraged to learn how to become autonomous,
how
to become free, and be proud to be themselves in their difference and uniqueness. In
fact, they need to be treated with dignity, with utter
respect for their uniqueness.
Thus, emotionally troubled and
perplexed human beings must always be treated humanely,
compassionately and with utter respect and dignity by their
psychotherapist.
They must be
given gentle encouragement, and afforded steady
promotion of their resilience and natural powers to heal themselves.
They certainly do not need the labels of mythical "mental
illness" (e.g. The DSM
series) which are really "accusations" that can deprive them of their human,
civil and legal rights.
They certainly do not need to be
arrogantly "accused" of
"mental illness" under the guise of being medically "diagnosed."
Such
"accusations" are too often part of the totally immoral process of "incarcerating" them in
"mental hospitals" and subjecting them to forced psychiatric drugging,
electro-shocking, and
worse.
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3g) From Passive Patient to Active Self-Healer
In non-drug psychotherapy people are made
psychologically stronger by learning how to use problem-solving
solutions that last.
* * *
Rather than being
told to rely passively on psychiatric medication for life, they
are shown by their therapist how to change in positive ways, how to make better
and healthier choices in life and relationships.
They learn how to use their inner
strengths, to heal, and actually to become their own healers for the rest of their
lives.
* * *
How?
They are coached by
their therapist on
how to attain life-long mental health, physical health, and
spiritual well-being - they learn how to avoid toxic aspects of their
environment in the best ways.
They learn to exercise and
have healthy physical activities on a regular basis. (e.g.,
walk, run, do physical work, get involved in aerobic, stretch
and weight exercises, learn meditation, focused and spiritually
uplifting breathing, yoga, kung fu, regular dance or form-free
dance, etc.)
They learn how to improve
their diet, how to live in over-all
healthier ways, how to develop greater
awareness and greater clarity of thought and purpose.
They learn how to discover, and
actually choose to practice,
realistic, healing, dignified and workable ways to enhance their own well-being and the well-being of others
and the environment.
* * *
In natural
therapy people learn that when they are anxious, panicky, troubled, depressed, etc. they, of course, produce natural chemicals in their bodies that are harmful and
that upset them even more.
However,
when people learn to live a balanced, healthy and
productive
life their bodies naturally produce chemicals that make
them feel good and that enhance their well-being.
Psychiatric or
street drugs don't truly help! They may make one
temporarily feel better. But the good feelings
don't last!
However, learning
how to live a healthier, more productive
and balanced life and having fulfilling, positive
relationships always helps! And not only temporarily, but on a
long term basis. * * *
FOR CONTACT INFORMATION please click HERE
h) The Central Approaches of
Natural Therapy:
The approaches
that are always focused on in natural therapy are the
following:
Learn
how to choose and get
engaged in a way of life that you
value and that you find emotionally and spiritually
satisfying.
Become
involved in goals and relationships that you find morally worthwhile, that you desire from your heart and the
depths of your soul!
Learn
how to help your true spirit come fully alive!
* * *
(To
find out how to make your spirit come alive by making "good"
choices in life, choices that actually work, please click
MAKING LIFE CHOICES
)
Top of page
FOR CONTACT INFORMATION please click HERE
4. IN ADDITION TO THE AIMS
MENTIONED BEFORE, WHAT ARE
SOME OF THE OTHER AIMS and SOLUTIONS OF NATURAL PSYCHOTHERAPY?
In addition to helping you resolve
your problems, the main aims of natural psychotherapy are to enable you to
value and respect your complexities and to develop your ability to
change for the better.
This holistic, global treatment always aims to enable
you to achieve
self-actualization and actually choose the "good life."
This means that in this
natural therapy you learn how to
change certain specific ways of how you have been living.
At the Natural Psychotherapy Center you
discover that natural treatment for depression, for panic, for
stress work.
You become empowered to attain the actualization of your
freedom, the fulfillment and growth of your uniqueness, your
strengths, your spiritual strivings, your interests, and your
true, ever-changing and adaptive self.
And beyond that,
other important aims are to enable you to use natural psychotherapy to actually become more
creative, more productive and help you live well.
The over-all aim of natural
therapy is to show you
specifically how to
find constructive solutions to your problems and bring more emotional and spiritual satisfaction, more happiness,
more dignity, and more joy into your life.
What Natural Therapy Can Help One Accomplish
In the
course of resolving your problems, this
very practical therapy
can
show you how to:
(1) be in charge of your relationships and life in balanced,
productive ways
(2) eliminate
self-defeating unconscious habits and automatic reactions
(3)
achieve what is meaningful and important to you
(4)
bring more love
and joy
into your daily existence
(5) attain and then maintain comprehensive (physical,
emotional, spiritual) well-being
* * *
* *
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5.
HOW DOES NATURAL THERAPY
ACTUALLY WORK?
5a.
IN NATURAL THERAPY THE FOCUS IS ALWAYS ON NATURAL SELF-HEALING, SELF-REALIZATION AND THE ATTAINMENT OF SATISFYING RELATIONSHIPS AND THE GOOD LIFE.
HOW?
Natural psychotherapy works by being
not only a psychological talk-therapy but also a psychological
action-therapy.
Its
truth-seeking, jargon-free and down-to-earth approaches
for positive change work for all ages.
People learn - one day at
a time - to
live in better ways. Ways that maximize
self-actualization and the attainment of greater happiness
by natural means.
And as that happens they get to feel better -
not just once in a while, but on a regular basis.
The focus of this evidence-based, global treatment is
a workable integration of
both - constructive in-depth talk and constructive actions:
The Talk Therapy
The talk-therapy involves:
(1) in-depth,
natural conversation
- a collaborative search by means of straightforward,
honest, open and bold dialogue
(2) creative brainstorming for constructive, new,
completely original solutions.
And the
therapeutic atmosphere that always fosters
such talk is one that is positive, patient, gentle,
calm and thoroughly realistic.
The aim of
such collaborative conversations with one's natural
psychotherapist is always to
understand, in depth, what really is going on and has been going on in your life.
And
especially to get to understand - through
constructive conversation - what you really want to be going on in the
future. And how - realistically - to
attain that kind of future.
* * *
The Action Therapy
The
actions-therapy
involves your actual practice of actions, behaviors and ways of
thinking and communicating that you find truly constructive.
This change to the truly
constructive and positive happens when you choose to put the insights you have gained through
your therapeutic conversations into the practice of your everyday behavior
and relationships.
This means giving up old destructive
patterns of acting and of communicating you may have learned (and over-learned) in
childhood.
In natural
actions therapy, you learn to become bold
and actually try out the completely new and more productive ways of behaving you have evolved in the natural talk therapy.
That the constructive new ways actually work is
totally surprising to those in
whose family background either one or both parents were
authoritarian, dictatorial, angry, moody and abusive.
* * *
Research
findings indicate that the very doing and practice of
constructive, honest and responsible talk and actions speeds all three: biological, psychological and
spiritual healing processes. You learn how to achieve states of
natural happiness and well-being.
Top of page
* * *
The way feelings change in natural therapy:
As people
become
progressively freer and empowered to think clearly and to act
positively and constructively, their feelings start to change.
Though they may feel strange or guilty when
they start to act in ways that primarily consider their own needs, goals and
preferences, these negative feelings get to become less frequent and less
intense over time.
After people practice constructive and positive
actions and constructive ways of communicating with others on a
regular basis,
they gradually get to feel better each day.
At the beginning, they may feel
guilty for taking care of themselves primarily and not putting
others first.
But over time, they stop feeling
bad or guilty and actually feel good when they truly take care
of themselves. They find that then they are in a better and
stronger emotional state to take care of others also.
They discover that it is only after they act and
behave in constructive ways, that they can start to feel more comfortable being themselves.
They thus discover that feeling better is a product of acting better!
Their own
well being and their relations to others
improve.
They become more optimistic,
and simultaneously more realistic.
Wishful thinking gradually
looses its attractiveness.
They give up seeking the
non-existent "quick fix," the "escape" from logical thinking.
Despite a feeling of resistance to want
to give up old, and by now automatic patterns of damaging
behavior, they are willing to try new ways of searching for and
actually learn how to attain states of natural happiness and
general well-being.
They become
more assertive in positive and constructive ways.
They
learn how not to be mistreated,
not be a victim, and not be involved in abusive relationships -
either with themselves or with others.
As a result, they become less frustrated, less unhappy with
themselves and less fearful, less depressed and less anxious.
At the same time (because they become less
frustrated and spiritually more fulfilled) they
become less hostile, less abrasive, less fault-finding, and less belligerent or antagonizing.
They
thus learn how to differentiate among withdrawal, hostile relationships and
assertive ones.
Each person learns how to separate her or his
authentic
values from her or his inauthentic values.
One learns how to pursue and how to live by
one's authenticity.
And as people start to feel more authentic and
real, they get to feel more and more self-empowered, and to feel
more free to express their uniqueness and creativity.
They also gain the desire and the power not to be
victims of their own blind and destructive impulses.
And then, they
can become more caring and more able to create and work toward the
kind of self, the type of relationships and the kind of environment they truly value.
5b) HOW TO ACCOMPLISH ONE'S GOALS:
To accomplish these goals,
natural psychotherapy has evolved an
eclectic, yet unified and holistic treatment approach that is deeply influenced by the findings and principles
of ecopsychology.
The comprehensive approach
of natural psychotherapy is
bio-psycho-social,
interpersonal, cognitive, spiritual, and psychodynamic.
Natural therapy's
in-depth approach is centrally a
humanistic and humane treatment.
Natural psychotherapy is
an effective, practical, and dignified alternative to the ineffective and harmful psychiatric drugging
and other invasive biological techniques of psychiatry.
FOR CONTACT INFORMATION please click HERE
5c)
THE INTERPERSONAL AND PSYCHODYNAMIC PERSPECTIVE:
From the interpersonal viewpoint, natural therapy regards human experience as
always related to one's situation, interactions, and relationships.
And in its natural state, human experience is always suffused with culture in
all its aspects, be they social, linguistic, spiritual, traditional,
religious, historical, political, economic, legal, etc.
* * *
In natural psychotherapy
people start to explore both conscious and
unconscious influences on their everyday behavior, and
especially on their emotional reactions to events.
They start to see that what they feel and do
is always related to what has come to be called
psychodynamic
influences.
This simply means that the nature of the relationships one has
with oneself and others is influenced by aspects one is aware of and also
aspects one is not aware of.
And through greater
self-understanding one comes to see how totally unconscious influences have their roots in one's
present psychosocial situation as well as in one's past.
And once one explores how that happens,
one's problems become much more
understandable and, subsequently, more manageable.
* * *
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5d) THE GOAL OF EACH THERAPY SESSION:
In fact, under the umbrella of such a
perspective, the purpose of every therapy session is to show one how to
become aware
of, and be able to use, one's inner freedom
and power to attain the good life - responsible, reasonable, fulfilling
and joyful.
And one becomes aware of the ways one may have
denied that freedom and unconsciously repeated self-deception, superstitions
and false ideas, self-defeating habits
of thinking and feeling, and self-harming
patterns of behaving and
interacting negatively and destructively with others and with one's milieu.
Throughout,
each therapy session is
focused on gaining self-understanding of one's own complexities as well as
of the complexities of the psychosocial situation related to
one's suffering.
The focus is on clear understanding of all the
complexities of one's choices.
One steers clear of "foolish choices"
and "quick fixes"!
One avoids the easy
"escapes and distractions" of blame, regret, drugs, anger, withdrawal, passivity,
irrational attachments, addictions and infatuations
- all of which are self-destructive acts that can prevent
self-understanding, self-growth and spiritual self-enhancement.
And during, as well as between sessions, the
focus is on clarity of vision.
One commits to put into actual
practice the productive changes in self-understanding and
self-growth which one has achieved.
One learns and practices
positive self-direction!
5e) EFFECTIVE TEAMWORK - COLLABORATIVE AND CREATIVE
BRAIN-STORMING:
What
open, natural, and positive dialogue really becomes when it works well is
effective teamwork.
The teamwork is effective
when both the person seeking therapy and the therapist work
together cooperatively and patiently on all the issues and problems a person
faces. Then such teamwork becomes a
naturally creative kind of joint brainstorming by
the person seeking creative solutions and the natural therapist.
Both
join - as a team - in the search for constructive, natural, healing solutions!
* * *
One of the many reasons such
brainstorming conversations have to be collaborative is
that you are the only one who really knows - even though you may not be
fully in touch with that knowledge - what your conscious and unconscious
perspectives and assumptions about life are, what your basic healthy goals
are, which human values you want to develop and foster.
* * *
And the natural
psychotherapist with a global holistic approach, is the one with the
know-how to enable you to become fully aware of that knowledge and use it
constructively.
* * *
You gradually learn to avoid potentially
destructive, or actually destructive ways of doing things.
For example, you become able not to focus
on changing others, finding fault with others or blaming others.
Instead, you learn how to
focus on carefully thought-out ways through which you can make your life really better - physically, emotionally, spiritually.
* * *
And as you
make your own life better in truly constructive and realistic ways you inevitably
increase your self-confidence and
self-reliance and become able to actualize your true self. And as you
keep doing that you start to feel better and better!
* * *
Your daily existence becomes more satisfying as you keep on developing and
improving your own natural resilience, creativity and strengths!
* * *
And most important, you learn that if you want creative and really
constructive solutions, differences of opinions, of
perspectives and even of values you and your therapist may have,
are the beginnings of conversation, and never the end!
* * *
You learn the real value of
being honest, patient, and reasonable in working out your
differences with you therapist (and with others) in
constructive, moral and life-enhancing ways: constructive
conversation and clear thinking.
You learn how and why to continue dialogue for a reasonable length
of time before giving up having dialogue.
And natural therapy is the best
place to practice how not to stop therapeutic conversation prematurely!
Thus in natural therapy one learns - often for the first time -
the magic of kind, calm and reasonable conversation.
One learns how to explore, and
slowly get to truly understand,
the differences and disagreements one may
have
with another human being and how to use these very differences
constructively.
* * *
And this may be the hardest to stick to:
to practice, to practice and to
practice: To make sure that you truly come to see that the new ways
of life you are starting, really work and have been truly mastered by you.
Top of page
5f) LEARNING TO LIVE BETTER IS A SKILL:
Learning to live well and productively,
and in ways that you truly feel are responsible and in your best
interest, is a skill like other skills,
only more complex. That is why it is so important to persist and prevail in
the open, totally honest therapeutic and natural conversations despite the time and
the effort they may take.
Your emotional concerns, upsets, and any psychological disabilities you may have
developed in the past, as well as the spiritual despair you may have
experienced, are seen as
transitional wake-up calls.
They are all experiences that can help
you finally to get rid
of misconceptions, of blind spots, and destructive patterns.
And as that happens, you
develop the ability to understand yourself better
and become more and more skilled in living well!
5g) WHAT TO DO WITH NEGATIVE FEELINGS:
Unpleasant and
distressing feelings,
when approached with curiosity and patience, are
always opportunities for greater self-understanding
and for positive reorganization of yourself and your relationships.
In
psychodynamic, analytically oriented therapies the analysis of these experiences are called
"analysis of transference" and they are always useful in natural therapy
also.
They are feelings and behaviors people transfer form their childhood,
their past, into the therapy experience.
"Transferred
feelings and behaviors" of course take place regularly
in everyone's life, but can be especially significant when an unconsciously feared
but important
break-through is about to take place. And to
understand them, makes it possible for
therapeutic progress to continue in constructive ways.
* * *
As natural therapy progresses you start to realize that with the knowledge and strengths you gained
through therapy, it is you who can become and stay responsible for
how you use your freedom to shape your life.
You learn to explore the
meaning of impulsive, anxious, or depressing feelings and not
just to follow them blindly.
You learn not to run away
from negative feelings but to use them to gain greater
self-understanding and self-empowerment!
* * *
If you wish a clearer and more specific explanation of
how natural psychotherapy actually works please click on
FREEDOM AND THE GOOD LIFE.
FOR CONTACT INFORMATION please click HERE
6.
HOW ARE MEDICAL
PROBLEMS DEALT WITH IN A NATURAL THERAPY APPROACH?
A person, of course, may have a specific medical disease, actual
medical symptoms, illnesses, or impairments that require
proper medical
evaluation, diagnosis and treatment.
Therefore, if
any concern about
an actual physical illness, impairment, or problem exists at the time one starts
or is in the process of natural psychotherapy, one should always have a physical
diagnostic checkup
by one's regular personal or family physician.
And
one should also, always, have a consultation with someone
who is expert (e.g. board certified diplomate) in the areas of one's concern,
whether it be an experienced specialist in cardiology, internal medicine, neurology,
endocrinology, pediatrics, geriatrics, oncology, otolaryngology,
ophthalmology, physiatry, or in any of
the various medical specialties that may be relevant to one's
concerns.
Competent, compassionate, expert medical diagnosis and treatment
should never be avoided when any concern about
physical illness is present!
Physical, medical disease or impairment always requires suitable medical diagnosis, intervention and
treatment.
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7.
HOW ARE CHEMICAL IMBALANCES REGARDED IN RELATION TO
LIFE PROBLEMS?
Do people develop chemical imbalances when
they get upset?
The answer is: yes, after
they get upset.
As a result of getting upset people develop
adaptive chemical changes. These changes and imbalances
are the result of the emotional and physical distress they have
experienced.
The body is
exquisitely sensitive to any kind of stress, even mild stress; and it reacts
accordingly.
One's psychological problems in living
can therefore cause chemical changes, as well as
musculoskeletal and other physical changes.
Thus it is important to remember that
there is overwhelming research and clinical evidence that psychological experience causes changes
in body chemistry and physiology.
However, research shows that
generally it is
not the other way around:
it is not
that people have "mental diseases" or "genetic defects" that
cause their chemical imbalances.
When
their psychological and social problems are resolved, so is
their mental upheaval, their suffering, and their chemical
imbalance.
Thus drugs do not eliminate the psychological and psychosocial reasons
that caused the chemical changes in the first place !
* * *
And furthermore, the crude "treatments"
by means of psychiatric drugs not only can have serious and
damaging side-effects, but also tend to impair the mind's and body's
natural healing and reparative responses to stress.
So what is one to do if told by a
"professional" that one has a chemical imbalance not related to
and caused by one's
psychologically upsetting situation?
If that happens, one should
always ask what
specific laboratory tests one can take to demonstrate and determine exactly and clearly what
the imbalance is.
* * *
And remember
this:
No
medical examinations or laboratory tests exist
showing that chemical imbalances precede mental distress!
Not even one!
There are no laboratory tests
or medical findings in
existence today that can point to actual medical and laboratory findings with regard to
chemical imbalances causing
mental problems, as exist with other problems such as diabetes, TB,
cancer, infections, actual vitamin or mineral deficiencies, etc.
* * *
And one must not forget either
that psychiatry has promised definitive medical tests for
"mental illness" for over 150 years. And it has still not
delivered!
* * *
Why?
Because, as Thomas Szasz M.D., has so clearly pointed out in his many books: the
task of finding such tests is hopeless.
This is so because the very idea of "mental illness" is
a mistaken idea, a myth.
Or, to put it more
bluntly - a
false idea, a completely erroneous idea.
Actually, the idea of
mental illness is a delusion of psychiatry.
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FOR CONTACT INFORMATION please click HERE
8.
HOW DOES NATURAL THERAPY VIEW MIND-ALTERING
STREET DRUGS AND PSYCHIATRIC DRUGS?
(a) The choice:
Whether people choose to take or not to take mind-altering
drugs relates to the culture, religious influences and the laws under which they live.
All, of course, should arrive at the
choices they make regarding the use of mind altering drugs in well-informed
and carefully thought out ways.
In a democratic society probably the less the government
actively interferes with, prohibits or punishes such behavior the better.
Thus people should have the legal right to take drugs if they choose to do
so, whether the drug is cocaine, ecstasy, Prozac, "grass", alcohol,
nicotine, Xanax,
heroin, Zyprexa or any other
mind-altering substance.
But under no circumstances should they be
coerced, cajoled or pressured to take these chemicals!
And the reason for this is clear: all
mind-altering chemicals can have serious and damaging
side-effects.
Educated about these chemicals, YES.
Pressured or coerced to ingest them, NO!
(b) OK to start natural therapy while still drinking,
smoking
or using mind-altering drugs:
Even though drugs may make it easier
to avoid dealing constructively with one's problems, experience over the past three
decades has shown that one can benefit from natural therapy even while still using
them.
Thus the use of excessive alcohol,
nicotine, or drugs, whether one uses them out of choice, habit, because one is in the
process of weaning oneself off them, or because one is committed to their
use for recreational, tranquilizing or analgesic purposes is never a
reason not to start natural therapy.
It is always beneficial to
explore psychologically the pros and cons of one's risky life styles.
It is always beneficial to explore specific ways to stop taking
risky drugs and chemicals.
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(c) Limited use of drugs in special
emergency situations:
In natural psychotherapy medication is hardly
ever used. And if a person wants it, it is used in minimal amounts in
order to reduce
acute upset in emergency situations.
However the emphasis always is on therapeutic dialogue
and therapeutic problem solving..
Constructive dialogue is encouraged and
reliance on cigarette smoking, alcohol and drugs is discouraged.
If someone is acutely distraught and
agitated, or in the throes of deep depression, tranquilizing and mood
altering drugs may be advised if
quick calming down is necessary and serious health or management crises
exist.
Clinical evidence demonstrates that a safe,
structured, caring, personal and compassionate therapeutic environment is
mostly sufficient
to bring about a general calming down.
But if a safe, loving, caring and
structured environment is not
available and potentially dangerous emergencies exist, psychoactive drugs are prescribed
and should be prescribed. Ideally,
by
someone who is
expert in, or at least congenial to, alternative, holistic medicine -
either a prescribing holistic psychologist, psychiatrist, internist, psychopharmacologist,
or psychiatric
nurse-practitioner.
Thus, in certain serious
situations, judiciously prescribed use of
psychoactive drugs may be of help on a temporary basis and may
definitely be required.
Each individual's safety,
welfare and comprehensive well-being are always of prime
consideration!
(d) Response to drugs varies:
Some individuals respond very
quickly (even in minutes or hours) to psychotropic medication.
Some respond slowly, over weeks.
Some don't respond to drugging or
medication at all, or respond minimally. Some respond negatively
with negative side effects.
Prescribed mind-altering drugs can thus
sometimes be of help in jumpstarting someone into
psychotherapy or in helping them overcome an acutely disturbing transitional
episode.
Once some
stability has been achieved, the
tranquilizing or mood altering drugs are used to the minimal degree necessary
to maintain focus on the psychosocial issues that caused the emotional
disturbances and upsets in the first place. This should be done in consultation with those professionals familiar with the person's psychosocial
and medical history and background.
(e) The focus in natural
therapy is always on one's natural healing
powers:
In holistic natural psychotherapy
one focuses on the organism's natural ways of healing, on its
natural inner healing powers and resilience. These natural
powers to heal oneself are consistently encouraged and
stimulated in natural psychotherapy.
It is self-empowering to go through the process of
natural therapy since one gradually learns how to make use of the
hormones and chemicals naturally produced by one's own body.
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FOR CONTACT INFORMATION please click HERE
9. WHAT IS IT BEST TO DO IF ONE HAS BECOME HABITUATED OR ADDICTED
TO MIND-ALTERING STREET DRUGS OR PSYCHIATRIC PRESCRIPTION DRUGS?
In the event one has become habituated
or addicted to street drugs, psychiatric drugs, or toxic levels of alcohol, it is
not
advisable to stop impulsively or abruptly.
The reason not to stop abruptly is that some
people can have very
serious negative physical and psychological reactions and
side-effects if they do so.
As Peter Breggin, MD has put it: "Most
psychiatric drugs can cause withdrawal reactions, sometimes
including life-threatening emotional and physical withdrawal
problems. In short, it is not only dangerous to start
taking psychiatric drugs, it can also be very dangerous to
stop them." (www.breggin.com)
It is therefore important to
remember that some psychiatric prescription drugs can be far
more addicting, damaging, and habit forming than many biological
psychiatrists and psychopharmacologists are willing to admit.
If one decides to stop excessive
alcohol or excessive taking of prescription
or non-prescription drugs, it is important to wean
oneself off carefully and slowly.
And such a decision should only be carried out with the help, the planning, the guidance
and the supervision of a caring, responsible, knowledgeable and
experienced, licensed professional clinician.
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10. WHAT ARE
SOME SPECIFIC BENEFITS OF NATURAL
THERAPY?
Natural
psychotherapy
is a therapy in the old sense of the word (from the Greek
therapein,
to
attend to, to heal, to make whole):
In Natural Psychotherapy
you learn how to
attend to and heal your psychological wounds and become
whole.
* * *
And this therapy, this attending to your
self, consists of care for your self: truth-seeking, constructive conversation and
creative brain-storming for positive and lasting solutions.
In this process you
are enabled to learn how to consider, love, and respect
yourself and others - more compassionately and more
comprehensively.
You learn the value of a committed,
responsible and trusting relationship of
love, of caring, of dignity, of reason and
of kindness.
* * *
In natural psychotherapy you acquire the skill of
being realistic - to see things, yourself, and
others as they actually are.
You become able to give up "spacing out"
and just passively "hoping" that "things will
get better" or that "others will one day change for the better."
You become able to achieve realistic,
constructive changes:
You
learn how to actually
make your life better in active ways!
* * *
In natural
therapy you gradually acquire the skill to become
your own
therapist.
You learn how to become
truly responsible for the direction and quality of
your life.
Throughout the
natural psychotherapy process you learn how to come alive, how
to love, care for, and find joy in yourself, in others, and in the natural world.
CONTACT INFORMATION:
Appointments
can be made either by e-mail or
by telephone.
Office hours are: Mon. - Fri., days and evenings.
Click here to send e-mail for an appointment
for therapy, counseling, coaching, and emotional support.
If, however, you prefer to telephone for an appointment,
just
click here also.
If the line is busy or you
get the answering machine, don't worry. Just click
here and send the e-mail
form in. You'll get a quick response - generally within a day or so.
* * *
IF YOU LIVE FAR FROM NEW YORK CITY OR DO MUCH TRAVELING:
Though the office is located in New York City,
natural psychotherapy is also available
-
nationally and internationally
-
via telephone and e-mail.
Persons who live in Manhattan, Brooklyn,
Queens, the Bronx, Staten Island, or Long Island and New Jersey
generally come to the office for therapy.
Persons who live far
from the New York
City office often have a session in person and then continue their natural
therapy sessions by e-mail and telephone.
Natural therapy sessions work well by
telephone and bring productive and positive results. This
is borne out by over thirty years experience of using such
"long-distance natural therapy."
In many situations people who live far from
New York work with their
international natural therapist only by e-mail and telephone.
Such sessions work very well and can bring
constructive, long-lasting, and very positive results.
E-mail and telephone therapy
sessions are also very useful
to persons who do a lot of
world-wide traveling and only occasionally can stop in New York City
for a personal natural therapy session.
GETTING STARTED:
So whether you live in New York, in the United States, or
in any country in the world,
any of the ways of natural, holistic psychotherapy can be
especially useful.
Find out how natural therapy can help you get started on the road to a more
meaningful and productive life, better
relationships, and more consistent general well-being!
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