In this last article of Head, Heart and Feet, let’s take a look at how the counselor assists a client who is “stuck in his/her feet”.  These clients are people who react by running, staying busy, leaving jobs, homes, partners, therapists, therapy, and treatment ad infinitum when faced with a feeling or an overwhelming event.

The first suggestion we offer is:   STAND STILL.  DON’T MOVE.  Begin there. In other words, you can run, but you cannot hide.  These people always skip the heart because feelings terrify them.

The few feelings “feet people” find useful are anger and “busyness”. In finding fault with you and other people, places and things, I can then blame you and leave in a huff.  If I am trying to be all things to all people I keep myself busy by focusing on you.  In both scenarios, I am avoiding my own feelings.

Recognizing the “feet” client

The angry client and the people-pleasing client can easily be misread by the treatment staff or the therapist.  The counselor may spend most of the time defusing outbursts from the angry or settling disputes with peers or other staff or family members.  This “putting out fires” defocuses the real issues with this client.  Before long, treatment has ended and major issues have barely been identified.  This “feet client” is a master of crisis, a master of defocusing, and a master of running.  They leave 5 minutes before the miracle.  Many counselors will think “feet clients” have “anger issues” when they really have feeling issues of fear, and hurt.  They “vote with their feet” as if to say, “I will reject you before you reject me.”

The “busy and helpful” client may not look like a “stuck in the feet” client because they are so helpful, compliant and the “teacher’s pet”.  These people make an A+ in treatment.  They leave as empty as they came in.  These people are the original codependents, before there was such a name.  They learned early to hide their true self and show only what they wanted people to see of them.  There is always a hidden agenda.  Sometimes it is to keep you at arms length or it is so they can be all things to all people.  Both view keep them focused on others instead of themselves.

The “feet client” is one of the more difficult clients. Because their chameleon-like ways make them so adaptable, the counselor must look past the constantly changing smoke screens for deeper problems.

So now what do we do?

Cognitive restructuring, emotion identification and behavior strategies are all needed with this client.  Boundary setting is vital.  The angry client must not be allowed to pull staff, family or other clients into their crisis.  Bullying with anger should be identified by staff and peers upon each occurrence and then the client should be asked to interact in a new manner.  Contrary action may be a good solution for this client.

The helpful and seemingly perfect client needs to learn to ask for help.  An exercise for this client might be to not allow them to be helpful to others in any way for a 24 hour period, to write down all thoughts that are brought up by this activity and then discuss in group or with a counselor how this activity made them feel.

Once feelings are identified in a given setting, the counselor can ask a very important question, “When have you felt this feeling before?  Or “how old were you when you first felt like this?” The client will usually answer automatically.  Then ask them to describe the age or the scene when they felt like this first.  This feeling is usually the one they are running from by becoming angry or busy.  This technique will draw the feet client into their heart.  Remind them that if they survived the event (which obviously they did because they are sitting before you) they can survive the memory and accompanying feeling.

Once the action (feet) and the feeling (heart) are identified, begin to look at the thoughts they are telling themselves.  All action is born in thought but these “feet people” usually do not believe so. They claim they act first, feel second and think last, when in reality they have a thought, feel it and then act or react.  For example, one client said he was so angered by a friend who stole from him, his first reaction was to engage in a fist fight.  When we broke down the situation, he realized he first took action (feet) because he was resentful (heart).  Such action was fueled by the resentful feeling which was fueled by his belief system (head) that he could trust no one.  Old ideas must be explored if “feet people” are to learn to process feelings and change behavior.

Excitement, joy, anger, frustration, and disappointment are all part of growing up. Learning how and when to show these emotions is known as impulse control.  Therefore the counselor must be able to role model appropriate impulse control.

Recovery can be full spectrum living.  When feelings, thoughts, and actions are in sync the spirit is at rest.  Peacefulness from inside out is possible no matter what circumstances are occurring.  A truly peaceful person does not struggle within self.  Balance becomes a way of living so your true self can shine through.

We hope you have found some useful tools in our Head, Heart and Feet articles so you may assist clients with an integrated recovery of body, mind and spirit.

See you next time.

Peace and Blessings to you all.

In this third article we will assist the counselor in moving the “HEART” person toward their HEAD, so they do not live in crisis and drama. When the head and heart are able to share and process input without the exclusion of one another, the client can then live from that balanced place where rational thinking and appropriate feeling meet.

So, how does a counselor assist a drama prone client to move out of the drama and in to a more rational pose?  Depression and pain can become so great the client either becomes frozen and unable to take action, or becomes so volatile they become impulsive and histrionic.

The first suggestion we offer is:   Pray!  No, really.  Begin there.  A good counselor always invites Spirit into the session and asks for inspiration to help the client sitting before them.  As a counselor, you have training in ways to help your clients, but Spirit knows the journey your client is on and you are only one of many who cross the client’s path during the process of recovery.  You are not the ONE responsible for their recovery.  We list this suggestion first because all counselors are vulnerable to countertransference.  The dramatic client, the one “stuck in feelings” can come across as the super victim, the helpless one, the injured party, the fragile one and on and on.  This type client might trigger the counselor’s need to help in some super power, super human, knight in shining armor or guardian angel kind of way.  Do this and you will foster the client’s dependency upon you.  Boundaries can become blurred very easily in this situation and the outcome can be unhealthy for client and counselor.

The dramatic client can trigger another kind of countertransference in the counselor. Here the counselor may dislike or disrespect people who “cannot control their emotions” so when the client disintegrates into an emotional state, the counselor reacts in a stern, cold manner.  The more withholding the counselor becomes, the needier the client becomes, thereby setting an even more vicious cycle in motion.  So, counselor, get your own ego and issues out of the way. Counselors can benefit from going to therapy themselves!

Secondly, highly emotional people may find themselves acting impulsively, yet claiming they were driven by feelings.  Before the action or the feeling there is a thought that drives both.  Clients may not have a clue what the thought was but discovering the toxic thought that preceded the feeling or behavior is key to understanding how they move through the world. Here is an exercise that might be helpful for your clients.

CHANGING OLD IDEAS or CORE BELIEFS ©

© Jeanie Griffin of FRESH OUTTA PLANS  www.freshouttaplans.com

The facts get in the way of the Truth.

The facts are “the story”.  Those facts that support the story are things we draw into our life to prove something. For example: If my core belief is, “Men cannot be trusted”, then I will send that mental state out into the Universe and draw men to me that prove my belief.  I will then say to you, “See, I told you men cannot be trusted!”  If my core belief is, “Women just want money from a man”, then I will draw to me women who are materialistic minded.  If I want my life to change, I must change my thinking.  If you want to know what beliefs drive your thinking, look at what is happening in your life.  If you want something to change, you must find old core beliefs, then ask Spirit to remove them and give you a demonstration of the opposite.  “Some of us tried to hold on to old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely”³

1. Write a BRIEF description of what happened.
2. Then list all beliefs OF YOURS (not theirs) that arise out of that circumstance.  Don’t worry if they are irrational, just write.  Keep listing until you feel inside you have the core belief.  Call someone to help with this process if you want or need to do so.
3. Once a core belief is exposed ask God to transform this belief.  Say, “  Just for this instant I am willing to set aside judgment about___________________, so I _________________.  One instant at a time claim understanding.

As you go through your life and something crops up, ask which core belief has been triggered and repeat the above process on the spot.

Ex:
Circumstance:
I lost my job.  I am very angry at my boss.  I can blame him for my troubles and take the victim stance or if I have the courage to change the things I can, I will take a look at my thinking and ask myself, “In what way could my thoughts have contributed to this outcome?”

Old Beliefs operating in this case might be:
Nothing good ever lasts.
Life has to be a struggle.
I will always be poor.
I should never have left________(person or place or thing)

Core Belief:  (A summary of the beliefs listed above)
God will take care of others financially but not me.

Once core belief is identified, pray something like this:

Just for this instant I can forgive myself my current belief system.  It is an illusion that God will not provide for me financially. Just for this instant I am willing to set aside judgment that Spirit will not provide for me, so I can experience God’s abundant provision in whatever form that takes.  I let go of the outcome and give my God full control.

There are very good cognitive (thinking) therapies that help people move through overwhelming feelings.  Cognitive-behavioral therapy does not exist as a distinct therapeutic technique. The term “cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT)” is a very general term for a classification of therapies with similarities.  There are several approaches to cognitive-behavioral therapy, including Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy, Rational Behavior Therapy, Rational Living Therapy, Cognitive Therapy, and Dialectic Behavior Therapy. Another very useful therapy is Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) developed by Francine Shapiro, PhD.   If you are not familiar with therapies or you need more practice using them, find a book, a course, a conference or mentor, to teach you how to incorporate them into your skill set.

More unknown, but also effective, are alternative therapies to assist in emotional healing and integration. Through less talking and more experiential methods, these include physical therapies such as acupuncture, and acupressure.  Energy work such as Reiki, Theta Healing™, Chakra Balancing, Massage Therapy and Cranio Sacral work are also useful in moving emotional blocks and helping to balance the mind, body and spirit.  Practitioners offering this work must be certified, so counselors can send clients to them as a supplement to traditional care. These methods are not a substitute for medical or psychiatric care.

Lastly, a Shamanic Practitioner is another alternative spiritual and emotional healer.  Shamanic Practitioners view illness from a spiritual perspective although it may manifest as a physical or emotional illness. Shamanic Practitioners go into an alter state of consciousness to consult with the spirits. Because they see illness as a loss of power or loss of part of the soul they facilitate power animal retrieval or soul retrievals as healing practices.  Learn more about shamanism online and in bookstores.

To update our readers, please note the change in our hats!  Candy now wears a tiara for her national intervention work based in Beverly Hills and LA. Jeanie, in her new cowgirl hat, has opened a new private practice in the Dallas/Ft.Worth area where she is a traditional counselor and shamanic practitioner at www.ASpaceForHealing.com.

In our next article, we will help you move those impulsive “feet” people into integrated thinking, feeling and acting so they live in balance of mind, body and spirit.

Peace and Blessings to you all.

_{All Rights Reserved. March 2009. Written by Jeanie Griffin, MFT, LPC, CADC, BRI II. Jeanie Griffin and Candy Finnigan are two addiction ladies whose work is grounded in simplicity, driven by spirituality, fueled by a sense of humor and dedicated to healing the lives of individuals, families, communities and the planet. Find more about them at www.TwoAddictionLadies.com and www.FreshOuttaPlans.com.  Send your questions, comments or ideas to info@twoaddictionladies.com.}

_{Jeanie Griffin 817-965-2206    Candy Finnigan 818-424-8044}

When asked by a counselor, “How do you feel about your best friend moving to another town?” Amy replied, “I think it is a great move for her.”  This response is common for someone who thinks feelings instead of feeling them.   Such responses often offer a defense against the pain of having to feel feelings.  Freud identified defense mechanisms such as intellectualization, isolation of affect and rationalization as ways to avoid feeling. Over explaining, defending and rationalizing are common verbal expressions of thinkers or “head people”.   Adult Children of Alcoholism often compartmentalize feelings or “sanitize them” in an attempt to have control over the unpredictable waves of emotion that sweep over them as they live through the events they experienced in hurtful homes. While this illusion of control offers safety from unpredictable feelings, the client becomes robbed of spontaneous emotional responses to events.  The counselor’s challenge is to create a safe place and use safe techniques whereby the client may begin to explore feelings instead of converting feelings into thoughts.

One way to facilitate the expression of feelings is to use quotes, poems, writings or songs of others expressing feelings and combine such works with non verbal and verbal techniques for sharing experiences.  We would like to suggest some possible works for you to use in your groups.

1)    Aaron Neville’s To Make Me Who I Am,
“I’ve walked through this world sometimes
Without a friend
My life has been up and down
Been close to an end
But I’ve been through the mill
And I’ve paid my dues
Walked so many miles in different
People’s shoes.
I’ve been through the fire
And I’ve walked in the rain
I’ve felt the joy and endured the pain

2)    Around the Year with Emmet Fox , A Book of Daily Readings, 1931
“God has not made you without a definite purpose in view.  The Universe is a universe, that is, it is a unified harmony, a divine scheme.  It could not happen therefore, that God could create a spiritual entity such as you are, without having a special purpose in view, a special place for you.  Whatever the place may be, there can only be one person who can fill it perfectly………Discontent is not necessarily a bad thing. It is your duty to be discontented with anything less than complete harmony and happiness.  A wholesome discontent with dullness, failure, and frustration is your incentive for overcoming such things.  Whoever you are, your true place is calling; and, because you really are a spark of the Divine, you will never be content until you answer.”

3)    Around the Year with Emmet Fox, A Book of Daily Readings, 1931
“Suppose that you had an invisible recorder on your shoulders tomorrow morning. At the end of the day, suppose that this record were played over to you so that every word you uttered for a whole day was repeated to you. Well, if you are like the average human being you would probably be embarrassed. Yet it really does happen that everything we say and think and do is recorded —- in the subconscious mind—and our daily experience is simply that record being played over to us. Never forget that the circumstances of your life tomorrow are molded by your mental conduct of today.”  — Emmet Fox

4)    A Course in Miracles, vol 1, page 536:
The only thing that is required for a healing is a lack of fear—nothing more than one instant of your love without attack is necessary.

Using these or other works of expression that you might find useful, ask clients to:

• Read the quote out loud in group.
• Sit in silence for 2 minutes letting the reading and the feelings resonate.
• Ask clients to re-read the quote silently again asking themselves how the reading applies in their own life.
• Distribute blank paper and colored markers or crayons and ask clients to draw a picture that illustrates their feelings.
• Share with each other.
• Ask clients to offer a favorite song or quote that affected them deeply

Do not expect “head” people to be able to “emote” on the spot.  This exercise may bring up many feelings for them that might be expressed as anger, disgust, irritation, or resistance.  Do not be tricked by the appearance of insensitivity.  Keep digging gently. More will be revealed. Good luck!

Next, we will help you move those dramatic “heart” people into their heads.

While we agree that professionals need a common language as a shortcut for communication of assessment, diagnosis and treatment, using such language exclusively with clients can hinder treatment progress and recovery rather than encourage it.  Too often clients are given a laundry list of labels and diagnoses, then trotted off to “work the steps” and “expect a miracle”, while professionals boast of high success rates.  When a counselor uses “psychobabble” and/or 12 Step slogans exclusively, there is the danger of delivering a “one size fits all” treatment solution. In our field there is much discussion of individualizing treatment, but in some cases the individualization occurs on paper and not in the delivery of treatment services.  We would like to suggest a simplified, individualized method of looking at the needs of your clients, assisting them in identifying where they get stuck, and helping them change. We call this method, HEAD, HEART AND FEET. It helps if all three are balanced and going in the same direction.

When observing a client, counselors are able to identify if a client is stuck in the head (intellectualization), or heart (drama queen), or feet (impulsive reactions).  While a client may operate out of one, two or all three of these arenas, they usually use a favorite one when responding to something they view as frightening or stressful.  Using a common stressor, let’s observe how a client will react from each of these arenas. Remember, regardless of how clients react to an event, each reaction is an unconscious attempt to keep them safe from what they see as harmful.  The client has learned this reaction to life long before a substance helped them deal with it.

BEING STUCK IN THE HEAD

The client stuck in their HEAD,  will intellectualize events and feelings.  Many times clients who are physicians, lawyers, psychologists, professors, counselors, or other highly educated professionals, react first from their heads when confronted with a stressor. Adult children of alcoholism or other dysfunction learned to cut themselves off from feelings in an early attempt to survive.  These are the clients who defocus intellectually in group or challenge the facilitator as not being skilled enough to run a good group.  Listen closely to how they describe events. They use the phrase “I think” in response to questions as to how they feel. When they do remember emotional events, they describe the emotional event with no feelings (flat or blunted affect) or with emotions that do not match the event (incongruence). We say people stuck in their head are shut down emotionally. What actually happens when a stressful event enters their psyche, is that the event gets popped up into their head to be categorized and sanitized until they feel safe.  It is as if the head is a computerized laundry room where everything gets washed until no emotion is left, and then each event is filed in folders on the hard drive.  Each folder has a password, and no one else has access. Sometimes even the client forgets the password, but no matter how buried it appears, footprints or cookies get left on the hard drive.  The cookies must be cleared in order for the head to run smoothly.  These clients are out of touch with their feelings and behavior. They respond intellectually to what comes across their paths.

BEING STUCK IN THE HEART

The client stuck in their HEART is the drama queen or king.  This client calls 911 when the TV won’t work.  Constant crisis is familiar to this client, and they feel visible and alive when in turmoil. Serenity and peace feels boring.  Unconsciously, they create uproar or diversion in an effort to avoid dealing with what is going on inside them.  This is the person in treatment who never gets down to working on any issues because there are so many outside crises to deal with. The counselor is focused on putting out fires with probation, spouses, children, work, or other outside distractions for the client, in an effort to finally get down to business of treatment and recovery.  Soon, it is time for the client to go and nothing in depth has been accomplished.  This client truly believes that “they” are to blame for “making them feel” whatever way they feel.  Listen to them in group.  They use phrases like, “He made me so mad.”  “She is the reason I cannot do that.”  This client sounds like “chicken little”, declaring “the sky is falling! The sky is falling”.  Being locked in crisis keeps the client from making any long lasting decisions. Being frozen in fear keeps the client from taking action.  Being fueled by anger keeps others at a safe distance.  All of these defenses keep the client from taking responsibility and mobilizes those around to solve the current crisis.  They are out of touch with their thinking and behavior.  Because this client is so in touch with feelings, they are in the best position to access Spirit and their spiritual values, but because they are unable to be still, they are unable to access and experience the deep knowing from Spirit.  These clients are out of touch with their thinking and behavior. They respond emotionally to what comes across their paths.

BEING STUCK IN THE FEET

The client stuck in their FEET is in constant busyness and motion. These clients are workaholics and jugglers of many projects at once. They leap tall buildings in a single bound while they keep Saturn on its axis.  They will not take no for an answer, and if plan number 462 does not work, they have plan number 463 ready in a flash.  They say things like, “Wait! Let me think. I will make this thing work.”  Their calendars are booked for the next year, and there is no room for spontaneity.  Additionally, FEET clients behave impulsively by gambling, fist fighting, shopping, eating, and other adrenaline activities in an attempt to run from feelings, and to quiet thinking. In our current culture, which values accomplishments and accumulation of material goods, sometimes these people get awards for their busyness.  They get Man or Woman of the Year, while they lose families repeatedly through divorce.  They earn lots of money, and take great vacations and live in expensive houses. When asked by family or jobs to go to treatment, they have such a busy schedule that they cannot possibly find the time.  Once in treatment, they point to their accomplishments as reasons why they do not need to be in treatment.   Sometimes these clients lose great amounts of money or families repeatedly,  while gambling on sports events.  They compulsively eat or not eat in an attempt to gain control over, and therefore safety, in their life.  These clients are out of touch with their thinking and feeling.  They simply react to what comes across their paths.

CHALLENGE FOR THE COUNSELOR

For those clients stuck in the HEAD, the challenge for the counselor is to move the client out of the HEAD, and into the HEART and FEET. For the client who is stuck in the HEART, the challenge for the counselor is to move the client from the HEART into the HEAD and FEET. For the client who is stuck in the FEET, the challenge for the counselor is to move the client into the HEART and HEAD.  In the following issues,  we will offer ways the counselor can teach clients this method, and we will offer exercises for clients to use to balance their HEAD, HEART and FEET.

All Rights Reserved. July 2008. Written by Jeanie Griffin, MFT, LPC, CADC II. Jeanie Griffin and Candy Finnigan are two addiction ladies whose work is grounded in simplicity, driven by spirituality, fueled by a sense of humor and dedicated to healing the lives of individuals, families, communities and the planet. Find more about them at www.TwoAddictionLadies.com Send your questions, comments or ideas to info@twoaddictionladies.com.