I-brainmap, freeing your brain for happiness
by Rita McInnes
Feeling stuck? In an emotional rut? constant craving? or the same old negative thinking loop? Your brain’s Stuck on Stress, SoS brain.I-brainmap® is an invitation to curiosity, a practical-experiential map, how-why the brain gets stuck, providing techniques to get unstuck.I-brainmap was developed by writer-psychologist Rita McInnes in her clinical practice.I-brainmap, freeing your brain for happiness (2014) is now available on audio.Note from author: I have made the audiobook of I-brainmap available for free. May you be happy and free.
Episodes
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Interview with writer and psychologist Rita McInnes discussing I-brainmap
In this lively and informative discussion*, writer and psychologist Rita McInnes explains I-brainmap**, developed in her clinical practice. I-brainmap™ is a practical process for working with-and-through traumatic and overwhelming experiences that have become imbedded in the body-brain.…
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INTRODUCTION – Preface
Introducing the brain, the characters, Jack and Mary, and I-brainmap, a process and technique for practical brain change, with an invitation to curiosity, as you listen and engage with this material.
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CHAPTER 1 - Meeting the yellow-eyed wolf
In this chapter I describe my experience of traumatic and overwhelming events that have shaped my life. It was these events that kindled a fascination for, and deep exploration of, the impact of trauma on the brain-body-mind. My passion for this work culminated in the development of the…
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CHAPTER 2 - Introducing the I-brainmap
This chapter describes how I developed I-brainmap in a clinical setting and its practical application outside therapy. You’ll meet Jack and others to discover examples of how the I-brainmap is introduced and works in a clinical setting.
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CHAPTER 3 - How I-brainmap works and when it doesn’t
This chapter provides some of the fundamentals of I-brainmap, and relevant brain functions. It describes how I-brainmap works and some of the pitfalls in the use of I-brainmap.
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CHAPTER 4 - Meeting Mary
Meet Mary, your other companion on this journey through I-brainmap. In this chapter I chat to Mary to explain the relevance of I-brainmap.
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CHAPTER 5 - Brain Basics
This chapter explores brain functions and structures relevant to I-brainmap, including principles of brain change such as bottom-up, brain change.
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CHAPTER 6 - Fight, flight, freeze and appease
This chapter outlines the body-brain’s survival response to threat, and describes how the system can become Stuck on Stress (SoS brain). (Chapters 6 - 14 outlines each section of the I-brainmap. You can access a copy of the I-brainmap here.)
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CHAPTER 7 - Triggers
In this chapter I describe some of the common ways the brain-body-mind is triggered by things that are linked to previous experience. Triggers can be internal or external.
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CHAPTER 8 - Stuck in old memory maps: Hippocampus, lost in action
In this chapter I explain the glitch in memory, associated with traumatic and overwhelming events, which can make some memories, or experiences, difficult for the brain to integrate.
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CHAPTER 9 - The gesture of integration
The gesture of integration offers a way of explaining the process from activation to integration using the hand, showing the dynamic relationship between big brain and lower brain function, in a simple way.
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CHAPTER 10 - Primary Activation
This chapter describes the experience of activation as it relates to brain function. It provides a list of experiences frequently reported by clients that are associated with activation. Here I introduce the most challenging principle of I-brainmap; that we are not trying to stop activation, but…
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CHAPTER 11 - Secondary Activation
Secondary activations are typically patterns of behaviour, or habits, in reaction to primary activation. Although initially adaptive, over time they can become mis-adaptive, when we lose our capacity to choose alternative behaviours.
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CHAPTER 12 - Making meaning
This chapter explains the usual process of meaning making brain function that can perpetuate the activation cycles, through our beliefs and expectations, and the stories we repeatedly tell ourselves.
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CHAPTER 13 - The Integration Zone or I-Zone
This chapter describes the process of brain integration in greater detail, while identifying helpful attitudes, and potential challenges, to allow you to more effectively shift, attune and move towards the Integration Zone, or I-Zone.
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CHAPTER 14 - Orientation and the AND pathway
This chapter explores Orientation and the And Pathway in greater detail and their importance in brain integration and sustainable change. The practical application of Orientation and the AND pathway through I-brainmap is outlined.
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CHAPTER 15 - Introducing the AIRs Technique: Applying the I-brainmap
In this chapter I explain and unpack the application of the AIRs protocol, during activation. AIRs is the practical application of the principles, brain processes and experience described in the I-brainmap. Moving through the AIRs sequence during activation promotes AND pathways and brain...
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CHAPTER 16 - AH! Awareness as it Happens
Awareness as it happens is the first principle of the AIRs sequence, like an Aha! This is Activation. Initially recognising and naming Activation as it happens is the beginning of integration, through awareness.
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CHAPTER 17 - Interrupting the pattern or habit
In this chapter, the second principle of the AIRs sequence, Interrupting, is explained, especially how interrupting is different to stopping activation. In this chapter I provide multiple ways you can experiment with interrupting the activation loop, until you begin to develop your own techniques.
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CHAPTER 18 - Reorienting
Reorienting applies the function of orientation, which is central to integration and sustainable brain change. It invites an orientation to sensory detail, which is the primary language of the lower brain, survival brain, which has been running, and re-running, the activation loop.
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CHAPTER 19 - Soothing the lower brain
In this chapter I discuss the importance of approaching your experience of Activation with kindness. This is to remind you that the part of the brain that is caught in activation is like a frightened child lost in a nightmare. So, be gentle.
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CHAPTER 20 - Finishing I-brainmap with AIRs
This chapter highlights some of the important principles that can be lost in translation into practice. One of the main challenges is the speed that activation is triggered and how quickly we become caught in established loops. It takes time and practice to learn any new skill and to change old...
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CHAPTER 21 - Sustainable happiness and creativity
In this chapter I explore the qualities of happiness and creativity as inherent brain states occurring when the brain is functioning optimally, and able to return to homeostasis or wellbeing, ease and presence, when it's no longer fighting for survival, aka Activated.
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EPILOGUE
So, it’s goodbye from me. Thanks for journeying with me through I-brainmap. May your brain be happy and may your curiosity never fade.
About this show
Feeling stuck? In an emotional rut? constant craving? or the same old negative thinking loop? Your brain’s Stuck on Stress, SoS brain.I-brainmap® is an invitation to curiosity, a practical-experiential map, how-why the brain gets stuck, providing techniques to get unstuck.I-brainmap was developed by writer-psychologist Rita McInnes in her clinical practice.I-brainmap, freeing your brain for happiness (2014) is now available on audio.Note from author: I have made the audiobook of I-brainmap available for free. May you be happy and free.
Hosted by
Rita McInnes