Mindfulness-Based (MBCT) Therapists in California
Find the right therapist in California for you. Each profile lists the insurances the provider takes, typical costs per session, and how to get in contact.
DDavid Shapiro
Psychologist
What's your experience with mindfulness-based therapy (MBCT)?
Well this is a question that I hoped would come up. So the question is, what's my experience with mindfulness based therapy. And this is incredibly close to home, something that I really find intrinsic to my practice and I'm glad to talk to you about it.
So one of the things that's a little bit unique about my practice and I've shared about this a little bit in some of the prior videos but I'll say it again, is I'm not only a psychologist, but I'm also a Buddhist practitioner and teacher. For the past 12 years, I've been studying with a variety of Buddhist teachers including intensive mentoring with Buddhist monks. For four years, as well as going on retreats with some, some pretty renowned teachers. I have studied a variety of mindfulness and meditation approaches, including, you know, something called Mahamudra, something called Dzogchen. And also there are these deep absorption states that are called Dhyanas, that I've also had a lot of intensive training in, but one of the really interesting things is how I've now been able to integrate, working with people with mindfulness and meditative techniques in order to complement psychotherapy, both individual psychotherapy but also in my work with couples, and, and parents and children and families.
So, it's been pretty interesting but but one of the things that I've really been interested in is to understand exactly what it is that I'm doing and why it's effective, and so I just want to share with you a little bit about that. One of the things that I would say is that there are a couple of distinct nervous system states that we know about, in psychology, one is called the sympathetic nervous system state which is aligned with the feelings of fight, flight, and freeze you know it's it's how we, we deal with emergencies, it's a very reactive. Nervous System state where you know we're stress hormones like adrenaline are released, and it's good for responding to emergencies, but it's not so good for some other things. There's, in contrast, a state called the parasympathetic nervous system state, which is really calm, open aware. And so one of the things that I've come to realize is that if people want to be able to be flexible and want to be able to learn new ways of responding, and want to be able to explore their thoughts and being able to perhaps form more balanced ways of thinking about and understanding situations the things we do in cognitive cognitive behavioral therapy. It's extremely important to help a person learn how to get out of that reactive state first.
And the same is true actually, what I've come to realize is when I'm working with people in terms of their communication, resolving of conflicts. So often, what I've what I've come to realize is that therapists will try to counsel people in how to relate to their spouse or their child or their parent in new ways, while the parties are very upset and stirred up, which is not the right state to be able to be flexible. So one of the things that, that I have now really gotten a lot of positive results with is helping people to first get themselves into the right emotional state before trying to do those things. Now once a person is in that emotional state. You can also work with cultivating particular attitude. And so some examples would be, compassion, loving kindness, all of which can can then lead a person to respond very differently once they start communicating or doing some sort of inner person interpersonal type type of a process.
And, and so again, by helping people be able to not only quiet themselves, but then intentionally cultivate a particular attitude, I'm finding that my clients are able to be a lot more successful in, in learning new and more useful ways of responding in to other people in their important relationships. And then of course, you know, there's this interesting interaction of mindfulness and meditation, with the area that's called Clinical hypnosis. One of my mentors Dr Michael Yapko recently wrote a book called mindfulness and hypnosis, in which he, he really points out that a lot of mindfulness practices, actually, are one in the same with with clinical hypnosis, states, and methods. And so what I've actually been able to integrate this by helping people learn how to get into some of these calm inwardly focused states. Then comes opportunity to use those states in instrumental ways in therapy, and, and not just in terms of supporting types of responding people, but also supporting people and being able to change some of their core beliefs and ways of thinking, which can be done through techniques such as clinical hypnosis, and by supporting people in developing something like a meditative technique. I'm actually helping them learn how to quickly go into a state which then can be adapted for something such as, as use of trance, in the therapeutic process as well.
So, my answer, perhaps a bit rambling, is really kind of gives a bit of a flavor for some of the ways that I worked with mindfulness and integrate that with therapy, and it'll be really interesting to explore with you if that's something that you would be interested in. Tt's not something that's necessary for my clients to do and there are many of my clients that I don't do, you know, mindfulness work with, but for those who are receptive and interested, many are really valuing the ways that I blend that with, with more traditional types of therapy. So, it would be worthwhile if you'd be interested to talk about some of your interests and what it is attempting to accomplish.
One thing that I offer my prospective clients is a chance to just visit online for a free consultation, and I hope you'll take me up on that and maybe we can see if, working with mindfulness consciousness is something that would benefit, what you're looking to accomplish. So, I hope to hear from you, and hopefully we can talk soon. Take care, bye bye.
