This week I was fortunate enough to be able to go to a seminar by John Briere called: “New directions in trauma mindfulness: multimodal therapy in complex posttraumatic stress.” Briere is an associate professor of psychiatry and psychology at a school of medicine on California and is an accomplished researcher. I’ve seen him on a couple of previous occasions and what I really like about him is that not only is he a “hard-core scientist” (his own words) but clearly also a compassionate and capable therapist. In psychology, unfortunately, all too often clinicians and researchers live in different worlds and do little to bridge the gap between them. So I always get excited when I come across someone who is firmly rooted in both camps and can speak to clinicians as well as to academics. Someone with the courage to talk about real issues that arise in therapy without hiding behind theoretical constructs.
John Briere is one of those.
This is what he wrote in a handout at the seminar under the heading The suffering of others:
“Some therapists grow in compassion during the course of their careers because of an implicit aspect of our work – the voluntary decision to be with people who are undergoing especially difficult times. By working with individuals who are greatly challenged or in extremis – for example those who are confronting impending death or who have been traumatized in major ways – the clinician may come to see more clearly the components and etiologies of suffering, as well as the subtle opportunities that can arise from chaos and crisis. Such work exposes him or her to impermanence in a real way, and can engender a growing realization that we are not only fragile, but also worthy of appreciation and love; that we are not here long, yet we are involved in a compelling and, in some ways, awe-inspiring process. As we assist and accompany people who are experiencing what we, in our culture, tend to deny or discount, there is the chance to access deepening levels of caring for others and ourselves, as we realize that we are all in this together.”
Yeah!
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