by Jerry Perlmutter, Ph.D.

December 2010 

 The ISP process fosters patients to explore a deep aspect of their psychological life, their self. This exploration supports their ability to go even further in their development. One way of looking at ISP process is to use the awareness cycle*. This cycle has four steps (each preceded by the word self): Awareness, Acknowledgement, Acceptance and Appreciation. Let's explore the cycle more by understanding the individual steps:

 

Self-Awareness - The cycle starts with a person becoming aware that he is having an experience - feelings, thoughts and action tendencies. I ask him to just notice the experience (that is, to allow the experience to happen without consciously trying to change the experience). Cultivating the capacity to just allow one's experiences to happen is crucial for the person to develop deeper levels of awareness of the experience in a permissive and spontaneous manner. I actively support this approach underscoring noticing his feelings, thoughts and actions (and I also invite him to allow themselves to move, if this wants to happen). Each time he goes into an awareness cycle, I cue him with the allowing and movement prompts. I am socializing him to the patient's role. When I see him allowing thoughts, feelings and action with consistency, I reduce the frequency of my prompts.

Further explanation of this step -- In our culture we often push ourselves to act the way we should or want to be. Either type of action is very different from allowing. Allowing is the gateway to the self. Being more active by trying or pushing oneself to become is a part of the more executive aspect of the personality, the ego. In ISP we spend much time settling into and exploring the self. Much later on we explore the ego and its standards and ideals. Then we focus on integrating the ego and self in a collaborative way so that neither dominates the personality. 

 

Self-Acknowledgment -- Here the focus is on taking ownership of what the  person is experiencing at a "deep level." His spontaneity affirms that this aspect is a deeper part of him. I respond empathically to the specifics of his experience and that it reflects a deep part of him.  

Self-Acceptance -- The person accepts what he finds in himself at a deeper level, and that he is significantly expanding the extent of his self-awareness. 

*The foundation for the awareness cycle comes from the work of John Weir. I spent two years helping to staff John and Joyce Weir's Self Differentiation Workshops for the NTL Institute for Applied Behavioral Science at Bethel, Maine. I have expanded the use of the cycle steps with the cues I offer and the uses of the four steps in the development of the person.

Congruent Action -- Once the first three steps of the awareness cycle occur, the probability is high that the person takes action that is consistent with what has become apparent during these previous steps. Often times the action occurs spontaneously and the feeling of "fit" becomes very obvious to the person. Movement or taking action is very important for the person because it is a culmination within the cycle of awareness. Developmental change is not merely a matter of insight -- this is not enough. Living in the world requires new behavior.   

Self-Appreciation -- Here the person values himself for moving into and through this awareness cycle. This work is not easy. Initially, one may feel quite anxious because one doesn't know where his experience will take him -- this is an unknown. And the size of the risk is also unknown until he stakes it. Importantly, he learns that he has the resources to carry him through, the courage to proceed even though he  feels a high level of anxiety. As he repeatedly goes through the awareness cycle, his level of self-trust and courage increase greatly. Eventually he feels less anxious because he knows he has what it takes to proceed fully and successfully. These lessons in this stage are so very important! 

 

The Context for the Awareness Cycle 

 What happens in an ISP session that initiates the Awareness Cycle? The person comes into a session with a dream or part of a previously unremembered memory. The person feels triggered. He either goes into the Awareness Cycle on his own, or I intervene by asking him to pay attention to what he is experiencing: thoughts, feelings and a movement that is emerging. And so we are off into his depths.    

If the person does not come into the session triggered, I will ask the person to do exercises that increase his energy charge -- stress work while doing deep breathing. As he does them I make the usual request: notice your feelings, thoughts and your tendency to move. And so again we are off into his depths. Or I may notice that muscles in his body are chronically tight, so I do touch work, which often triggers the person, and we again use the awareness cycle.     

As the person does this cycle repeatedly, he goes deeper inside himself and gets a fuller knowledge of himself. His actions are more authentic because they emerge from his deeper self.