The Difference between Brainspotting and traditional therapy approaches

Beyond Talk Therapy: Brainspotting heals what talk therapy can’t access

Talk therapy or what is known as cognitive behavioral therapy CBT has been the gold standard form of therapy for most mental health issues from depression, anxiety, emotional distress, behavioral patterns and even trauma. Talking activates the analyzing and rationalizing systems of the brain. While it allows individuals to have new insights and improved self-awareness, many clients hit a point where progress stalls.

Top-Down Approach: Knowing what’s wrong doesn’t fix it

Talk therapy is known as a ‘top-down’ approach where the thinking brain is used to analyze and control emotions, thoughts and behaviors. We hear this all of the time from clients we work with. They understand why they feel stuck—yet the pain, habits, or overwhelm persist. They know what’s wrong but can’t seem to fix it. That’s because talking activates the part of the brain that analyzes and rationalizes. In contrast, healing trauma, emotional reactivity and unconscious patterns require accessing different parts of the brain.

Healing trauma requires accessing different brain regions: Brainspotting therapy

This is where body-based or brain-body connection therapies are essential. Unlike talk therapy, Brainspotting is a bottom-up approach, it is a body-based therapy designed to reach the deeper roots of experience. Where traditional talk therapy targets the thinking brain known as the neocortex, our center for logic and analysis, Brainspotting targets the midbrain, subcortical brain and nervous system, where trauma, emotional pain, and deeply held patterns are stored. This is known as a ‘bottom-up’ approach where the body or felt sense is the pathway for healing the mind, emotions and behaviors.

These are key differences that have a significant impact on the ability to release stored trauma, traumatic memories, process emotions, release painful memories of past events, and heal the mind and body.

1. Thinking vs. Sensing: Different parts of the brain

   Traditional therapy engages the part of the brain responsible for rational thought. This is known as the neocortex and it is responsible for language, analysis, and decision-making. These functions are essential for decision making, planning, organization reflection and goal setting.

   But they don’t;

   • regulate the nervous system
   • manage emotions
   • process trauma

   Clients cannot resolve deep patterns through insight alone.

   Brainspotting therapy therapy is unique in that it targets the midbrain, the region of the brain responsible for instinctive, emotional, and sensory processing. This is where the nervous system stores the imprints of unprocessed trauma through sensations, feelings, and experiences. It is based in the premise, ‘where you look affects, how you feel’. The ocular nerve is responsible for where you are looking and what you are seeing, it has direct access to the most primitive parts of the brain related to our survival instincts. This is part of our survival wiring, where our eyes allow us to see if we are in danger. These are also the parts of the brain that store our experiences of trauma. Healing trauma requires accessing these primitive brain regions.

2. The Limits of Talking: Cognitive behavioral therapy CBT

   • Roughly 80% of information processed by the brain is sensory rooted in the five senses, existing outside of any verbal interpretation or language.
   • Only about 20% is accessible through thoughts, cognition and language.

   Based on this awareness, traditional talk therapy accesses around 20%, but misses the 80% that is stored in body memory, sensations, emotions, and nonverbal experiences.

   This is why people often say: “I’ve talked about this for years, but I am still stuck.”

   Brainspotting therapy works

   Brainspotting therapy accesses the 80%. Unresolved, stored trauma lives in the roots. Brainspotting resolves unprocessed trauma at the root level. Along with your qualified therapist you will identify an issue, feel the sensations in your body related to that issue and then find an eye position that correlates with the strongest sensation in your body. This is known as the “brainspot”—a location in the visual field where trauma is held.

   Through the calm attunement of your therapist and your continued awareness of your sensations and emotions, subtle shifts will begin to emerge. The healing process may involve deep emotional processing, physical sensations, release tension and bodily sensations, process trauma and emotional pain, and changing negative thought patterns at the subcortical level. The healing journey and process of brainspotting is far more about allowing your body to lead and help you heal then any analysis or explanation.

3. Branches vs. the Roots: Talk therapy is the branches while Brainspotting is the roots

   Imagine the mind is like a tree where unresolved trauma lives in the roots. The roots are the foundation for the health of the entire tree including the trunk, branches and leaves. You can talk about the leaves or the symptoms, you can even cut off the branches or the behaviors but if the roots are not healthy, the old patterns return.

   Traditional talk therapy is effective at identifying the symptoms and even trimming the branches which helps clients manage their situation and possibly start to think differently. Talk therapy addresses the symptoms and behaviors. But if you don’t access the roots, results are temporary.

   Brainspotting tends to the roots, helping to resolve trauma and stored stress at the level of the nervous system. This allows for the brains natural ability to help the nervous system regulate and emotional well being to be restored.

4. Releasing Instead of Reliving: Resolving emotional pain

   Retelling the same trauma story strengthens neural pathways related to that trauma. This is of course unintentional however by nature of neural plasticity, ‘what fires together wires together’. The more we tell the same story, the more we strengthen it.  Brainspotting is not about retelling the story. It is an experiential, somatic process of releasing where the trauma is stored in the body and nervous system, at the root level.

5. Safety Allows for Healing

   Healing requires emotional safety. Primary tenants of brainspotting are compassion and attunement. Brainspotting incorporates dual attunement, which means the therapist is attuned to your emotional state, while you are attuned to your internal sensations. This creates a nonverbal environment of safety—where deeper healing becomes possible.

   Talk therapy on the other hand provides emotional validation and support. It typically invites the client to “talk through” what is happening. If this involves anything traumatic, subconscious, emotionally charged or a nonverbal experience, talking and thinking are not going to access the roots.

   For people dealing with complex trauma, long standing wounding, repetitive patterns and emotional reactivity, this can be highly frustrating and defeating. In fact, research comparing Brainspotting to cognitive therapy for treating PTSD have shown that participants in the Brainspotting group continued to improve over time, demonstrating more profound and lasting results.

6. When Talking, Storytelling and Insight Aren’t Enough: The mind body connection

   Many clients come to Brainspotting after years of telling their story and analyzing and reevaluating their past. Insights are not always the answer. You may know what happened and why you feel the way you do but that does not always mean you can change it. This is usually an indicator that you are dealing with unresolved trauma or nervous system dysregulation due to a stressful past experience.

   You can’t talk your way out of the survival response, it is sensory, emotional, and instinctive, not verbal and analytical.

   Brainspotting allows the body to complete those unfinished survival responses.

The Answer: Brainspotting goes beyond talk therapy

Talk therapy brings insight, Brainspotting rewires the mind and body. If you’ve been dealing with the same issues, even after years of personal growth, it may be time to try a different approach.

Brainspotting doesn’t replace talk therapy aka cognitive behavioral therapy CBT, it works together with talk therapy to go deeper into the mind body connection. After identifying the symptoms now, we can go into the roots and heal the real issues.