COMPASSION IN THERAPY SUMMIT 2022, 20-24 APRIL, ONLINE
How can we learn to learn from positive experiences? This was the core enquiry in neuroscientist Rick Hanson’s session, and the theme of a recently co-authored paper (Hanson et al, 2021).
“No matter how hard the past has been, we can grow a little, learn a little, heal a little every day,” he said.
“As coaches and therapists, in ‘Growth 1.0’, we’ve traditionally treated people as a positive vessel into which we pour experience or information and hope some of it sticks. But the ‘dirty little secret’ is that for about two-thirds of the population there’s no lasting benefit from their practices or our interventions. They’re momentarily pleasant but the people didn’t learn from them in lasting ways,” he said.
“Neuroscience is helping us learn to see how we can grow the good, the grit, the happiness, self-worth, secure attachment, executive functioning, emotional intelligence. How do we grow in these ways informed by modern science?” said Hanson.
“ ‘Growth 2.0’ teaches people little things they can do while they’re having experiences (helping professionals) are inducing in them or they’re reading a book or listening to themselves talk and so on. We can engage neuroplastic factors that lead to lasting change in the brain, hard-wiring secure attachment, compassion and self-worth.”
He said that although it’s “nice to go through life smelling the roses”, it was important to recognise “the challenges of life for all of us and also have awareness of our negativity biases”. Some of the learning that’s important to develop doesn’t feel good, such as healthy remorse and wise disenchantment, he said.
“This isn’t about seeking positive experiences per se, it’s strength-building the driver of the bus of who you’re becoming, particularly based on developing wholesome factors.”
Evidence-based techniques to try include “extending the duration of a useful experience – try to have a learning curve by just staying with the experience, the feelings in the body, the intention, the understanding or insight for a breath or two – keep those neurons firing.”
“Opening up to the experience in the body” is important, as is “focusing on what’s rewarding or joyful about the experience. By focusing on the reward value, we heighten the dopamine and norepinephrine (neurotransmitters) in the hippocampus, increasing long-term change and structure of the brain,” he said.
The HEAL framework
To bring this all together, Hanson presented his HEAL framework:
H = Have a beneficial experience
E = (let it be) Enriching
Attend to duration (for at least a breath), intensity (turn up the intensity), and multimodality (bringing in bodily sensations and so on, not just cognitive), novelty (the more we explore new aspects, the more it’ll land), and salience (why does it matter to you?).
A = Absorbing
Sensitising your brain and increasing sensitivity to the experience, and setting intention to absorb it so it’s more likely to stick.
L = Linking
Being aware of two things at once – the beneficial experience in the foreground such as the feeling of grit or determination, off to the side, some smaller negative material such as being bullied. “Being aware of both at the same time and keeping the positive bigger. The positive gradually associates with the negative and can soothe it and even replace it,” Hanson explained.
Reference
- R Hanson, S Shapiro, E Hutton-Thamm, M R Hagerty and K P Sullivan, ‘Learning to learn from positive experiences’, in The Journal of Positive Psychology, 2021