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Welcome to the Husband Material podcast, where we help Christian men outgrow porn. Why? So you can change your brain, heal your heart, and save your relationship. My name is Drew Boa, and I'm here to show you how. Let's go. Welcome to session three of the Porn Free Man Conference, sponsored by Husband Material Academy. Husband Material Academy is the all-in-one program for Christian men outgrowing porn. And if you want to continue what you started here with momentum, with community, with professional support for an extremely affordable price, join HMA at joinhima.com. Today I want to tell you what I have been learning over the last year and a half about the brain. This session is called

Welcome And Mission: Outgrowing Porn

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How God Designed Your Brain to Heal Itself. How many neurons are in an adult human brain on average? A lot. If you look up this question on Google, you'll see about 86 billion neurons,

Session Theme: God Designed The Brain To Heal

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nearly a hundred billion. Now, our neurons, our brain cells, have vast interconnected networks with each other. Each neuron has an average of 7,000 connections. Eighty-six billion neurons, seven thousand connections. We consider how many connections between neurons exist in your brain. It's about six hundred and two trillion. Earlier this week on the Husband Material podcast, David Grand, the founder of Brainspotting, said that each human brain has somewhere in between one to four quadrillion synaptic connections. Connections between neurons. This number is just so big. It's way beyond our ability to comprehend. And that's exactly my point. There is a universe within you. Not just a world, a universe. So complex, so vast,

Awe At The Brain’s Vast Complexity

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our brains are so intricately interconnected that talking about the brain is like looking up at the stars. We are just scratching the surface of what God created inside us. So the best we can do is stand in awe and be curious about what's happening in our brains. The answer to that first blank in the worksheet is a million billion. That's one quadrillion. One quadrillion is a million billion. And uh we got between one to four quadrillion neuronal connections. So when we talk about the brain, I want us to keep that posture of awe and wonder and humility. Because there is so much more within you and within me than any of us could have imagined. Here's what I want you to know. Your brain is a genius, it is brilliant. It is absolutely incredible. You may have thought that your brain is a problem. You may have thought that your brain is defective, but your brain has been highly adapted and hardwired for survival. It is a genius at helping you survive. And even more than that, it is hardwired for healing. This is not just something that happens from another source to heal you, it is something that happens within you. You might even call it self-healing. It might sound unchristian to talk about self-healing. My goal today is to convince you that there is no contradiction between self-healing and God healing. There is no contradiction between needing others and community and being able to heal within yourself. It's all part of one big picture because our bodies have self-healing properties. If you scrape your knee, what happens? Eventually, your knee will form a scab. And then eventually the scab will fall off, and your skin will heal itself. The body heals itself. And if you have

Self-Healing, Faith, And Safe Containers

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a disease like Cushing's syndrome or problems with your pituitary gland, and your body stops healing itself, you'll notice. Bruises don't go away, scabs don't heal, things get infected. Our bodies are constantly healing themselves. And your skin will heal itself unless it gets infected. If you get a more significant injury, let's say you break your arm, what happens? You go to the doctor, the doctor puts a cast on it. The doctor does not heal your arm. Your arm naturally heals itself. The doctor creates a safe container for that healing to happen. You don't have to think about it, you don't have to understand it. All you need is a safe container and attunement, meaning you continue to sense how the arm is doing and adjust as needed. For example, if the cast is very uncomfortable or if there's continued pain, that's a clue that maybe we need to adjust something. This is huge, okay? Your body heals itself when it has a safe container and attunement. Now, if you cut off your hand or cut off your head, your body's self-healing properties are not going to be sufficient for that. But in general, there is a self-healing ability that many of us didn't even know we had. Just like your skin can heal itself, just like your bones can heal themselves, your brain can heal itself. It's mind-blowing. So, what are the optimal conditions for self-healing? A safe container and a tumor. And I'll tell you more of what I mean by that. When you clean out a wound so that it doesn't get infected and you put a bandage on it, that's creating a safe container so that the healing can happen. When you put a cast on an arm, a brace on your neck if you if you broke your neck, that's that's just creating the space for the healing to happen. And that's our role when it comes to healing, finding freedom. We cannot control the outcome. We can create the space. God does the healing. He has created our bodies to be able to heal themselves and to heal each other. And it happens through a safe container and attunement. Attunement is another way of saying reading and responding to the needs in a relationship or within yourself. Accurately reading and responding to your own needs. The brain needs protection and connection. That's another word for a safe container and attunement.

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Protection and connection.

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If you've got a scrape or a broken bone, it needs that container for protection. And it also needs to stay connected in order to heal. And our brains are the same way. They need protection and connection relationally. So when these conditions are in place, healing naturally happens. You don't have to think about it, you don't have to understand it. You can just let it happen. And I'm going to not only describe what that looks like, but show you a demonstration that was recorded about a month ago, where you are going to witness that happening. And I realize that for some of you, this concept of self-healing goes completely against what you've learned in church or in other Christian settings. But I want to encourage you to be open to self-healing from a Christian perspective. How can we understand it? The same way we understand medical treatment. If you get cancer, you go to the doctor,

Protection And Connection As Healing Conditions

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you go to the medical system for help. And if you get healed and the cancer goes away, you say, God healed me. There's no contradiction. In the same way, through the process I'm going to describe to you, your brain can heal itself and God is doing it. You know, in the New Testament, in the life of Jesus, we see people being healed in all kinds of wild, weird, wonderful ways. Sometimes Jesus speaks a word to somebody and they're healed. Sometimes he touches them and they're healed. Sometimes he spits on the ground and creates some mud and rubs it in the person's eyes and then they're healed. Sometimes he doesn't say anything. And then miles away, the healing happens. There is no formula for what freedom and healing and redemption is supposed to look like. And so the best thing we can do, like I said at the beginning, is to stand in awe of how this process happens, like looking up at the stars, rather than judging self-healing or saying, that's not biblical, that's not how God works. Let's acknowledge that our brains are so much more complex than we can understand. And we're just scratching the surface. We have so much to learn. And one approach to creating the conditions for allowing your brain to heal itself is called brain spotting. This is how I got introduced to what I'm sharing today. Brain spotting is an amazing type of therapy that has a wide variety of applications, including healing trauma, being free from addiction, anxiety, depression, like unlocking creativity, performance, health, autoimmune issues, all kinds of mental health concerns, and even physical issues have been treated through brain spotting. And brain spotting is not some kind of method that cures you. Rather, it's an approach to creating the conditions for your brain to heal itself. Brain spotting originally was discovered by Dr. David Grant, who was a therapist trained in EMDR, eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, which has become a widely known therapy for trauma.

Introducing Brainspotting

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Many of our husband material community members have experienced EMDR, which discovered a connection between eye movement and reprocessing. Brain spotting took that a level further, discovering a much deeper, profound connection between our eyes and brains than we thought was there. Your eyes are literally part of your brain. In the womb, our eyes grow out of our brains. They are millimeters apart. They share cells. Our eyes are lightning fast. They're extremely sensitive. They're complex. They're nuanced. And out of all our five senses, our sense of sight is perhaps the most sophisticated, the most fully developed. It is incredible. The eyes are the windows to the soul. And many of you have experienced this. If you've ever been to a husband material retreat where we do extended eye contact exercises, when you stare into someone's eyes, there is a profound depth and intimacy. Our eyes are one of the quickest, most efficient ways to access the midbrain and the deep brain, also known as the subcortical brain. The neocortex is our thinking brain, our brain that makes decisions, that chooses options and analyzes. Our subcortical brain includes the limbic system. It includes our gut emotions. Addiction does not live in the neocortex, it lives subcortically. It's in our bones, it's in our feelings, it's in our emotions, our passions, our imaginations. The basic concept of brain spotting is that you can use this connection between your eyes and your brain for healing. And I think it's especially powerful for men who are struggling with porn. Part of the reason why porn is so powerful is because it hijacks this eye-brain connection, that through visual stimulation, you're experiencing something in your body. That same mechanism can be used for healing. And that's why we're talking about brain spotting for how your brain can heal itself. If

Eyes As Portals To The Subcortical Brain

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I had to summarize brain spotting in one sentence, it would be this where you look affects how you feel. Maybe you've noticed that when you're having a conversation with somebody, sometimes your eyes will lock on to a particular spot. It could be eye contact with the other person. It could be a corner of the room. Your eyes could be looking out a window. Maybe you feel like you're staring off into space, but you're not looking at the sky. Your brain is accessing information at that point in your visual field. Like if I'm trying to remember something, I might look up. Now, while I'm literally physically looking up, internally, I am looking up information. I might need to close my eyes to be able to focus. I might need to look off to the side. Sometimes when we're experiencing shame, we look down. I feel like I can't make eye contact. Sometimes when we're feeling joy, we look up. Now there's no rules about what a specific spot means. Remember, our brains are vastly complex, way more than we could ever understand. But we know that the connections are there. And in brain spotting, you are basically finding a spot in your visual field that's connected to something within you. To something in your brain. To some of those billions and trillions and maybe even quadrillions of connections. For example, I might find a spot that's connected to a certain behavior or relapse, or how I feel about myself, good or bad. I might find a spot that's connected to how I feel about my dad or my mom or my sister or my wife or my kids or bullies from school or my boss at work, or you might find a spot that's connected to fear or confusion. You might find a spot that's connected to your strength and beauty and masculinity. You might find what's called a God spot where you feel the presence of God and you're able to access something that maybe you know intellectually, but you haven't felt emotionally. You can find a brain spot for anything. And when you find a spot, the job of the brain spotter working with you is simply to create a safe container at that spot for you. And to be attuned, to be connected to you. Remember, what does the brain need? Protection and connection. That's it. And then the Feeling naturally flows. And in this process, you might get images, words, body sensations, memories. If you have a powerful imagination like me, you can have all kinds of wild and crazy things happening. If you have no sense of imagination, you might still have some very powerful physical manifestations, such as yawning, burping, blinking. People have even fallen asleep during brain spotting sessions and then woken up and said, that was the best session ever. Remember, we don't

Where You Look Affects How You Feel

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have to understand it to be able to access it. Our bodies and our brains can heal themselves if we just give them the space. It's incredible. And by the way, I think for a lot of you, you're already experiencing this at some level. Like when you look into the eyes of another man and just feel loved. That's brain spotting. When you're trying to say something that you've never told anyone before, and you have to close your eyes to go to that place to say it, and you bring it out, and you find that you're accepted. That's brain spotting. It's using our eyes as a resource for healing. And we did that at the most recent husband material retreat. Right after the worship service, I split men into their small groups and gave them a prompt to do a nonverbal blessing where each man would receive the love of God, not through words, but just through pure presence, through pure embodied brotherhood that could include touch, eye contact. But it was silent. It was a safe container with attunement where each man's heart could be protected and connected. And we watched the tears flow. We watched the healing happen. It was incredible for each person. Occasionally, I would narrate a little bit, maybe say some words from scripture, maybe just encouraging people to make space for whatever they were experiencing. And wow, each man experienced something different. And yet it was so profound. We created the space for our brains to heal themselves. And one very powerful connection that allows that healing to happen is through the eyes. That's what brain spotting is about. I see a couple of you who came to the retreat talking about that, saying it was an amazing experience. I felt loved in places I didn't know existed. Yeah. That was a powerful container for protection and connection. And in a brain spotting session, there's typically a lot of silence and waiting to allow the processing to happen. It might seem like nothing's happening, but nothing is not happening. So I want to give you a taste of this right now in this conference. We are going to do a little brain spotting exercise. We are going to do a little bit of self-spotting. So brain spotting does not require a therapist necessarily or a brain spotting practitioner. Remember, this is your brain's ability to heal itself. So just like you can find a brain spot connected to trauma and wounds and struggles, you can also find a brain spot connected to your true identity or to who God is or to compassion, connection, courage. So if you're by yourself, it might not make sense to try to find a brain spot connected to your trauma. That might not be safe. But just to look around and see where do I feel the most connected if I look around? My room. Where do I feel the most courageous?

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Hmm.

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Where do I feel the least amount of shame? Just finding a spot like that. That's self-spotting. We can talk more about it another time. For now, I just want you to think about one issue that you are facing in your life, perhaps connected to sexual recovery, and perhaps not. Just one issue that is difficult for you right now.

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Something you've been struggling with. Get quiet. Get comfortable.

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And we're going to see how you feel when you look in three different directions while thinking about that struggle.

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First, look off to your right. And think about that struggle. And notice how you feel when you look to the right. Notice if anything starts coming up for you.

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Now turn your attention and your eyes to straight ahead of you. And notice

Live Self-Spotting Exercise And Reactions

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how that struggle feels when you look straight ahead.

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No judgment. Just observation.

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And finally, look to the left.

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Think about that struggle. Think about that challenge. See how you feel when you look to the left.

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It's not even there. It's like it's not there anymore. I'm sure everyone is going to have a different experience of this, and that's okay. What happened for you in those three eye positions? This is a very simple intro to brain spotting that I experienced in my first brain spotting training that I went through. It's just demonstrating that where you look affects how you feel. Wow. Chris says, tears began to flow when I look to the center. Eric says, mine's on the right. Roger says, tears are flowing. I don't know why. You're doing it. This is what we're talking about. Healing tears, releasing whatever you're carrying. Your brain can heal itself under the right conditions. Drew said, I felt pain at every location, but especially to my left. So that's interesting. That's something we can explore more. Maybe you'll explore that later. Randy says, What does this mean? It's like looking up at the stars, man. What does it mean? I don't know, but God is amazing. And he created the stars and he created a universe within you.

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Let's pause and look.

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Let's stop and look at these different eye positions. And as processing happens and releasing happens and healing happens, we worship God for creating us with this ability.

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And even if it was rather unimpressive or uneventful for you, that's okay too.

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Okay, some of you guys are saying you felt different things. I felt more ashamed looking to my right, I felt sadness looking to my right. William says, to my right, I felt lost and uncertain. But when I look straight ahead, I thought, I can do this. Wow. Spencer says, shame to the left, almost immediate tears to the right. Michael says, anxious on the right, thoughtful on the left. Wow. So just notice that. Spend some more time in one of these spots and just see what happens.

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See where that takes you. You can turn your head or not. Your choice.

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So what is happening for you right now as you spend a little bit more time at one of those spots? Chuck says, I feel empathetic tears for the pain I've caused my wife. Wow. Bob says it took me to the grief I was ignoring. Roger says, awkward peace comes over me right now. Drew says, deep pain, tears, praying through the pain with Jesus. Beautiful. Michael said, inviting Jesus into my situation. Love that.

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Kurt says, I feel love for the difficult person. Guy says, calming.

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Keith says, hope and adventure. Aaron says contentment. William's getting in touch with a childhood experience. Eric says, I'm giving compassion and care to a wounded part of me instead of being overwhelmed by it. Chris says the tears are less intense, and now I'm feeling peace. I see a couple of questions here. Randy says, Do you have to actually be seeing something? Can it just be a blank wall? Yes, it could be a blank wall. You're not looking at the wall. You're looking within. The wall or the spot is just part of that safe container. You to hold space for whatever's within you, letting it work itself out. You know, if you scrape your knee, it takes some time to heal. If you break a bone, it takes even more time. But this inner healing can happen at light speed. Of course, it's a journey. And it's not linear. And there are lots of twists and turns at the same time. In a brain spotting session, as like what you're going to witness in a few minutes, shame can vanish. Shame over a specific event can disappear.

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Fear can dissolve.

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I mean, in a moment, or in an hour or two, and the therapist and the brain spotter or the small group leader or the group does not do the healing. We just create the space. Ben says, is it bad that all three directions bring me difficult feelings? No.

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In fact, that's really good self-awareness. Something to explore. It truly is wild.

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Julio says, the left connected me to a child within, feeling pressured to perform and grow up. Roger says, I feel forgiveness. Frank says, I identify that my struggle is worth. Jim says, I'm not noticing a certain feeling. Am I doing this wrong? No, you're not doing this wrong. In fact, even the absence of a feeling can be a feeling, like feeling numb or feeling nothing. That could actually even be really significant. But there's no way of knowing unless we create the space, hold it, and get curious about it. It's not just about direction, left, right, up, down. You know, you could look at an image that evokes something for you or a person who means

Q&A On Spots, Meaning, And Safety

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something to you. And all of those are brain spots. How can brain spotting help you outgrow porn? Number one, by healing developmental trauma. At Husband Material, we emphasize inner child work. Heal the boy to free the man. How do you do that? What does that look like? Well, you can find a brain spot where you get in touch with that little boy. Or if if you hate that kid, maybe you find a brain spot where you feel love and compassion for him. Or where you feel the love of Jesus for him. Or maybe a person in your life who loved you. And you could find a brain spot connected to that person to be able to relate to the little boy within you with what he needs. Protection and connection. With no shame, with no fear, with no agenda. That's very important in brain spotting. We set our agenda aside for what this healing is supposed to look like, both for the person receiving the brain spotting and for the practitioner. For example, I once received a brain spotting session where I was feeling very overwhelmed. Felt like there was this huge storm. So I felt like I was in a rainstorm. And all of a sudden, I saw this giant creature standing right next to me while I was like curled up in the fetal position in the rainstorm. And I was like, I don't know what that is. It just seems weird to me. But I decided to lay my agenda aside and just go with it. What is this giant? It turned out to be my strength. The giant said, I am your strength. You disowned me a long time ago. When your dad overpowered you over and over again, and if you spoke up or stood up for yourself, you would just get punished more. So you disowned me, but I am your strength, and I'm still here. And I felt that strength in my spine, and my spine straightened up, and I started to feel that strength and reclaim it. And whoo. The creature was a giant orangutan. And I was like, why is it an orangutan? Well, you know, orangutans are also tender. I mean, they're strong, but they're gentle too. And like, that's my strength. It's not a lion tiger strength. It's like a giant orangutan strength. So, yes, it's weird. And it's wild and it's awesome. It's part of the universe within me. And there's a universe within each of us. And my creative brain somehow came up with that as part of being able to heal. So rather than judging it or thinking that my healing should happen a certain way, I'm learning to flow with it and to go with it. And I needed a space where I could do that. And brain spotting gave that to me. So brain spotting can help you outgrow porn through processing feelings and memories at light speed. Because that's where porn gets its power, from our feelings, from our memories

Seven Ways Brainspotting Helps Outgrow Porn

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stored in our bodies. There is so much going on underneath our patterns of sexual arousal. And that's why the third way brain spotting can help you outgrow porn is through unpacking sexual arousal patterns. In my very first brain spotting session, the guy asked me what I wanted to work on, and I talked about my sexual fetish for braces and orthodontics that I never really understood. And he just asked me some questions and asked, like, hey, did you ever like have any experiences with teeth or biting when you were a kid? And I realized, oh my goodness, my sister used to bite me from when I was two years old, three years old, four years old. Like she would bite me and I would bleed. Had no idea that could be connected to my sexual fetish. And my focus in porn was always on teeth. Always. And um, never put that together before. Things like that were coming to the surface when we created space. So, how can brain spotting help us outgrow porn? Heal developmental trauma, process feelings and memories, unpack sexual arousal patterns. Fourth, meet underlying attachment needs. More and more, I'm using the language of attachment to porn instead of addiction to porn, because attachment both describes what we're trying to outgrow, this attachment to porn. It's like a toxic relationship that I need to break up, need to detach from porn and reattach to myself, to others, to God. Attachment is both the problem and the solution. And in brain spotting, in this safe container with attunement, you can be seen, soothed, and safe. You can learn to feel that in your body. You can learn to receive that from God. Some of you were including Jesus in your process that we just did together, and it was awesome.

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And you can learn to be that safe, loving adult that you needed when you were a boy. That's part of brain spotting.

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Brain spotting can also help you outgrow porn through allowing you to emotionally experience the love of God. If you intellectually understand the truth of the gospel, but you don't feel it in your heart. If there's a gap between what you know in your head and how you feel in your body, brain spotting can bridge that gap very quickly. It can also help you access clarity, confidence, and courage. This is through the expansion model of brain spotting, which is not focused on a specific trauma or a specific struggle, but just allowing you to tap into your potential. As a human being, you can find a brain spot for the qualities that are within you, but you don't have access to. Some of you guys view yourself as weak when in fact you're incredibly strong. Some of you guys feeling insecure when you actually have so much confidence within you that you don't even know is there. Some of you guys feel so alone, even though there's connection all around you. You feel like you can't access it, you can't tap into it. Brain spotting can help you move through those obstacles to find what has been within you all along. And finally, brain spotting can help you outgrow porn by discovering resources for self-regulation. I'll give you one example of this. I was in an airport with my one-year-old son when an older woman walked by and said, Oh, how adorable. Looking at my one-year-old son. And then she looked into my eyes and said, Both of you. And while she was walking away, she kept like looking at me. It was very creepy. And based on my experience of being sexually abused by my grandmother, I was so triggered. So triggered by that experience. So what did I do in the moment? I used brain spotting. I found a spot. I looked at it. I blinked. I noticed what was coming in within me. I I let it process. I let it happen. I didn't fight it. I flowed with it just in the moment, holding my one-year-old son in an airport, feeling so triggered, feeling so uncomfortable in my body, wanting to escape. Brain spotting gave me a resource for self-regulation just through my eyes. Yeah. And those are just the first seven ways that I thought of. I mean, there's probably more. Remember, we're just scratching the surface here. So we do brain spotting. I do brain spotting on Fantasy Fridays in Husband Material Academy. And we have a couple of other Husband Material leaders who are also trained in it, including Mike Chapman. Mike gave me the opportunity to do a brain spotting session with him that I want to share with all of you as an example of what this actually looks like. It's 25 minutes long. There will be periods of silence where I will provide a bit of commentary, connecting what you're about to see with what we have been talking about in this session. And then afterward, we will debrief that just a little bit so that you can witness how God designed your brain to heal itself. Remember, it looks different for each person, but the point is, when Mike and I did the session, he had something that he wanted to work on. We actually didn't know how it might be connected to his sexual story. But it was. And then where the session ended blew me away. And I had no idea we could have gone there. And there's no way, I think, that I could have helped Mike get there

Live Session Setup With Mike

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other than just creating the space, the safe container, and holding it with attunement. If I had told him some of the truths that he came to in this session, it wouldn't have been as powerful. But because God designed our brains to heal themselves, he came to this. And I was just with him in the middle of it. So I want to show you what brain spotting is like. This is what we do every week in HMA at one of the coaching calls. It's just one of the approaches we use. And I'm really excited about it. Here we go. Hey Mike, what do you want to work on today?

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Hey, Drew. When you mentioned the possibility of having this meeting, the thing that had come up very recently. That yeah, I still think I need to work on. We just celebrated two years in the new house. And when two and a half years ago, when we were looking at buying it, you know, I have a dog that I got from my daughter. She rescued him. And he's now 16. We got him when he was 12. So we've had him four years. And we were living in a little duplex with no real yard. It was just common, grassy area. And I could see this dog who had a lot of trauma early in his life. And it's like, no, this dog

Processing Unworthiness And Childhood Trauma

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deserves to have his own house in his own backyard. But I didn't feel the same way about me that I deserve my own house. Feeling I was not worthy for that. But this wonderful dog has been a huge help and a huge companion to me, he deserved his own backyard and his own house. And in many ways, I still feel that way. I mean, doing well, financially stable, and two years making mortgage payments on time and no huge issues with that. But still feel like, yeah, I'm gonna mess it up because I'm unworthy, I'm gonna lose it. So those fears, and then that I I really don't deserve having a nice house. And this has been an ongoing theme. And different things like that where God showing me, yeah, I am worthy to have good things. But this is just another thing, and that that mindset that somehow I am unworthy to receive blessing, to receive nice things. It's it's a common theme for sure.

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You get in touch with that feeling right now of not deserving a house, not being worthy of good things.

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Yeah. I hear your voice changing as you say that. Yeah. Where do you feel that in your body?

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Right here. Chest, gut.

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Right there, heavy. Yeah.

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Sounds really deep. Yeah, it feels very deep. How strong is that feeling right now from one to ten?

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I want to say an eight, but it's more a nine and ten. But yeah, it's it's it's really strong. Yeah, nine or ten. Yeah, we'll call it ten.

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So it's really strong right now.

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Yeah.

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Do you want to process on that feeling?

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Yeah. Okay. Yeah. If that feeling could talk, what would it say? I'm nothing, I'm worthless. I have no value. You know what that feels like. Yeah. Yeah.

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Would you prefer to process with your eyes closed?

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Yeah. Yeah, they're already closed. And yeah. Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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As you stay with that feeling, watch your processing wherever it goes. Just like watching a movie. See what happens. He just had his eyes closed, and that is a brain spot.

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Yeah, when I go deep, it's hard to get words out.

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Um and it's okay if there are no words, or if the words don't come out, I'm right here with you.

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Yeah.

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This is the part where his brain is now just doing the work of healing. He doesn't have to do anything, he's just going with it.

SPEAKER_02 49:18

Yeah, just remembering the trafficking abuses. I was, you know, I was trafficked between five and eight by my father, two different men at different events. Yeah, I was sedated for most of it, but this is like the feelings associated with that feeling scared, feeling helpless, feeling worthless. That my only value is to be used, the equivalent of a rag or a Kleenex or whatever. Just something that someone else could use for their pleasure, but no other value, intrinsic value. Just a hole.

SPEAKER_01 50:06

A hole for these men. Yeah. To use. Yeah. As you're talking about this,

Jesus’ Presence, Worth, And Release

SPEAKER_01 50:18

I saw your eyes go down.

SPEAKER_04 50:22

You may want to see if there's anything down there.

SPEAKER_02 50:32

Yeah, it's like I can look down in that same spot.

SPEAKER_03 50:37

Um so Mike is getting in touch with this feeling like he has no worth, and that's part of the porn addiction cycle of shame.

SPEAKER_01 50:53

Seemed like it was unrelated, but it was directly related. Just imagining little me curled up in a ball, like in a corner.

SPEAKER_02 51:07

Me's just sitting there, scared, alone, afraid.

SPEAKER_01 51:15

Like a piece of trash thrown into the corner.

SPEAKER_04 51:24

We're just holding the space.

SPEAKER_01 51:29

Just curled up a little ball. Taking up as little space as possible. Hoping for safety. He's just gonna go with this and see where it leads. Notice what's happening in your body.

SPEAKER_02 52:41

My brain is already going to the next spot where I'm I can feel Jesus lying down next to me and squatting down next to me and just holding me.

SPEAKER_01 52:58

Holding the boy in the corner. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 53:23

Yeah, he's on my left. I don't know why that's important, but he's on my left, and like the corner's like behind my right shoulder.

SPEAKER_01 53:31

Can you sense that boy in a corner of the room where you are right now? No.

unknown 53:41

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 53:41

No, not in this room, but in that room I'm abaging, yes.

SPEAKER_03 53:45

Yeah. Yeah, that was something I didn't resonate with Mike, and that's okay. Sometimes you can find that little boy in your room and you have a brain spot in the corner or under your desk.

SPEAKER_02 53:56

I used Mike.

SPEAKER_03 53:58

Holding me.

SPEAKER_01 54:01

Embracing me. Pouring love out. Notice what that's like. For Jesus to pour out his love on you. Even when you feel worthless.

SPEAKER_03 55:11

Letting that happen. Not forcing it.

SPEAKER_02 55:19

Dirty and messy and gross because of all the stuff that has happened. But he doesn't care. He doesn't care. Like your kid falls in the mud and he's hurting and he's big, all messy, and you pick him up and you hold him, even though you get mud all over you.

unknown 55:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 55:38

Doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_04 55:43

Because he loves you so much.

SPEAKER_01 55:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 55:49

Because you're worth that much to him.

SPEAKER_03 55:57

You can see now Mike is weeping, and I think that word worth really touched the pain of feeling worthless. At least that's my idea of what happened there. And he's just allowing his body to feel that and to release what happened to him when he was a boy, to receive the love of God in this moment.

SPEAKER_02 56:25

It's like there's an analogy of a crisp brand new $20 bill. And if you crumple it up, throw it in the mud, get it all dirty, it's still a $20 bill. It doesn't lose its

Taking Up Space And Identity Shift

SPEAKER_02 56:39

value. You're still going to wipe it off, use it because it doesn't lose its value.

SPEAKER_01 56:48

Um it's like that.

unknown 56:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 57:08

So he was already touching his chest, and I brought his attention to that so that he could keep going with it. That's the place where he felt the shame. Mike starts coughing. I'm letting his body and his brain do whatever it needs to do, but he's literally coughing out what went into him.

SPEAKER_01 58:09

And it comes in waves. And that's okay.

SPEAKER_02 58:57

Saying he was gonna fill those dark places with his love and his glory. And then in the process, it was pushing the bad stuff out, and that was the coughing up. Yeah. And then he could fill in more and then bring up more stuff and then fill in more. And then yeah, it's like, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Lots of bad stuff.

SPEAKER_04 59:22

Lots of bad stuff. That literally went into you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cough it out and getting it out of your system. Yeah.

unknown 59:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 59:38

Releasing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:40

So that you can receive. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 59:48

I don't know if this would resonate, but it's like he is taking up more space in you. Yeah. Yeah. So that you can take up More space.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:01

Yeah. Oh yeah. Before I really started healing in starting in 2019 and then joining H in 2020. Yeah, I was still that little boy in the corner, taking up as little space as possible. And that described my life. I'm taking on the hearing person and the deaf person and interpreting for the two parties, so I don't have to be present. I can be them and I can be them. And I don't have to be me. So I could hide in that. It was very, very safe, but not healthy. And now, yeah, I take up a lot of space in good ways.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:52

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:53

Yeah. Yeah. I'm getting better at taking up space to bigify. Until most abuse survivors, yeah, we we smollify because that's safe. Even though there's no danger now, but still our brains go there. It's like we make ourselves as small as possible. And learning to bigify that, yes, I'm not too much. I can take up space and it's okay. In fact, it's not only okay, it's good and it's important and it's healthy to take up space. Let's go.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:38

So yeah, yeah. Even the literal space of a property in a house. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:47

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we didn't do any traditional brain spy, but I mean I do go ahead and we do it and you you do it, and it's like, okay. Oh, I'm just going there. Okay. All right. Boom. All right, we're there. Yeah, don't need to find the spot. Spot's already there. All right, we're good. Do you want to keep going?

SPEAKER_04 1:02:09

Properly close it out. Yeah.

unknown 1:02:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:12

Yeah. Let's do that. That's what I was thinking too. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:17

Want you to take a few deep breaths. Come back to that place in the center of your chest. That got me laid out.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:55

Turns out there was more.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:57

Yeah, there was one more spot.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:00

Yeah. So we go with it. Come back to that place in your chest.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:09

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:10

That place where Jesus is filling you up and pushing out what used to be there. Get a sense of Jesus with you right now.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:45

Like a warm blanket. Just cover me up and safety alone feel that warmth and safety. And trust it.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:27

Like royalty. Like the prodigal son returning.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:40

Though I didn't go willingly.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:42

I was taken. But welcome back.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:52

Put a robe on his back, put sandals on his feet, put a ring around his finger because my son was dead. And now he's alive again. Kill the fattened calf because he's worth it.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:18

Brisket. Yay.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:29

And there's a great brisket place right down the road from us too.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:46

There was a word that stood out to me. Royalty. It matters whose you are. Yeah. Is that robe still on yet? Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:35

I don't think it's coming off.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:41

It's like super narrow hose.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:44

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:55

Yes, and the rope can become a captain. Yes, it's like.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:00

I love it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:01

Yeah.

Debrief: Results, Obstacles, And Holy Spirit

SPEAKER_01 1:07:10

Does that feel like a good place to stop?

SPEAKER_04 1:07:15

Yeah, but follow up. How strong is that feeling in your chest that was a nine or a ten when we started?

SPEAKER_02 1:07:23

Yeah, it's it before that last comp it was still a two, and now it's down to a one. There's still yeah, residuals, and that's okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:33

Yeah. But yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:39

Yeah. If you want to keep processing on that one, we have time. If you want to be done, that's great too.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:46

No, I think we're in a good place because there's still a lot before we deal with the one, I think.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:55

There's more.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:56

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:59

There's always more.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:00

Yeah, there's always more. But yeah, it's like we got categories of stuff. And this is a new category. Okay. Got through a lot. Okay. And then yeah, there's like little piles from stuff I've already worked on. And then okay, then we got more stuff. And that's a later. And now we're down here, so we're good. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:17

Yeah. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:29

Awesome. Thank you, Drew. You're welcome. We did it. We did it. Yeah. May I give you a blessing? Yes, I would I would love a blessing.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:42

Mike, you are royalty.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:47

You are God's beloved son. He treasures you. And in you, he is well pleased.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:00

Amen.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:02

So that is one example of brain spotting. How God designed your brain to heal itself. This totally flips the traditional idea of therapy and counseling and coaching upside down because instead of the provider having all the knowledge and all the results and trying to give that to the client, the client leads the way. Because God designed your brain to heal itself. And the role of the helper is to be with you, to create this safe container with attunement so that things can unfold. Now, Mike and I have a strong friendship. We've known each other for years. We've gone through a lot together. And he's familiar with brain spotting. So this flowed pretty well. And we also took out some of the spaces in between. There are long pauses. And also, brain spotting doesn't require you to talk either. So you can be having these profound experiences without saying a word. And that's okay. You can talk or not. And you know, with Mike this time it was coughing. But for me, there have been times when I felt like I had to throw up. One of my friends did a brain spotting session where afterward he peed for like two minutes straight because all of the toxicity and condemnation was coming out through his urine. I mean, how do we understand this stuff? I don't know. It's like looking up at the stars. But thank you, God. Thank you for creating such beauty and glory and brilliance in our brains. There is a whole universe within you.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:55

And when you tap into a brain spot, it's like a comet flying through space.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:06

Follow the comet. Stay in the we stay in the tail of the comet, as David Grant says. It's an amazing adventure that will take you farther and deeper into healing and freedom than you may have thought was possible. I'm going to invite Mike, who is here, to be a part of this. And we will answer any questions that you all have. You can put your questions in the chat. Hey Mike. Oh, what's up, man?

SPEAKER_02 1:11:35

Hey guys. Yeah, I I forgot about the blanky part. And it's like, oh, oh, wow. Okay. Yeah, that is like, oh. Yeah. And yeah, amazed where it went. So, yeah, and my dog is down here with me. That's great. Sound asleep at my feet.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:57

There was so much releasing and receiving in that session.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:02

A huge part of it was not trying to judge or understand what was happening. Right? Just allowing that deep brain-body work to just do its thing.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:18

So amazing. And when I am in your role in this, where I'm the provider, it always blows me away where things end up and what comes out and where things go. It's like I've read the book, I've I've yeah, I've done up entry training. I still don't get how how it works. I mean, I understand the mechanics and so forth, but this amazing stuff always happens. It's like you just kind of trust God and Holy Spirit and inspiration and all this stuff going on, and this wonderful stuff happens. And I don't get it, but it's there and it's wonderful and it's very effective. And then, yeah, when I'm in the hot seat, then it's like, wow, wow.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:05

There is a book, Brain Spotting.

unknown 1:13:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:11

The Revolutionary New Therapy for Rapid and Effective Change by David Grand, if you want to read more about it.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:18

And you just interviewed him on your podcast too, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:13:20

Right. Yes. This past week. So that this is a double episode of hearing for the founder and then you know witnessing what it really looks like. There was another great question from Scott saying, Mike, would you share what you have noticed since that session?

SPEAKER_02 1:13:40

Yeah, definitely feel. I mean, there's still a little bit of that unworthiness. I don't know if that will necessarily ever go away. But yeah, I think since then I'm doing more positive self-care with me and the house working on some of the renovations, getting the things moving. And yeah, we're we're converting the garage into living space and had a lot of that progress quite far this last month. And I don't know if it's related or not, but yeah, I love that. I'll claim it.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:20

When a wound heals, often we don't even notice. Yeah. When there's pain or an injury, we think about it all the time. But when it's gone, it's like, oh wow, I wasn't even thinking about it. So we sometimes don't even notice when healing happens after a brain spotting session because the issue's just not affecting us the same way. Right, right. And the same is true for many other types of healing processes. So sometimes it's helpful to notice what you don't notice. Like, hey, I'm not thinking about that one thing all the time anymore. Right. Alan says, what can get in the way of the recipient going deep? Well, one thing that can get in the way is certainty and having an agenda. If you have an agenda for what it should look like, that's gonna get in the way. That's why I say don't should all over yourself, because that can get in the way. However, as I'm continuing to learn about brain spawning, I'm finding out that what's in the way is the way. And if you want to work on something, but something's getting in the way, maybe we need to go there first. Like, if you want to deal with a certain sexual

Tools, Pointers, And Practical Use

SPEAKER_03 1:15:47

behavior, but you can't go there because you're too ashamed to talk about it. Well, then maybe we start with the shame. What's in the way is the way. Aaron says, I love how intimately Jesus was involved in this. He was giving you healing images as this went on. Is that common in these sessions? It is when you have that relationship with Jesus as a foundation. We don't force that or impose that. It's okay if that doesn't happen. If somebody's not a believer, they're probably not going to have that experience.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:23

Right.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:24

But brain spotting is a very open model. So we welcome Jesus. We welcome the Holy Spirit. Greg says, why not just ask the Holy Spirit to bring up the scars and trauma that need to be healed? I actually was. During some of those periods of silence, I was praying for Mike. So you can ask the Holy Spirit overtly or covertly. We when we do that, we need to release our agenda for what we think that should look like.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:54

Right.

unknown 1:16:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:56

Often at the beginning of a session, I will pray those exact things. Father, show us what you need to show us. Yep. Uncover what needs to be uncovered. And let the Holy Spirit do the work.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:08

Right. So we are following wherever the Spirit leads. The wind blows wherever it's gonna go. And the Holy Spirit's gonna do whatever he's gonna do.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:20

And it's interesting is that when my face would change color, it's like, oh, I got really red there. Wow. Seeing just all the physical, physiological changes during the process. Well I change position when I slump over. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:36

Yeah, very interesting. Saxon says, I noticed you closed your eyes almost immediately. And that is just one variety of this. I'm gonna bring out my brain spotting pointer because this is what people usually do with brain spotting. They have some kind of pointer with I got mine, a color at the end of it, and the pointer holds the spot. You can have multiple spots. For example, a spot where I feel the lies I believe about myself, and a spot for the truth about myself. You can do this in person, you can do this over Zoom. You can also have a gaze spot, which is where you're just looking at something in the room. And when I saw Mike's eyes go down, that was me noticing what seemed like a gaze spot for him. Well, thank you, Mike. Um thanks, guys. We did it. Yep. And I don't know how all of this works. I'm just standing with you guys before the wonder that is within us and saying, look at that. Isn't God amazing? And maybe there's more within us than we thought was there. In the name of the Father who loves you, and the son who died for you, and the spirit who lives in you. Always remember you are God's beloved son, and you he is thrilled, overjoyed, absolutely excited, and well pleased.