Tuesday, April 24, 2012

On the Memory of Killing Afghan Civilians



I read a piece in the paper about a soldier who killed 16 Afghan civilians. He claims he can remember before and after, but not during the crime. His attorneys are going to argue in his defense that he had a “diminished capacity”. I assume that means he didn’t have all his marbles. Let’s look at it from a Primal perspective.

After several deployments where people were trying to kill him, and shortly after a bomb went off that injured his teammates, he finally cracked. What does that mean? The pain from his early life and his current traumas all merged and edged out his third line; the pain replaced his perceptive, critical apparatus and flushed out all ability to hold back impulses. It also replaced any reflective capacity for what he was doing. It was as if he was in a dream: what happens in that dream is that lower-level processes take over; logic is abrogated and feelings fill all cognitive space. No wonder he cannot remember. His conscious/awareness was missing. All the past and current pain merged together to blot out any awareness. He was acting as if sleepwalking. (We have had a patient who walked to a store and bought gum while asleep and later had no memory of it. He was in the same state as our soldier/killer: unconscious.) That is, his unconscious replaced conscious/awareness. When he discharged enough rage, fear, and pain he could finally realize what he did, but not during his act.

This is the classic Primal definition of transient psychosis: pockets of insanity due to being overcome with a combination of past and present pain. The third-line cognitive functions cede to the lower levels, which are in overload and need expression. It is all acted out as if in a dream; the perpetrator doesn’t know any better because there isn’t any functioning top level for the moment.

Now what is strange in all this is that in a Primal the patient’s brain must cede to lower levels so that she can have access to deeper levels of consciousness. And when that happens the patient is again in the past, reliving being yelled at by her mother, seeing her earrings and smelling the odors in the kitchen. She is “back there”; there is little top-level functioning. If there were, the Primal would be aborted and she would be back in the present. And she would be in control again. And patients who need control have a hard time letting go of top-level cognition. They often must exert control because of the power of lower-level pain.

Our killer was “back there” too, but he was not in a safe clinic where he could act out violently by punching the walls or screaming out his hate. He took his feelings into the present; he had no one to help him into his feelings. He didn’t even know that he had feelings or that they were hidden somewhere inside of him. But the signs were there, and if there were a shrink around who knew the signs the killing could have been avoided. If there were a group culture of knowing about feelings and understanding that it is important to see a professional when the pressure builds, there might not be any murder. We need to teach kids in school about feelings, not just punish them when they act out, but help them understand how feelings push them to act out and what they can do to avoid it. Everyone in the class must pass a test on this subject; it is essential to the learning process. They need to learn about ADD and what causes it, assuming the shrinks manage to learn about it as well. We can feel for all the murder victims and for the killer too. It is too late for him, his life is over; but let us change the zeitgeist of schools and the military and save lives.

14 comments:

  1. Art,

    “let us change the zeitgeist of schools and the military and save lives”.

    We have a problem Art... the problem is that teachers and officers are in the same emotional process that the school children and soldiers in the field are… they are also victims… they don’t know how and where to begin.

    Someone must have the primal therapeutic insights and that has to be found outside of what the societies has to offer.

    A society that would offer a primal therapeutic process and have the insight of what it means... is changing the society's view about what a therapeutic process is all about… and that almost immediately when understanding the primal therapeutic process.

    We are not so open-minded that we can perceive two such radically different approaches as cognitive processes versus primal therapy. I mean collaboration falls on its own absurdity when primal therapy only in its presentation talks about what the cognitive exposes patients to... it is a confrontation that is impossible in a social system that emphasizes diversity as an escort.

    The primal therapeutic process is not quiet and reserved when quackery is the question of witch methods should be used.

    There is one way… that is to prove it by scientific… I know that is what you are trying to do Art. That is what is up here at SBU in Sweden. I “hope”... and we have to wait and se.

    As I said long time ago… we must be representative… we must be of a sentence tempting to what primal therapy has to offer. We are as human tempted to everything that we intend to do... we look to others to find something to allow ourselves... that is where the primal therapeutic process will have its revolution.

    You know what A.S Neill did… he tried to put a seed to germinate… but without the soil necessary the seeds died… most of what he set.

    No I will not give up... I know there is a road that will be viable

    Frank

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    1. Frank: I knew Neill. Went to see him in England. A very good guy. art

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  2. Well, it also says something about "those" who placed the young man into the circumstance in the 1st place. But above and beyond guilt or lack of guilt, society has been forced to make some tough decisions on what to do with people who go "mad."

    when someone strays too far from good conduct, then courts and juries apply law so that society is protected from further abuse, in theory. It often does not work that way. Plus, if indeed, others place one where one does not want to be, who is the real culprit who should answer for the crime?

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  3. An email comment:
    "Dear Dr. Janov,

    I find your reflections always intriguing and this one very insightful and frightful. You are so very right. We need to teach at a tender age how to deal with feelings. It must be part of the curriculum. More importantly we must stop Dystocia by Design and Default...our medical model of industrialized birth — which sets the first pave stone on the journey to poor health both mentally and physically...creating a pathway to pharmacy...loading the dice for easy military recruitment and building an army of aggressive and violent people ready to vent with impunity because their leadership entered the world through a gaping wound in their mother...and their first view of the world is with eyes blurred with their mothers blood. Post traumatic stress disorder greeting us at birth is the causality for a life of disorder and desperation — the catalyst of collateral casualties.

    Thank you for your reflections. Always a mind smack."

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  4. Art: In terms of "cracking" or "diminished capacity" I would think the "legal" defense would be temporary insanity? Since "insane" is a legal term if I'm right. I am interested in understanding what may be the different levels of what may be observed as a nervous breakdown. A young marine became psychotic in a platoon near us and started firing at the other marines from the top of a small hill killing two and wounding another. He later hanged himself while imprisoned. I am only surprised that this isn't more common in war. I experienced what was a breakdown but only perceived it as my inability to function in my duties as a medic after 10 months in-country. I voluntarily left my unit to get help in the rear because I knew I was incapable of continuing. I did not become psychotic but did suffer some kind of dis-connect since when I went to work in the hospital in DaNang I started smoking opium to self-medicate. 5 years after returning home(1975)I did have the classic breakdown which is common with those diagnosed with post-traumatic stress. Without Primal tx I never would have made it. May I please ask you what actually did happen to me over there? A benign breakdown of some sort? I'm sure combined with birth trauma, a neglected childhood and Vietnam I was ripe to implode and did but still I functioned more or less for a few years until the actual overt nervous breakdown of sobbing, agitated depression etc. took place and I came to Los Angeles to begin what was my true salvation in your therapy. Any input would be much appreciated.

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    1. Wally: I need a more specific question. I will help if I can. art

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  5. Post script: My writing this out and reading your article triggered a primal. The feeling in the past ( Vietnam ) was "I'm already crazy, I don't want to be dead." This followed up by the fact that I could only save myself. Going psychotic would have happened if I didn't leave my unit and go to the military hospital.(I had jungle sores and immersion feet, but I made no mention of feeling that dis-connect to the doctors for lack of a better word.) Of course feeling the " need " for my dad is the component that resolves this specific scene along with the most important aspect of allowing me to heal.

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  6. So if one is traumatized by war they can go back and experience what I think of as "connected flashbacks" by integrating those intrusive memories which the Post-Traumatic terminology and literature uses to actually heal yourself. Initially, I saved myself by literally leaving the combat area and now I'm saving myself by feeling what happened to me. My need to save people (being a medic, trying to help my depressed mother etc)is actually about me saving me!

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  7. Armed forces are in a difficult position as they often recruit from among people who are indeed very damaged by their life experiences. The young soldier is looking for a supportive family to replace the emotional hell he (usually he) was put through. The deal is that the young soldier gets the family as long as they repress the childhood traumas and concentrate on obeying orders.

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  8. Art: Thank you for addressing this. The aspect of this experience in Vietnam which eludes me is the fact that I didn't have a psychotic break. Also nothing noticeable to others in a psychological manifestation could be observed by either the doctors who treated me for my physical problems or by the marines in my unit. What precipitated this "event" was the death of one of my marines who I could not save. I did break down sobbing but went back to my duties for a few weeks until the "awareness" that I was incapable of functioning hit me. It's something that I knew inherently on some level. I'm trying to articulate the specific question which is can you have a break in your defenses due to some extreme event or events as I experienced and have breakdown but still function( though not well ) for a number of years ? 5 in my case. It also appears fairly common that only some years after veterans return do they start having the classic symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress which is of course just another level of pain laid down which must be resolved as any other primal pain would be. I hope I'm being clear in my question?

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    1. Wally: The answer is yes. If you are pretty strong you can withstand pressure but the weakened state from current stress puts you right on the brink of a breakdown. Symptoms can be delayed for a long time but you operate just under the threshold of a total break where symptoms appear. art

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  9. Art: You don't have to post this unless you think it would be helpful for those reading it to learn something. I've obviously been in a feeling writing on your blog and what I've "felt" and understand is that what happened to me there was the feeling: "I'll never be ok and I'll always be crazy." First line intrusion always with my primals. That's what I've been scared to feel and face. I can say now in the present "I am ok and I will be ok because I can feel what happened to me." Thanks !

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  10. Hi Wally & Art,

    I'm following this line of conversation:

    Wally: May I please ask you what actually did happen to me over there? A benign breakdown of some sort? I'm sure combined with birth trauma, a neglected childhood and Vietnam I was ripe to implode and did but still I functioned more or less for a few years until the actual overt nervous breakdown of sobbing, agitated depression etc.



    Peter Wolfe: Armed forces are in a difficult position as they often recruit from among people who are indeed very damaged by their life experiences. The young soldier is looking for a supportive family to replace the emotional hell he (usually he) was put through. The deal is that the young soldier gets the family as long as they repress the childhood traumas and concentrate on obeying orders.

    Wally: Can you have a break in your defences due to some extreme event or events as I experienced and have breakdown but still function( though not well ) for a number of years ?

    Art: Yes. If you are pretty strong you can withstand pressure but the weakened state from current stress puts you right on the brink of a breakdown. Symptoms can be delayed for a long time but you operate just under the threshold of a total break where symptoms appear. art

    Wally: what happened to me there was the feeling: "I'll never be ok and I'll always be crazy." First line intrusion always with my primals. That's what I've been scared to feel and face. I can say now in the present "I am ok and I will be ok because I can feel what happened to me." Thanks !

    This feels very familiar to me. I am reminded of my incarceration in elite military style boarding schools as a child.

    'Membership' of an elite group really re-enforces the projection of the unmet need.

    The cognitive value to this is like a virus. Once you realise trauma can be 'used' to gain an advantage then the 'consequences' are delayed; up and down the hierarchy of 'privilege' (or do I mean command)? The advantage is in the delayed re-action. You musn't jump off or maybe you'll get eaten by the Tiger you were riding. . . Follow orders, pay later. To hold a rifle, to 'kill an opponent' or holding a qualification gained through access to restricted 'information' amounts to the same thing in elitist establishments.

    Is this why some argue for National Service. . . so that we all have to endure the 'privilege' of war? To say the armed forces are in a difficult position is understatement in the extreme, though I totally agree with the sentiment. I have to agree, how could I not? I was trained into the officer class and now I wish I had not been because I do not want the responsibility of an unfair advantage. . . it seems nearly always a false 'advantage' as well. . . The Vertical Hierarchy.

    Art said the Navy had been a great leveller for him, but he made an exception of the officer class.

    Is it not the terror of mediaeval style society that the ability to 're-cognise an advantage' is seen and made into a 'privilege'? Nepotism, Authoritarianism, Fascism. . Genetic Inheritance, Good Blood / Bad Blood. . . This is what we do in military style societies and the arms race is the dreadful extrapolation and consequence of it.

    Thank Evolution for my feelings back again.

    Paul G.

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Review of "Beyond Belief"

This thought-provoking and important book shows how people are drawn toward dangerous beliefs.
“Belief can manifest itself in world-changing ways—and did, in some of history’s ugliest moments, from the rise of Adolf Hitler to the Jonestown mass suicide in 1979. Arthur Janov, a renowned psychologist who penned The Primal Scream, fearlessly tackles the subject of why and how strong believers willingly embrace even the most deranged leaders.
Beyond Belief begins with a lucid explanation of belief systems that, writes Janov, “are maps, something to help us navigate through life more effectively.” While belief systems are not presented as inherently bad, the author concentrates not just on why people adopt belief systems, but why “alienated individuals” in particular seek out “belief systems on the fringes.” The result is a book that is both illuminating and sobering. It explores, for example, how a strongly-held belief can lead radical Islamist jihadists to murder others in suicide acts. Janov writes, “I believe if people had more love in this life, they would not be so anxious to end it in favor of some imaginary existence.”
One of the most compelling aspects of Beyond Belief is the author’s liberal use of case studies, most of which are related in the first person by individuals whose lives were dramatically affected by their involvement in cults. These stories offer an exceptional perspective on the manner in which belief systems can take hold and shape one’s experiences. Joan’s tale, for instance, both engaging and disturbing, describes what it was like to join the Hare Krishnas. Even though she left the sect, observing that participants “are stunted in spiritual awareness,” Joan considers returning someday because “there’s a certain protection there.”
Janov’s great insight into cultish leaders is particularly interesting; he believes such people have had childhoods in which they were “rejected and unloved,” because “only unloved people want to become the wise man or woman (although it is usually male) imparting words of wisdom to others.” This is just one reason why Beyond Belief is such a thought-provoking, important book.”
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Quotes for "Life Before Birth"

“Life Before Birth is a thrilling journey of discovery, a real joy to read. Janov writes like no one else on the human mind—engaging, brilliant, passionate, and honest.
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Art Janov, one of the pioneers of fetal and early infant experiences and future mental health issues, offers a robust vision of how the earliest traumas of life can percolate through the brains, minds and lives of individuals. He focuses on both the shifting tides of brain emotional systems and the life-long consequences that can result, as well as the novel interventions, and clinical understanding, that need to be implemented in order to bring about the brain-mind changes that can restore affective equanimity. The transitions from feelings of persistent affective turmoil to psychological wholeness, requires both an understanding of the brain changes and a therapist that can work with the affective mind at primary-process levels. Life Before Birth, is a manifesto that provides a robust argument for increasing attention to the neuro-mental lives of fetuses and infants, and the widespread ramifications on mental health if we do not. Without an accurate developmental history of troubled minds, coordinated with a recognition of the primal emotional powers of the lowest ancestral regions of the human brain, therapists will be lost in their attempt to restore psychological balance.
Jaak Panksepp, Ph.D.
Bailey Endowed Chair of Animal Well Being Science
Washington State University

Dr. Janov’s essential insight—that our earliest experiences strongly influence later well being—is no longer in doubt. Thanks to advances in neuroscience, immunology, and epigenetics, we can now see some of the mechanisms of action at the heart of these developmental processes. His long-held belief that the brain, human development, and psychological well being need to studied in the context of evolution—from the brainstem up—now lies at the heart of the integration of neuroscience and psychotherapy.
Grounded in these two principles, Dr. Janov continues to explore the lifelong impact of prenatal, birth, and early experiences on our brains and minds. Simultaneously “old school” and revolutionary, he synthesizes traditional psychodynamic theories with cutting-edge science while consistently highlighting the limitations of a strict, “top-down” talking cure. Whether or not you agree with his philosophical assumptions, therapeutic practices, or theoretical conclusions, I promise you an interesting and thought-provoking journey.
Lou Cozolino, PsyD, Professor of Psychology, Pepperdine University


In Life Before Birth Dr. Arthur Janov illuminates the sources of much that happens during life after birth. Lucidly, the pioneer of primal therapy provides the scientific rationale for treatments that take us through our original, non-verbal memories—to essential depths of experience that the superficial cognitive-behavioral modalities currently in fashion cannot possibly touch, let alone transform.
Gabor Maté MD, author of In The Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters With Addiction

An expansive analysis! This book attempts to explain the impact of critical developmental windows in the past, implores us to improve the lives of pregnant women in the present, and has implications for understanding our children, ourselves, and our collective future. I’m not sure whether primal therapy works or not, but it certainly deserves systematic testing in well-designed, assessor-blinded, randomized controlled clinical trials.
K.J.S. Anand, MBBS, D. Phil, FAACP, FCCM, FRCPCH, Professor of Pediatrics, Anesthesiology, Anatomy & Neurobiology, Senior Scholar, Center for Excellence in Faith and Health, Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare System


A baby's brain grows more while in the womb than at any time in a child's life. Life Before Birth: The Hidden Script That Rules Our Lives is a valuable guide to creating healthier babies and offers insight into healing our early primal wounds. Dr. Janov integrates the most recent scientific research about prenatal development with the psychobiological reality that these early experiences do cast a long shadow over our entire lifespan. With a wealth of experience and a history of successful psychotherapeutic treatment, Dr. Janov is well positioned to speak with clarity and precision on a topic that remains critically important.
Paula Thomson, PsyD, Associate Professor, California State University, Northridge & Professor Emeritus, York University

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Dr. Janov has crafted a compelling and prophetic opus that could rightly dictate
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downright fascinating to any lay person interested in the mysteries of the human psyche."
Dr. Bernard Park, MD, MPH

His new book “Life Before Birth: The Hidden Script that Rules Our Lives” shows that primal therapy, the lower-brain therapeutic method popularized in the 1970’s international bestseller “Primal Scream” and his early work with John Lennon, may help alleviate depression and anxiety disorders, normalize blood pressure and serotonin levels, and improve the functioning of the immune system.
One of the book’s most intriguing theories is that fetal imprinting, an evolutionary strategy to prepare children to cope with life, establishes a permanent set-point in a child's physiology. Baby's born to mothers highly anxious during pregnancy, whether from war, natural disasters, failed marriages, or other stressful life conditions, may thus be prone to mental illness and brain dysfunction later in life. Early traumatic events such as low oxygen at birth, painkillers and antidepressants administered to the mother during pregnancy, poor maternal nutrition, and a lack of parental affection in the first years of life may compound the effect.
In making the case for a brand-new, unified field theory of psychotherapy, Dr. Janov weaves together the evolutionary theories of Jean Baptiste Larmarck, the fetal development studies of Vivette Glover and K.J.S. Anand, and fascinating new research by the psychiatrist Elissa Epel suggesting that telomeres—a region of repetitive DNA critical in predicting life expectancy—may be significantly altered during pregnancy.
After explaining how hormonal and neurologic processes in the womb provide a blueprint for later mental illness and disease, Dr. Janov charts a revolutionary new course for psychotherapy. He provides a sharp critique of cognitive behavioral therapy, psychoanalysis, and other popular “talk therapy” models for treating addiction and mental illness, which he argues do not reach the limbic system and brainstem, where the effects of early trauma are registered in the nervous system.
“Life Before Birth: The Hidden Script that Rules Our Lives” is scheduled to be published by NTI Upstream in October 2011, and has tremendous implications for the future of modern psychology, pediatrics, pregnancy, and women’s health.
Editor