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Beyond Biofeedback – Drs Elmer and Alyce Green

We had not anticipated, in our research, the relatively high frequency of subject reports indicating that integrative experiences leading to feelings of psychological well-being were associated with extended alpha-theta practice.

Training sessions during the first week or two left a few subjects feeling sluggish, fatigued, or nervous, but these effects were only temporary. One subject, for example, after a few weeks of practice reported having more energy, saying,

"I don't feel drained all the time. I am able to encounter things easier because it doesn't seem like I'm burning up the nervous energy I seemed to burn up before. I seem more relaxed in my everyday approach to life."

Another subject said,

"I have experienced generally, after sessions, a kind of speeding up. I feel good inside, physically things are in order, and I just feel sharper. I've noticed that the sharpness doesn't last, but with me it's a very precious experience. I have trouble feeling that way."

Another described it as

"I'm getting clearer and clearer." He described an experience he had: "It seems like last Saturday night something happened to me. Something clicked and I've felt different ever since, I'm calmer and I feel more inner peace. I just kind of slipped into a state of mind and I haven't left it much since-if you look at my notebook you'll see that this week things are picking up. I can get into myself much better."

Other subjects put it in other ways: "I feel good, good after a session, like whatever I have to do, I can do";

 "I feel so put together";

 "l feel so with it."

Improvement in difficult interpersonal relationships was spontaneously reported, two with fathers, one with a roommate, due, the subjects felt, to growing tolerance and understanding on their part of the other person's point of view. Two students reported girlfriends liked them better-found them more interesting and easier to talk to. Several reported being more at ease in the classroom with their peers and with their professors.

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Several subjects mentioned the feeling of greater involvement in whatever they were doing and also in their surroundings-for example, their increased awareness of nature: the varied colors, the wind, the trees, the sky.

Archetypal images (to use Jung's term) were the common experience of a number of our subjects: images of tunnels, the experience of going through a dark tunnel, or a tunnel lighted by sunlight at its end; images of stairs, and of climbing up or down; images of a cave or a pyramid. Images of a pair of eyes, or of a single eye, were reported by several subjects, as was the image of a wise old man in the form of a teacher, a professor, or a doctor. A book containing knowledge was another recurring image.