NYC, NY, New York, Therapy and treatment of depression, stress, panic, fears, anxiety, anger management in Manhattan, NY, Natural, Drug-free, Holistic, Alternative Psychologist, Therapist, Marriage Counselor, offers Cognitive Psychotherapy, Couples Counseling, Treatment for stress, bipolar, seasonal and major depression, anxiety, panic, sexual addictions, bipolar disorders, schizophrenia, mental illness

Natural psychotherapy developed by New York Drs. Eric and Miriam Riss is a mind-freeing therapy for positive self-empowerment and self-growth.

It is a drug-free alternative treatment for all ages that is effective for personal, relationship, and mental illness issues - from the simplest to the most complex and severe.

This creative, holistic therapy aims at lasting mental health; it does not use damaging psychiatric labeling, drugging, or any of the negative ideas and risky practices of psychiatry.

Instead, one learns important stress management and anger management skills. One acquires specific methods to lessen anxiety and achieve greater self-understanding and balance. (See FAQ # 5 below)

In this comprehensive and medication-free therapy each person learns constructive methods to solve her or his psychological problems. Natural methods that put an end to one's emotional distress, depression and fears. Natural, holistic ways that lead to a much better life!

Find out how, in this complex world of so much uncertainty, suffering and pain you can attain and maintain well-being.

And find out how you can help those you love and care about also achieve greater happiness.

And above all, find out how you can clarify where you are in life, where you want to go, and how you can actually get there!

ADDRESS AND OFFICE HOURS:

New York City Office Hours: Mon.- Fri., Days and Evenings (By Appointment Only)

New York Address: 174 East 73rd Street, NYC, NY 10021

FOR CONTACT INFORMATION just click HERE

If you are feeling excessively depressed, anxious, angry or emotionally overwhelmed, natural therapy's solution-oriented holistic treatment can be of definite help.

As the list below illustrates, natural therapy is an alternative treatment that can help with problems such as anxiety and poor communication, as well as with more complex ones such as panic, bipolar disturbances, depression and schizophrenia.

Thus, natural therapy and counseling enable you to attain self-understanding and long-term constructive solutions by means of the following:

As this evidence-based alternative Web site will show you, every issue or problem listed above, actually is not - as psychiatry claims - a mental illness or mental disorder.

Rather, they are all very real psychosocial problems, but not "psychiatric disorders" or "mental diseases."

As Thomas Szasz M.D., demonstrated long ago, the idea of mental illness is a myth.

Depression is not a medical disease. Anxiety is not a medical disease, a bipolar pattern is not, schizophrenia is not, nor are any of the other problems and issues listed.

Rather, what the scientific evidence shows is that each listed issue is a problem in living - an understandable (though sometimes self-defeating) natural bio-psycho-social and spiritual reaction to a problematic, painful, depressing or emotion-arousing situation.

YES, your problems and issues are learned emotional reactions, but not permanent conditions.

YES, the so-called mental illnesses are all psychological reactions and emotional difficulties which you can modify by means of this holistic, alternative therapy.

NO, your problems in life are not permanent biological, medical illnesses or medical conditions.

As you will see on this Web-site, your problems (no matter how severe) are not conditions for which you "need" to be drugged, electro shocked, or worse.

In sharp contrast with psychiatric drugging or electro-shocking or magnetic tinkering for the so-called psychiatric treatment of mental illness, the focus of this alternative, natural and positive treatment is always on self-understanding and the constructive resolution of personal and relationship issues.

In natural therapy you learn, specifically, how to find your self and how to achieve well-being and happiness by alternative, natural means.

Natural therapy is a way to search for, to find, and to maintain a state of natural happiness and natural well-being - on a regular basis!

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If you want more specific clarification, please go to READINGS AND REFERENCES

Carefully examine the strong evidence behind the questioning of the prevalent psychiatric treatment of so called mental illness presented by Mary Boyle, Ph.D., Paula Caplan, Ph.D., Peter Breggin, M.D., Grace Jackson, M.D., Lucy Johnstone, Ph.D., B.P.Karon, Ph.D., Lauren Mosher, M.D., Thomas Szasz, M.D., Robert Whitaker and others.

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And most important: The incontrovertible hard scientific fact is that not one of the problematic reactions listed is a permanent "mental illnesses"!

The facts actually show that all the troubling aspects of a so-called mental illness are learned patterns and behaviors rather than physical genetic illnesses.

The so-called mental illnesses are all transitional reactions to stress and they can all respond well to a solution-oriented, straightforward, natural psychotherapy and treatment.

These reactions and experiences of emotional distress require exactly what natural therapy and counseling offer: a new perspective, and a new in-depth understanding of oneself, one's relationships and one's situation.

Natural, no-drugs therapy can show you specific ways to make constructive changes in your life.

You are enabled to relieve your pain and suffering by learning alternative, creative and new ways to resolve general or specific psychological, social, spiritual and biosocial issues and problems.

First, by helping you challenge your negative assumptions and negative ways of thinking about yourself or your problems.

You practice the actual daily giving up of numbing negativism and paralyzing pessimism. You learn how to rid yourself of any delusions of inadequacy from which you may have suffered.

Second, as you give up your habits of negativism and pessimism, you learn how to tap into your inborn, natural creative abilities to heal and change for the better.

And, most important, no matter how bad your past was, nor what your age is today, natural therapy can now start to enable you to use and to experience the strengths and the creativeness of your real self!

This is done by means of comprehensive, eclectic, integrative psychological treatments that include: cognitive, psychodynamic, bio-social, eco-psychological, Zen Buddhist, and humanistic concepts and practices.

And in addition, in natural therapy there is an emphasis on a variety of positive, alternative, natural treatments that may be especially helpful for one's issues and problems.

These natural and positive treatments include: relaxation therapy, stress management, anger management, focused breathing, financial planning and financial management, physical exercises, natural hypnotherapy, nutritional guidance and positive life-style changes. Each of these is always useful in one's quest for comprehensive health and well-being.

In fact, these natural, holistic and positive psychological ways can increase and promote the body's natural abilities to heal neurological, circulatory, endocrine, musculoskeletal and other body systems.

By means of natural therapy one can discover when and how it is actually possible (and when it's not possible) to use the positive psychology of a natural approach.

A NATURAL HOLISTIC APPROACH is an approach of living in accordance with nature and "reality," without falseness and artifice, consistently focused on in-depth understanding of what is going on in your situation in life.

By gaining in-depth understanding of your self and your situation you can learn to become free to get on - and stay on - roads of self-discovery and positive change!

You learn how to become free and how to stay free to be responsible for the choices you make.

You realize how you can empower yourself to actually choose to make positive or negative choices.

Your start to realize through natural therapy, that it is you, in the end, who can learn how to shape your life and to choose the roads on which you want to travel.

You find out how, specifically, you can choose the roads that actually lead to self-realization and the freedom to be your authentic self !

In natural therapy and counseling you can learn how take a variety of roads that lead to self-empowerment and freedom to become true to your unique self.

These natural roads to freedom can take you from a life of emotional distress, depression and anxiety to an authentic, self-assertive and productive life of well-being and joy.

And along these roads and ways, you learn how to find, value and cherish your uniqueness and your unique ways of interacting with and benefiting from the natural world!

You learn how to actually attain a greater degree of general well-being and happiness.

You learn to attain a kind of excellence!

As Aristotle so clearly said it:

"Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then is not an act but a habit."

And in natural therapy one learns that the habit of excellence can indeed be acquired. One comes to see that excellence is nothing more and nothing less than the habit of being truly alive!

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In the words of Howard Thurman, "Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive."

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Please click here for CONTACT INFORMATION and find out how natural therapy can help you "come alive."

In this holistic, gentle and truth-seeking talk-therapy and positive action-therapy, you learn to free you mind from stress by developing the freedom to examine your problems, issues and goals in life in alternative and creative new ways.

And, at the same time, you start to practice to put your new insights into actual positive and constructive actions.

You develop the ability to free yourself from stress by freeing yourself from paralyzing inhibitions, negative attitudes, emotional impulsiveness, self-destructive behavior patterns, and conscious as well as unconscious self-defeating actions and reactions.

You learn how to become more aware of yourself, your current situation and your past. As a result, you start to understand yourself better and integrate your thoughts, feelings and actions in constructive and realistic ways.

You become free to see how your real problems in life - even those which produce severe emotional pain - can be treated constructively and creatively.

Second, you acquire and develop abilities to perform positive acts based on these insights.

Third, you gain the power to free your mind from mind-altering medications or street drugs.

Fourth, you practice to free yourself from an array of distractions and ways you may have acquired to "block out" reality.

Fifth, You learn to focus on practical plans to do something positive and constructive for yourself every day.

Sixth, you start to focus on the here and now: not on guilt or regret over a past that cannot be changed, and not on worry about a future that is always unknown.

Seventh, you practice, practice and practice the skill you have acquired of giving up blame and performing positive, alternative, constructive actions on a daily basis - 24/7.

And as you move away from practicing blame (of yourself and others) you start to feel the freedom of being truly in the constructive realm of choosing - and working for - a life that is truly good for you.

And significantly, during this seven step process you gradually acquire the power to free yourself from the damaging influences of irresponsible, negative, harmful people, and especially from the propaganda of critical, fault-finding family members, "friends" "authorities" and "experts." ( See: FREEDOM AND THE GOOD LIFE )

And at the same time, you acquire skills in interpersonal relations that can free you from negative and destructive ways of relating to yourself, to others and to society.

It becomes especially gratifying in natural therapy to learn how to free yourself from the negative ways of life you may have learned!

You learn creative new ways to free yourself from impulsive outbursts of anger or rage, passive-aggressive patterns, unethical or harmful behaviors, automatic tendencies of withdrawal into depressing passivity, paralyzing fearfulness, or self-defeating unassertiveness.

In natural therapy and counseling you can learn how to free yourself from ever being a victim of toxic relationships with others.

You learn to free yourself from becoming a victim of destructive or irresponsible actions, toward yourself or toward others, that you yourself may have acquired.

To truly become free to be yourself, your unique self, you learn how to regularly emancipate yourself from false ideas, from ignorance, damaging preconceptions and prejudices, superstitions, obfuscations, lies, unnecessary fears and unresolved (but resolvable) conflicts and ways of inhibiting yourself.

That may certainly feel like a tall assignment, but it gets easier and easier once you get started.

You start to welcome the truth and to appreciate that indeed the truth does make you free.

You discover the benefits of focusing on the practice of truth-seeking, self-emancipation and creative self-realization on a regular (24/7) basis.

In natural psychotherapy you find out how to free yourself to discover and use your inner strengths and powers to actively shape your life in positive ways.

You practice shaping your life in ways which really make sense to you, which fit your sense of ethics, your personal sense of right and wrong, and which you truly desire and truly value.

You become open and willing to actually choose alternative, new, original and creative ways to attain your goals and values.

You learn how to exercise your capacity to choose, plan for, and actually bring about (what you consider to be) an over-all responsible, fulfilling and truly productive way of life.

As a result of living a productive, responsible and fulfilling lifestyle you don't feel "tired," '"fatigued, or "hopeless."

Rather, to your surprise, you start to develop a much happier and emotionally exciting life for yourself and others.

You start - and continue - to experience the "natural highs" of comprehensive creative well-being!

3a) Natural therapy is an alternative therapy that does not approach psychological problems as medical illnesses.

Natural psychotherapy is a comprehensive and effective alternative treatment for both, psychiatric theory and practice as carried out by the average biologically oriented psychiatrist today.

Natural psychotherapy is, in fact, one of a growing number of creative, constructive and positive psychosocial treatments that have completely and successfully resisted the medicalization of psychotherapy.

In fact, natural therapy has successfully avoided all current attempts of biological psychiatry to practice "mind control" masquerading under the name of "psychiatric treatment" or "medical treatment of mental illness."

Natural psychotherapy is a therapy of no psychiatric theory and practice, no psychiatric labeling and none of psychiatry's risky treatments:

No psychiatric drugs, no ECT (electro-convulsive shock therapy), no surgical body implants, no surgical brain implants, no magnetic interferences with your brain, no neurological and brain surgery, no laser brain surgery and no forced psychiatric incarceration, falsely called "psychiatric treatment."

What natural psychotherapy offers instead of psychiatric treatment, is an effective "psychological, creative talk and problem-solving therapy."

Natural therapy is a treatment that is completely focused on the choice of positive actions and on positive results that last.

3b) In natural therapy one learns how to free oneself completely from the mistaken psychiatric idea that there is something biologically wrong with people who have psychological problems or who behave in ways which others find not acceptable.

In this holistic and completely positive treatment one learns that distressing and troubling psychological reactions or socially unacceptable behaviors are not the results of a mythical, non-existing brain disorder, chemical imbalance or mental disease.

As one makes progress in natural therapy one gets to see clearly that one's emotionally upsetting and disturbing experiences are really transitional emotionally charged reactions to problems in living or to self-defeating and damaging life views.

*Again, please see the strong evidence supporting this view presented by Mary Boyle, Ph.D., Paula Caplan, Ph.D., Peter Breggin, M.D., Grace Jackson, M.D., Lucy Johnstone, Ph.D., B.P.Karon, Ph.D., Lauren Mosher, M.D., Thomas Szasz, M.D., and Robert Whitaker by clicking READINGS AND REFERENCES!

Of course, actual neurological, physical, organic, medical problems that should be medically treated do exist. And they should be diagnosed and treated with competent, compassionate and suitable medical methods. But these are not what modern psychiatry refers to in its mistaken view of labeling social, psychological, and spiritual problems as "mental disorders."

Real medical conditions can, of course, actually be verified by physical, neurological, physiological, and laboratory tests and then treated and hopefully cured by appropriate medical procedures. Such verification is not possible, for what psychiatrists label mental illness.

They are: bio-psycho-social and spiritual crises that can be resolved by appropriate psychological methods.

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The fact is that none of psychiatry's so called mental illnesses can be verified as biological diseases by means of any scientifically and medically valid procedures.

There exist no blood tests, no x-rays, no lab-tests, no physical examinations to do this!

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3c) Too many psychiatrists miss the simple and obvious fact that human beings do indeed have psychosocial problems and issues that result in biological disturbances, but are not caused by biological disturbances.

Each person is an ever-changing and ever-growing being who has complex feelings, thoughts and values, and who lives in complex human situations and interactions.

And it is within these complex human bio-psycho-social situations that these problems (whether called depression, schizophrenia, etc.) have their origin and maintain their current existence.

One always needs to look carefully and compassionately at the whole context of someone's psychological, spiritual and social situation before trying to "help" in any way.

Natural therapy should, in fact be more accurately called wholistic or holistic, since it always considers the whole context and all the complexities of one's situation, experiences and goals. That is the kind of respect and realistic, truly scientific, understanding that a troubled or upset person always needs!

What a trouble person does not need is to have her or his brain or body chemistry tinkered with or assaulted by the reductive and mistaken theories and harmful practices of current psychiatry.

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Natural therapy regards most of psychiatry's ideas and procedures of treating "mental illness" as scientifically unsound, logically flawed, therapeutically harmful and morally bankrupt.

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Therefore, the natural therapist does not ever resort to psychiatry's ways of "treating mental illness," to the usual psychiatric, unscientific, immoral, and pathologizing ways of regarding and treating distressed and emotionally troubled people.

Troubled people are seen, and learn to see themselves, as what they really are: basically healthy but often perplexed, frightened, or troubled human beings caught up in transitional or long-standing emotional situations of suffering - situations and contexts that need to be understood and dealt with constructively - not masked or hidden by psychiatric drugs.

In this effective, evidence-based holistic alternative to the disempowering methods of psychiatry, people get to realize the following:

One just does not need to get endlessly, and too often forcefully and brutally, labeled, drugged, electro-shocked, get devices implanted into one's brain and body, get a variety of risky "patches," get the vagus nerve electrically stimulated, be given magnetic brain stimulations, or be subjected to destruction of vast numbers of brain cells by means of lobotomies, brain implants or laser brain surgery. Especially since safe, constructive and self-empowering natural methods are available, and have been proven to work.

In natural therapy people get to understand why the methods of biological psychiatry are not only inhumane, but are also unnecessary, outdated, and can be seriously damaging.

3e) A Psychosocial Empowering Perspective Rather than a Psychiatric Disabling One:

Besides making those who are emotionally stressed feel even more disabled, helpless and hopeless, current psychiatric practices too often are downright damaging! Too often people undergoing such thoroughly inhumane "treatments" are disabled for life.

Why are persons in natural therapy never stereotyped and classified by means of psychiatric labels?

Because human beings are unique; their minds and spirits are much too complex and individualistic for that kind of naive oversimplification.

Troubled human beings do not need just to be classified and labeled; they need to be treated with utter respect for their uniqueness.

Emotionally troubled and perplexed human beings must always be treated humanely and compassionately.

They must be given gentle encouragement, and afforded steady promotion of their resilience and natural powers to heal themselves.

They certainly do not need the labels of mythical "mental illness" (e.g. The DSM series) which are really "accusations" that can deprive them of their human, civil and legal rights.

They certainly do not need to be arrogantly "accused" of "mental illness" under the guise of being medically "diagnosed."

Such "accusations" are too often part of the totally immoral process of "incarcerating" them in "mental hospitals" and subjecting them to forced drugging, electro-shocking, and worse.

In non-drug psychotherapy people are made psychologically stronger by learning how to use problem-solving solutions that last.

Rather than being told to rely passively on psychiatric medication for life, they are shown how to change their life style, how to make better and healthier choices in life and relationships; how to get better and stay better.

They learn how to use their inner strengths and become their own healers for the rest of their lives.

They are coached on how to attain life-long mental health, physical health and spiritual well-being by learning how to avoid toxic aspects of their environment in the best ways.

How to exercise and have healthy physical activities on a regular basis. (e.g., walk, run, do physical work, get involved in aerobic, stretch and weight exercises, learn meditation, focused and spiritually uplifting breathing, yoga, kung fu, regular dance or form-free dance, etc.)

They learn how to improve their diet, how to live in over-all healthier ways, how to develop better life styles, greater awareness, and greater clarity of thought and purpose.

They learn how to discover, and actually choose to practice, realistic and workable ways to enhance their own well-being and the well-being of others and the environment.

In natural therapy people learn that when they are anxious, panicky, troubled, depressed, etc. they, of course, produce natural chemicals in their bodies that are harmful and that upset them even more.

However, when people learn to live a balanced, healthy and productive life their bodies naturally produce chemicals that make them feel good and that enhance their well-being.

Psychiatric or street drugs don't truly help! They may make one temporarily feel better.

Learning how to live a healthier, more productive and balanced life and having good, fulfilling, positive relationships always helps! And not temporarily, but on a long term basis.

The approaches that are always focused on in natural therapy are the following:

Learn how to choose and get engaged in a way of life that you value and that you find emotionally and spiritually satisfying.

Become involved in goals and relationships that you find morally worthwhile, that you desire from your heart and the depths of your soul!

Learn how to help your true spirit come fully alive!

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(To find out how to make your spirit come alive by making "good" choices in life, choices that actually work, please click MAKING LIFE CHOICES )

In addition to helping you resolve your problems, the main aims of natural psychotherapy are to enable you to value and respect your complexities and to develop your ability to change for the better.

This holistic treatment always aims to enable you to achieve self-actualization and actually choose the "good life."

This means that in this natural therapy you learn how to change certain specific ways of how you have been living.

You become empowered to attain the actualization of your freedom, the fulfillment and growth of your uniqueness, your strengths, your spiritual strivings, your interests, and your true, ever-changing and adaptive self.

And beyond that, other important aims are to enable you to use natural psychotherapy to actually become more creative, more productive and help you live well.

The over-all aim of natural therapy is to show you specifically how to bring more emotional and spiritual satisfaction, more happiness and more joy into your life.

What Natural Therapy Can Help One Accomplish

In the course of resolving your problems, this very practical therapy can show you how to:

(1) be in charge of your relationships and life in balanced, productive ways

(2) eliminate self-defeating unconscious habits and automatic reactions

(3) achieve what is meaningful and important to you

(4) bring more love and joy into your daily existence

(5) attain and then maintain comprehensive (physical, emotional, spiritual) well-being

IN NATURAL THERAPY THE FOCUS IS ALWAYS ON NATURAL SELF-HEALING, SELF-REALIZATION AND THE ATTAINMENT OF SATISFYING RELATIONSHIPS AND THE GOOD LIFE.

Natural psychotherapy works by being not only a psychological talk-therapy but also a psychological action-therapy.

Its truth-seeking, jargon-free and down-to-earth approaches work for all ages.

People learn - one day at a time - to live in better ways. Ways that maximize self-actualization and the attainment of greater happiness by natural means.

And as that happens they get to feel better - not just once in a while, but on a regular basis.

The focus of this evidence-based treatment is a workable integration of both - constructive in-depth talk and constructive actions:

The Talk Therapy

The talk-therapy involves:

(1) in-depth, natural conversation - a collaborative search by means of straightforward, honest, open and bold dialogue

(2) creative brainstorming for constructive, new, completely original solutions.

And the therapeutic atmosphere that always fosters such talk is one that is positive, patient, gentle, calm and thoroughly realistic.

The aim of such collaborative conversations is always to understand, in depth, what really is going on and has been going on in your life.

And especially to get to understand - through constructive conversation - what you really want to be going on in the future. And how - realistically - to attain that kind of future.

The Action Therapy

The actions-therapy involves your actual practice of actions, behaviors and ways of thinking and communicating that you find truly constructive.

This change to the truly constructive and positive happens when you choose to put the insights you have gained through your therapeutic conversations into the practice of your everyday behavior and relationships.

This means giving up old destructive patterns of acting and of communicating you may have learned (and over-learned) in childhood.

In natural actions therapy, you learn to become bold and actually try out the completely new and more productive ways of behaving you have evolved in the natural talk therapy.

That the constructive new ways actually work is totally surprising to those in whose family background either one or both parents were authoritarian, dictatorial, angry, moody and abusive.

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Research findings indicate that the very doing and practice of constructive, honest and responsible talk and actions speeds all three: biological, psychological and spiritual healing processes.

As people become progressively freer and empowered to think clearly and to act positively and constructively, their feelings start to change.

Though they may feel strange or guilty when they start to act in ways that primarily consider their own needs, goals and preferences, these negative feelings get to become less frequent and less intense over time.

After people practice constructive and positive actions and constructive ways of communicating with others on a regular basis, they gradually get to feel better each day.

At the beginning, they may feel guilty for taking care of themselves primarily and not putting others first.

But over time, they stop feeling bad or guilty and actually feel good when they truly take care of themselves. They find that then they are in a better and stronger emotional state to take care of others also.

They discover that it is only after they act and behave in constructive ways, that they can start to feel more comfortable being themselves.

They give up seeking the non-existent "quick fix," the "escape" from logical thinking.

Despite a feeling of resistance to want to give up old, and by now automatic patterns of damaging behavior, they are willing to try new ways of searching for and actually attaining states of natural happiness and well-being.

They learn how not to be mistreated, not be a victim, and not be involved in abusive relationships - either with themselves or with others.

As a result, they become less frustrated, less unhappy with themselves and less fearful, less depressed and less anxious.

At the same time (because they become less frustrated and spiritually more fulfilled) they become less hostile, less abrasive, less fault-finding, and less belligerent or antagonizing.

They thus learn how to differentiate among withdrawal, hostile relationships and assertive ones.

Each person learns how to separate her or his authentic values from her or his inauthentic values.

And as people start to feel more authentic and real, they get to feel more and more self-empowered, and to feel more free to express their uniqueness and creativity.

They also gain the desire and the power not to be victims of their own blind and destructive impulses.

And then, they can become more caring and more able to create and work toward the kind of self, the type of relationships and the kind of environment they truly value.

To accomplish these goals, natural psychotherapy has evolved an eclectic, yet unified and holistic treatment approach that is deeply influenced by the findings and principles of ecopsychology.

The approach is bio-psycho-social, interpersonal, cognitive, spiritual, and psychodynamic.

It is centrally a humanistic and humane treatment that is an effective alternative to the ineffective and harmful psychiatric drugging and other invasive biological techniques of psychiatry.

From the interpersonal viewpoint, natural therapy regards human experience as always related to one's situation, interactions, and relationships.

And in its natural state, human experience is always suffused with culture in all its aspects, be they social, linguistic, spiritual, traditional, religious, historical, political, economic, legal, etc.

In natural psychotherapy people start to explore both conscious and unconscious influences on their everyday behavior, and especially on their emotional reactions to events.

They start to see that what they feel and do is always related to what has come to be called psychodynamic influences.

This simply means that the nature of the relationships one has with oneself and others is influenced by aspects one is aware of and also aspects one is not aware of.

And through greater self-understanding one comes to see how totally unconscious influences have their roots in one's present psychosocial situation as well as in one's past.

And once one explores how that happens, one's problems become much more understandable and, subsequently, more manageable.

In fact, under the umbrella of such a perspective, the purpose of every therapy session is to show one how to become aware of, and be able to use, one's inner freedom and power to attain the good life - responsible, reasonable, fulfilling and joyful.

And one becomes aware of the ways one may have denied that freedom and unconsciously repeated self-deception, superstitions and false ideas, self-defeating habits of thinking and feeling, and self-harming patterns of behaving and interacting negatively and destructively with others and with one's milieu.

Throughout, each therapy session is focused on gaining self-understanding of one's own complexities as well as of the complexities of the psychosocial situation related to one's suffering.

The focus is on clear understanding of all the complexities of one's choices.

One steers clear of "foolish choices" and "quick fixes"!

One avoids the easy "escapes and distractions" of blame, regret, drugs, anger, withdrawal, passivity, irrational attachments, addictions and infatuations - all of which are self-destructive acts that can prevent self-understanding, self-growth and spiritual self-enhancement.

And during, as well as between sessions, the focus is on clarity of vision.

One commits to put into actual practice the productive changes in self-understanding and self-growth which one has achieved.

One learns and practices positive self-direction!

What open, natural, and positive dialogue really becomes when it works well is effective teamwork.

The teamwork is effective when both the person seeking therapy and the therapist work together cooperatively and patiently on all the issues and problems a person faces. Then such teamwork becomes a naturally creative kind of joint brainstorming by the person seeking creative solutions and the natural therapist.

Both join - as a team - in the search for constructive, natural, healing solutions!

One of the many reasons such brainstorming conversations have to be collaborative is that you are the only one who really knows - even though you may not be fully in touch with that knowledge - what your conscious and unconscious perspectives and assumptions about life are, what your basic healthy goals are, which human values you want to develop and foster.

And the natural psychotherapist is the one with the know-how to enable you to become fully aware of that knowledge and use it constructively.

You gradually learn to avoid potentially destructive, or actually destructive ways of doing things.

For example, you become able not to focus on changing others, finding fault with others or blaming others.

Instead, you learn how to focus on carefully thought-out ways through which you can make your life really better - physically, emotionally, spiritually.

And as you make your own life better in truly constructive and realistic ways you inevitably increase your self-confidence and self-reliance and become able to actualize your true self. And as you keep doing that you start to feel better and better!

Your daily existence will become more satisfying as you keep on developing and improving your own natural resilience, creativity and strengths!

And most important, you learn that if you want creative and really constructive solutions, differences of opinions, of perspectives and even of values you and your therapist may have, are the beginnings of conversation, and never the end!

You learn the real value of being honest, patient, and reasonable in working out your differences with you therapist (and with others) in constructive, moral and life-enhancing ways: constructive conversation and clear thinking.

You learn how and why to continue dialogue for a reasonable length of time before giving up having dialogue.

And natural therapy is the best place to practice how not to stop therapeutic conversation prematurely!

Thus in natural therapy one learns - often for the first time - the magic of kind, calm and reasonable conversation.

One learns how to explore, and slowly get to truly understand, the differences and disagreements one may have with another human being and how to use these very differences constructively.

And this may be the hardest to stick to: to practice, to practice and to practice: To make sure that you truly come to see that the new ways of life you are starting, really work and have been truly mastered by you.

Learning to live well and productively, and in ways that you truly feel are responsible, is a skill like other skills, only more complex. That is why it is so important to persist and prevail in the open, totally honest therapeutic and natural conversations despite the time and the effort they may take.

Your emotional concerns, upsets, and any psychological disabilities you may have developed in the past, as well as the spiritual despair you may have experienced, are seen as transitional wake-up calls.

They are all experiences that can help you finally to get rid of misconceptions, of blind spots, and destructive patterns.

And as that happens, you develop the ability to understand yourself better and become more and more skilled in living well!

Unpleasant and distressing feelings, when approached with curiosity and patience, are always opportunities for greater self-understanding and for positive reorganization of yourself and your relationships.

In psychodynamic, analytically oriented therapies the analysis of these experiences are called "analysis of transference" and they are always useful in natural therapy also.

They are feelings and behaviors people transfer form their childhood, their past, into the therapy experience.

"Transferred feelings and behaviors" of course take place regularly in everyone's life, but can be especially significant when an unconsciously feared but important break-through is about to take place. And to understand them, makes it possible for therapeutic progress to continue in constructive ways.

As natural therapy progresses you start to realize that with the knowledge and strengths you gained through therapy, it is you who can become and stay responsible for how you use your freedom to shape your life.

You learn to explore the meaning of impulsive, anxious, or depressing feelings and not just to follow them blindly.

You learn not to run away from negative feelings but to use them to gain greater self-understanding and self-empowerment!

If you wish a clearer and more specific explanation of how natural psychotherapy actually works please click on FREEDOM AND THE GOOD LIFE.

A person, of course, may have a specific medical disease, actual medical symptoms, illnesses, or impairments that require proper medical evaluation, diagnosis and treatment.

Therefore, if any concern about an actual physical illness, impairment, or problem exists at the time one starts or is in the process of natural psychotherapy, one should always have a physical diagnostic checkup by one's regular personal or family physician.

And one should also, always, have a consultation with someone who is expert (e.g. board certified diplomate) in the areas of one's concern, whether it be an experienced specialist in cardiology, internal medicine, neurology, endocrinology, pediatrics, geriatrics, otolaryngology, ophthalmology, physiatry, or in any of the various medical specialties that may be relevant to one's concerns.

Competent, compassionate, expert medical diagnosis and treatment should never be avoided when any concern about physical illness is present!

Physical, medical disease or impairment always requires suitable medical diagnosis, intervention and treatment.

The answer is: yes, if you mean adaptive chemical changes as a result of the emotional and physical distress they experience in their lives..

The body is exquisitely sensitive to any kind of stress, even mild stress, and reacts accordingly.

One's psychological problems in living can therefore cause chemical changes, as well as musculoskeletal and other physical changes.

Thus it is important to remember that there is overwhelming research and clinical evidence that psychological experience causes changes in body chemistry and physiology.

However, research shows that generally it is not the other way around: that people have "mental diseases" or "genetic defects" that cause their psychological problems. When their psychological and social problems are resolved, so is their mental upheaval and suffering.

Thus drugs do not eliminate the psychological and psychosocial reasons that caused the chemical changes in the first place !

And furthermore, the crude "treatments" by means of psychiatric drugs not only can have serious and damaging side-effects, but also tend to impair the mind's and body's natural healing and reparative responses to stress.

So what is one to do if told by a "professional" that one has a chemical imbalance not related to one's psychologically upsetting situation? If that happens, one should always ask what specific laboratory tests one can take to demonstrate and determine exactly and clearly what the imbalance is.

And remember this:

No medical examinations or laboratory tests exist showing that chemical imbalances precede mental distress! Not even one!

There are no laboratory tests or medical findings in existence today that can point to actual medical and laboratory findings with regard to chemical imbalances causing mental problems, as exist with other problems such as diabetes, TB, cancer, infections, actual vitamin or mineral deficiencies, etc.

And one must not forget either that psychiatry has promised definitive medical tests for "mental illness" for over 150 years. And it has still not delivered!

Because, as Thomas Szasz M.D., has so clearly pointed out in his many books: the task of finding such tests is hopeless.

This is so because the very idea of "mental illness" is a mistaken idea, a myth.

Whether people choose to take or not to take mind-altering drugs relates to the culture, religious influences and laws under which they live.

All, of course, should arrive at the choices they make regarding the use of mind altering drugs in well-informed and carefully thought out ways.

In a democratic society probably the less the government actively interferes with, prohibits or punishes such behavior the better.

Thus people should have the legal right to take drugs if they choose to do so, whether the drug is cocaine, ecstasy, Prozac, grass, alcohol, Xanax, heroin, Zyprexa or any other mind-altering substance.

But under no circumstances should they be coerced, cajoled or pressured to take these chemicals! And the reason for this is clear: all mind-altering chemicals can have serious and damaging side-effects.

Educated about these chemicals, YES. Pressured or coerced to ingest them, NO!

(b) OK to start natural therapy while still drinking or using mind-altering drugs:

Even though drugs may make it easier to avoid dealing constructively with one's problems, experience over the past three decades has shown that one can benefit from natural therapy even while still using them.

Thus the use of excessive alcohol or drugs, whether one uses them out of choice, habit, because one is in the process of weaning oneself off them, or because one is committed to their use for recreational, tranquilizing or analgesic purposes is never a reason not to start natural therapy.

It is always beneficial to explore psychologically the pros and cons of one's risky life styles. And it is always beneficial to explore specific ways to stop taking risky drugs and chemicals.

In natural psychotherapy medication is hardly ever used. And if a person wants it, it is used in minimal amounts in order to reduce acute upset in emergency situations.

However the emphasis always is on therapeutic dialogue and therapeutic problem solving..

Constructive dialogue is encouraged and reliance on alcohol and drugs is discouraged.

If someone is acutely distraught and agitated, or in the throes of deep depression, tranquilizing and mood altering drugs may be advised if quick calming down is necessary and serious health or management crises exist.

Clinical evidence demonstrates that a safe, structured, caring, personal and compassionate therapeutic environment is mostly sufficient to bring about a general calming down.

But if a safe, loving, caring and structured environment is not available and potentially dangerous emergencies exist, psychoactive drugs are prescribed by someone who is expert in, or at least congenial to, alternative, holistic medicine - either a prescribing holistic psychologist, psychiatrist, internist, psychopharmacologist, or psychiatric nurse-practitioner.

Thus, in certain serious emergency situations, judiciously prescribed, limited use of psychoactive drugs may be of help on a temporary basis. The individual's safety, welfare and well-being are always of prime consideration.

Some individuals respond very quickly (even in minutes or hours) to psychotropic medication. Some respond slowly, over weeks. Some don't respond to drugging or medication at all, or respond minimally.

Prescribed mind-altering drugs can thus be of help in jumpstarting someone into psychotherapy or in helping them overcome an acutely disturbing transitional episode.

Once some stability has been achieved, the tranquilizing or mood altering drugs are used to the minimal degree necessary to maintain focus on the psychosocial issues that caused the emotional disturbances and upsets in the first place. This is done also in consultation with those professionals familiar with the person's psychosocial and medical history and background.

(e) The focus in natural therapy is always on one's natural healing powers:

In natural psychotherapy one focuses on the organism's natural ways of healing, on its natural inner healing powers and resilience. These natural powers to heal oneself are consistently encouraged and stimulated in natural psychotherapy.

It is self-empowering to go through the process of natural therapy since one gradually learns how to make use of the hormones and chemicals naturally produced by one's own body.

And yes, one's naturally produced hormones and chemicals can always be relied on to help one feel good. And they are completely harmless!

In the event one has become habituated to street drugs, psychiatric drugs, or toxic levels of alcohol, it is not advisable to stop impulsively or abruptly since some people have very serious negative physical and psychological reactions if they do so.

Some of the prescription drugs are far more addicting, damaging, and habit forming than many biological psychiatrists and psychopharmacologists are willing to admit.

If one decides to stop excessive alcohol or excessive taking of prescription or non-prescription drugs, it is important to wean oneself off carefully, slowly, and always with the help, the planning and the guidance of caring, responsible, knowledgeable, and experienced professional clinical support.