From the author: my translation of Julia Diamond's article The article explores how the edges of our self-image, especially the long-term ones, are connected to the myth of life and are similar in structure to addictions. I sat down to write this article with great enthusiasm. I turned to the computer and while I was waiting for it to load, my mind raced ahead and the article ended before the screensaver on the computer appeared. I became depressed at the thought of starting the article over again when I had already seen its end. I stared at the blank screen and felt like my efforts were futile. Where to begin? My enthusiasm turned to hopelessness as the computer booted up. I looked out the window, and as soon as I turned away from the computer screen, my thoughts began to work again. And again ideas started pouring in, lively and inspiring. But when I turned back to the blank screen, everything disappeared. Before I noticed it, I clicked on the Solitaire program and played it five times in two minutes. My mind swirled with ideas as I mindlessly clicked on icons and dragged them around the screen. Click, drag, double-click. I wrote the article in my head while another part of me was distracted by the repetitive, lulling movements of the computer mouse. I feel like everyone else is addicted. It doesn't have to be Tapeworm, it could be alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, sex, shopping or some other substance or behavior. I feel like I'm addicted because I'm caught in a web of compulsive, unconscious, and repetitive behavior. The process of writing something takes me to the edge, it challenges me to believe in my ideas and fight self-doubt and feelings of insecurity. The process of writing means facing the guard dogs at the gate, overcoming the various distracting emotions that prevent me from doing something new, something difficult, something that is beyond the boundaries of my familiar known identity. And here, on the edge, I escape from difficulties. A tapeworm or looking out the window allows me to "sort of" satisfy my purpose behind writing, but only in my mind, not on paper. Calling my edge behavior an addiction highlights certain dynamics of a chronic long-term edge. In this article I explore how edges, especially long-term ones, are related to life myth and are similar to addictions. The reverse is also true - we can assume that dependencies are associated with long-term edges. While process theory views addictions as indicative of altered states of consciousness, I would like to add a view of addictions as chronic, long-term edges associated with our life myth. Addictions confront, challenge the introduction of a new aspect into our identity or the living out of a life dream or ambition; we are approaching the edge, the limits of our known, comfortable identity. At this edge we develop some kind of ritualistic behavior or patterns, whether we use something or not. The chronic edge revolves around a life myth. The life myth represents our essence behind our social role. It is the archetypal identity, power, creativity or energy represented by our dreams, body experiences and transpersonal experiences. This archetypal nature is difficult to define for many reasons, primarily because our identities are often conditioned and imposed by social norms and consensus reality. Also our resistance or edges oppose these rejected processes, they are organized around difficult experiences, painful events and traumas. For some reason, it is much easier to avoid living our true nature. In this sense, our normal identity, or what we call the primary process, may actually be long-term edge behavior that allows us to continually avoid yet another part of our personality. Thus, we are who we are in our primary process because it is possible to escapedifficulties. Primary Process as Edge Behavior Judy, a woman in her 30s, came to me with the following dream: An Airbus was flying dangerously close to the ground, houses and high-voltage power lines. I was afraid that his wings would hit the house or touch high-voltage lines and break. But I knew that once the First Minister, who was on the plane, was replaced by a Conservative Opposition Minister, everything would be fine. The difficulties in Judy's life concerned her partner and children. They accused her of being bossy and controlling. She thought it was true and tried to change. Judy was always an artist, but gave up when she adopted her second child. She was an extraordinarily creative and powerful woman and struggled to put her creativity and power to use. Her association with the First Minister was that he was a sociable, friendly politician. He created many social programs, but was accused by his enemies of appointing people to positions through acquaintances, embezzling money and being an alcoholic. Another First Minister was good from a financial point of view; a conservative personality, he was less inclined to create social programs, in general, he was less familiar. It seems that the dream recommended - put a conservative at the helm and the airbus will taxi. Airplane - Judy's strength and creative energy could not manifest itself with the First Minister, he was too “social”. The part of her that was socially oriented could not fly on an airplane, she needed a more reserved and conservative nature in order to establish contact with her creative part. Judy identified herself as a relationship-oriented person and found it difficult to be alone with her work. She had many ideas, plans and dreams, and she had a tendency to socialize or involve her children in working on her projects more than to focus on her dreams. She didn't like having her creativity fill such a small vessel. The plane was flying too low, too close to the rooftops - to her relationship. She had far more creative energy than friendship or parenthood could contain. She needed a wider field of activity to keep her off the roof. In a sense, we can say that Judy's primary process - her relationships - is dependence. This is not just a primary process, something with which she identifies, but a chronic pattern of behavior created by that part of her that is unable to focus on itself. She found it easier to have relationships with others rather than focus on her own projects. She used the relationship to avoid the enormous task, her life myth. Relationships for Judy are like an addiction, a chronic edge behavior that protects her from something that she finds difficult and traumatic. This type of addictive behavior is a very common pattern; many of us use our primary aspects more to avoid other parts of ourselves. This process comes to the fore when we take on new challenges in life - in work, in relationships, in school. Another example: Dan and one of the participants were paired as therapist and client in a workshop. Dan was a therapist who experienced confusion in the middle of his work. He asked for the supervisor's help, and as the three of them began discussing the work, it became obvious that Dan wasn't sure he understood the client's process structure. He said that his way of working is to follow the heart and maintain loving contact. He noted that he doubted that he really understood what edges, channels and process structure were. Dan said that he should already know the basic structure at this stage of learning, but he avoids learning signals because it is difficult for him. He said that he constantly tries to study from videos, but every time he gets depressed and feels hopeless. Studying reminds him of his cold, analytically oriented teachers, and how stupid he felt in school. HeI was an emotional child and suffered because I tried to live out this sensitive part of myself at the expense of achieving success in school. Even now, despite becoming a successful teacher himself, he continued to feel stupid and afraid that he would be found out as a fraud. After an emotional discussion about his early teaching and his childhood, the supervisor asked him what he would like to do in the training with this feeling of lack of something, that he is missing something. There was an awkward silence. Dan looked down, shifted uncomfortably, and said he'd like to try to work on it. Everyone in the room, including Dan, looked unconvinced. His answer seemed superficial, expected, but not sincere. The supervisor turned to him and said in a tone filled with compassion, “Dan, it is clear that you have suffered and were able to follow your heart in working with people and thereby helping to heal. We are now at a critical point regarding your studies...” The supervisor paused. He looked at him and said, “I think now you must make the decision to look at your pain and incorporate the analytical part into your work. I don't think you can move forward in your learning without making this decision." Dan's loving and open nature was one of his talents, but he also used this talent as a defense against injury. In a sense, it was a “defense mechanism,” a way of avoiding traumatic situations. But locked away in the depths of this traumatic experience were aspects of himself that he had no access to. He used compassion and warmth in his work not only because these qualities were his strength, but also because he did not have access to other parts of his personality. Thus, his warmth became a form of dependent behavior, he had no choice but to face his end. His loving nature and analytical coldness were elements of his life myth, his long-term process. Dan is now his own teacher in the profession, moving to a new stage of learning in his mid-life. Clearly, the drama surrounding school, emotional abuse, and analytical thinking is a central theme of his life myth. Both examples highlight how edge behavior is similar to the structure of addiction. In Judy's case, the relationship was a dependent tendency that helped her avoid focusing on herself. And so Dan used love because his analytical part was locked in a traumatic event. In both cases, the primary processes are just one part of their identity, a part formed by the edges. Perhaps for both of them, at some point, developing their relationship or love orientation was healing, something that helped them close out of traumatic situations. But now this behavior was no longer helpful, in fact, they had become addicted. In this sense, what becomes an addiction is not our behavior, but an avoidance of the edge. We become addicted to avoid painful points; we cling to other behaviors and identities rather than face the painful facts. For Dan, avoidance, running away from coldness, from the analytical learning system, and maintaining his loving and emotional nature was central to his development. It turns out that even though something healed him, it also became a way to avoid another part of himself. He needs a new relationship with his edge, a way to negotiate with this edge and appropriate his own parts locked in this experience of traumatic situations. Second attention and metacommunicator development Process work understands addictions as a tendency towards an altered state of consciousness. Altered states of consciousness, caused by a substance or behavior, catapult us over the edge into a new state of consciousness. While other theories view addictions as a struggle between a person and a substance, the process work paradigm views addictionsas a struggle between states of consciousness. The teleological perspective of process work looks at addictions as a “cure” for our normal state of consciousness. For example, a businessman who focuses one-sidedly on achievements and work constantly suppresses fatigue, emotions, or anything else that interferes with the implementation of his intentions. This can lead to dependence on wine or anything else that can compensate for its one-sidedness. Alcohol creates a feeling of relaxation without changing his identity much. An altered state of consciousness has some value for a person. The theory of altered states of consciousness provides a psychological explanation for why we become addicted: the altered state of consciousness that a substance or behavior provides is only a surrogate for what we really crave. Max Schupbach gives an analogy with being on the road. We yearn to get home, to be in our own bed, but instead we go to the hotel. It looks like home, but not quite. The altered state of consciousness that the substance causes is a hotel, but not a home. For example, when I smoke, I access an altered state of consciousness: my eyes are closed, my breathing is slow and deep, my muscles are relaxed. But smoking only promises this condition, it does not completely reproduce it. Many of those who use something say that nothing compares to taking the drug for the first time, taking a puff, taking an injection. The first dose is closest to the pure state, and everything after that no longer gives the same effect. This is “almost, but not quite there” - and creates addiction. We keep striving for the promised state, but the desired state is never truly achieved, but we try again and again. Another reason why we become dependent on a substance is because it catapults us over the edge and we never develop the ability to negotiate with the edge in order to get a holistic view of oneself. We access an altered state of consciousness through our second attention. Passing over the edge is like crossing a threshold, we don’t do it ourselves, and we don’t know exactly how it happens, how it turns out. We avoid confrontation and refuse to see the big picture of what is happening. A simple reading of process work: one could say that our goal is to help people move past the edge, the movement from the primary identity, or the known one, to the one we know less, to the avoided identity. Thus, the edge seems to be an obstacle to the secondary process and occupies one of the central places in process work. If you negotiate on the edge with the secondary process, this leads to increased awareness and learning. Edge work develops second attention, disciplines the awareness needed to notice momentary, unintentional, irrational experiences that lie behind the habitual, normal identity. While first attention is the normal, ordinary awareness we develop when dealing with everyday reality, or what Mindell called the “victim body,” second attention is the awareness we need to focus on the dream body . Mindell defined second attention as the ability to: focus on those things that you usually push aside, focus on external and internal subjective, irrational experiences. Second attention is the key to the world of dreams, to unconscious and dream-like movements, to the accidents, synchronicities and slips that happen throughout the day. Developing second attention is an ancient technique that can be found in various forms in tantric, Hindu, Buddhist practices meditation. For example, tantric meditation techniques support the practitioner in maintaining attention on a sacred object, sound or image, without wandering the mind. This is also true for some forms of Vipassana meditation. The idea is to catch the moment when the mind gets carried away and bring it back to the goal of meditation. We are inIn process work, we believe that distraction and entrainment of the mind is an important process, we agree that awareness of the moment when the mind is distracted (without now considering how to use this moment and develop it) is a component of developing the ability to second attention. Second attention plays an important role in process work. One of the main ideas of the concept of process work is the distinction between the flow of events: 1) in those experiences that are associated with our identity (primary process) and 2) in those that lie beyond our identity (secondary process), and 3) disturbing, discomfort signals accompanying the secondary process (edge ​​phenomenon). This differentiating perception is entirely dependent on second attention, and our ordinary awareness is trained to notice only those experiences that are closer to our identity. Without second attention, we will simply be caught up in experiences, sensations and emotions, not understanding where the primary experience is, where is the secondary, and where is the marginal phenomenon. Second attention also creates and develops a neutral metacommunicator, an internal therapist who can relate to our experience without judgment and has openness to what happens to us or provokes us. The practice of inner work requires detachment, the ability to discipline awareness, to notice moods, internal judgments, prejudices, inclinations and figures that bother us. Without a neutral metacommunicator, internal work can be a living hell. We find ourselves at the mercy of demons, monsters, and critics of all sizes and stripes. A minute of going inside can make us depressed, hopeless, afraid and sad. Second attention is the concentration we need in order to hold and record signals in our consciousness. It gives us the ability to notice and negotiate with edges, remain alert in altered states of consciousness, interact with edge figures, and follow subtle cues in unoccupied channels. Without second attention, the dreaming process puts us to sleep. Instead of following and revealing the dream process, we become identified with roles and figures, without realizing what role we are in and how it can be useful. Immersion in the dream process without awareness of what is happening is like sleepwalking or passive participation in the dream experience. This immersion in sleep is less useful in therapy because in this case we unconsciously become figures in the dream process and work without a neutral communicator. When we jump into this state without awareness, we support and encourage the thoughts, opinions, affects of the dream figure. Believing that we are neutral, in reality we are attached to a certain outcome, a consequence. Working with the unknown without second attention means that we are mixed up and the experience has absorbed and covered us. In Carlos Castaneda's book "Tales of Power", Don Juan, a Yaqui shaman, teaches Carlos second attention through the art of blurring objects at a distance. He shows him the danger of merging with experience. According to Don Juan, the trick is to not allow the object to use the object's intention to merge with the observer. Carlos remembers Don Juan's warning: “I will not allow the distortion to pull me in, but I will still gradually enter into it. What I need to avoid is allowing the hole to grow and suddenly swallow me up.” Developing Second Attention and Working with the Edge as a Negotiation Process How exactly does working with the edge develop second attention? It is typical to describe the region in spatial terms - as a place, a border between identities. But in practice, the edge is a dynamic, a conflict between aspects, our own sides. The edge mechanism is the suppression or denial of parts of ourselves with which we ourselves or others are in conflict. Thus, when we want to connect with the denied parts of ourselves, we expose ourselves to the displeasure of the edge figure, returning to the wound or heartache that was created by that denial.Living out one's own rejected aspect may involve external or internal figures, and in some cases means returning to the original trauma or violence that first established the edge there. Thus, the edge can be a negotiation of pain, personal history, ghosts, or violence. Dealing with the edge can mean a determination to deal with pain, complexity or conflict. We are in a terrible double trap: we are drawn to our secondary process, but facing it involves pain. It is in human nature itself to avoid the edge, or to pass through an obstacle without encountering pain. Immigration is an apt analogy: states of consciousness are no different from states and nations. For example, let's say we come from a small town in the American Midwest - conservative, small-town, traditional. All our lives we dreamed of living in Paris - a Mecca for our denied sensuality, spontaneity, freedom and artistic nature. We know that moving to Paris will be an absolute healing for someone who grew up in Centerville, Iowa. But to move to Paris, you need to go through the border and immigration control. Our personal history, our luggage will be examined and opened. We will be tested and viewed with suspicion. All our shortcomings, weak points, our past will come to light. We must endure cross-examination and fight for our desire to be in Paris. If only we could go to Paris straight from Iowa without that damn immigration! But in reality, the immigration process is Paris. If we go through this immigration process, with its humiliations, challenges and violent moments, if we remain true to our intention to get to Paris, we will revive our own Parisian nature. We will realize those Parisian aspects that we so passionately desire. Without such negotiations, we will never be able to fully identify with the new state. In this case, if we simply cross the border of the country, we will become illegal aliens. We have no passport, no identification card, no formal permission to stay in the country. Our new identity is the result of negotiations with officials at the border, not simply the fact that we crossed the border. This means that our identity changes through working at the edge rather than simply experiencing our secondary process. This may explain why we often only think our process has changed when we feel good about the secondary process. This is not the moment of landing in a new country, but rather the moment of negotiation itself. Sneaking across the border is like digging a tunnel under the edge, the same as using an altered state of consciousness to go over the edge. There are times when we, however, deliberately use ASC to go over the edge. We change channels, take substances in our imagination, use movement work or body work in order to do certain things or experience aspects of ourselves that we do not usually identify with. Experiencing the rejected parties in unoccupied channels can allow one to go over the edge. For example, John's normal identity is to be a smart student who works hard, he may have negative dreams such as being a clown, a fool, or the village idiot. If we ask him to imagine himself as stupid, as a fool, he will not be able to do it. But if we start moving around it, we can find this dream image in the movements and non-verbal cues. As we intensify our movements, we will access this experience and find ourselves staggering like drunks, stumbling and fooling around. John temporarily went over the edge, grabbed a secondary process, but in a channel with which he is not identified. This is less of a challenge to his identity. He is not a "he". This way of working - deliberately walking around a large edge - allows you to get a picture of the experience that is beyond the edge. Later, at some point, the edge may turn on itselfattention. Working with a less familiar channel is reminiscent of Don Juan's use of psychotropic plants to help Castaneda loosen his fixation on the tunnel, the world of consensus reality. Altered states of consciousness expand consciousness, broaden the picture, and increase awareness in relation to another state of consciousness. How, in practice, do we differentiate between tunneling and deliberation, a temporary avoidance of negotiation? In the John example above, if the therapist spends what feels like an eternity getting him to move around the room like a drunken fool, and as soon as John sits back down and asks from his usual state, “What was all that about?” to conclude that there was no awareness in avoiding negotiations on the edge, nothing was deposited in experience. And if, on the other hand, John wanders drunkenly around the room, laughing, obviously enjoying himself, and after sitting down, looks disheveled, changed and asks with a wide smile: “What was it all about?”, then we we can imagine that he had this experience, and it was deposited in his experience, no matter whether he identified himself with it or not. John walked around the negotiations on the edge and entered an altered state of consciousness. His consciousness expanded, he experienced something new in himself with the help of a “psychotropic” channel change. There is no basic rule for passing the edge through negotiation. However, it is thought that where the goal is to develop second attention, as, for example, in certain processes that exist over a long time and in training conditions, bypassing negotiations at the edge can lead to a loss of second attention, which is what happens, and is too expensive in the future. An example of bypassing negotiations and losing second attention could be Castaneda's experience with Don Juan. During his 15 years of training, Carlos went through amazing altered states of reality and achieved extraordinary mastery of the force (energy). But on his own, without Don Juan's second attention or psychotropic plants, he could neither remember these experiences nor repeat them. Carlos's second focus developed through the use of power plants. Castaneda's follower, La Gonda, explains: Don Juan said that his power plants made you crooked; they were able to cut off your attention from the tonal (everyday world) and put you directly into your second attention, but without mastering that attention. In the previously mentioned example with Dan and the supervisor, the supervisor challenged Dan to negotiate with the edge - with his analytical abilities . Dan's return to love over and over again in his work with clients diminished his second focus. He developed a talent for working in an appropriate (loving) style, but could not use his mind in his work. The supervisor's challenge not only pushed Dan to develop his analytical skills, but also to recognize his habitual refusal to do so. With chronic edges, simply being helped over the edge is less helpful than becoming aware of your relationship with the edge. At some level we choose avoidance, avoidance of certain processes, and so we have to make a choice - to go over the edge, to face the difficulties and make a change. The Meaning of Edge Work: Facilitating Our Relationship with Nature Process work changes and evolves over time. One of the greatest sources of knowledge comes from the learning process (when we teach, learn). As we strive to teach process work, we discover aspects of the theory that have been hidden and intuitive. In addition to the skills of detecting double signals, edges and amplification, there are meta-skills: our point of view, our beliefs, ideas about people, nature and life that determine our use of the skills. Another change that has emerged over time is less focus on what one is doing and more focus on awareness. And finally, working with peoplealtered states of consciousness, in extreme states, with the dying led to a more accurate understanding of the metacommunicator - that part of us that can talk about our experiences and experiences. The discoveries that emerged from our work with chronic edges led to another distinctive feature in the practice of process psychology: instead of focusing on the possibility of going over the edge, working with the edge, i.e. establishing relationships between the individual and the region. What does a person’s relationship with his land mean? How will a person's own nature interact with conflict at the point of choice? Is she interested in this region? Does she have a metacommunicator or part willing to lead the way in this situation? It is a complex interaction of factors that determine an individual's relationship with his or her situation and personal experience. There is a professional passion for therapists - at times we are more interested than the clients themselves in helping them change. When we enthusiastically push clients to change, we may miss the fact that it is our enthusiasm, not the clients' interest, that keeps the boat afloat. The danger is not just that our goals conflict with our clients' goals, or that burnout may occur, but that our efforts overshadow the client's own relationship with their process. The way people negotiate with the region reveals their spiritual nature. What happens to people who are at a major crossroads in their lives? How does their nature deal with conflict? The edges can reveal depression or hopelessness. The edge can reveal a warrior who will break through at the last minute, or lead a person to admit the fact that he needs help and relationships with others. When someone comes for help while in acute crisis, edge work assistance may be all the client needs at that moment. Be that as it may, in long-term therapy or therapy aimed at training therapists, the ability to see the relationship of a person with his process is very important. Plus, if the therapist sees his task as helping to go over the edge, in this case he may be going against nature . The spirit has its own system of counting time; processes mature at their own rhythm, and sometimes change is neither in the power of the client nor the therapist, but in the power of God, nature or the Tao. Being on the edge, allowing oneself to interact with the edge rather than just pushing over the edge, reveals important moments for the person themselves that may be obscured by the therapist's own involvement in the process of change. Thus, following someone's process means not only following cues, but following—or sometimes challenging—the person's relationship with his cues. The secondary process is no longer the main goal; Facilitation of a person's relationship with the edge becomes more important. There are additional factors that influence how people negotiate on the edge. Does the person have enough second attention to focus on the process? Is the metacommunicator neutral enough to help him work on the edge, or does awareness work against him? Sometimes secondary processes or edges are used as cannon fodder against clients. Work on something secondary can be inhibited by the metacommunicator, the internal therapist who uses information to put the client on his back. For some people, going over the edge is simply a change in behavior created by the therapist's intention; it is an unsustainable change because the client has not had the opportunity to develop his second attention and an internal metacommunicator who can pick up the process in the next step. Staying on the edge also reveals a short-term therapeutic goal or method of working that suits the person. Some clients need an external stimulus or an ally who shows interest in their process. Others mayIt may be necessary to completely avoid negotiations, walk away from pain and difficulties, and take time out. Others may be interested in experiencing the difficulty and tension on the edge. Some people are predisposed to out-of-body experiences. While on the edge, they may lie down, dissociate, go out of body, or go into a trance. Such people will give negative feedback to any intervention that requires curiosity, excitement, awareness on the edge. For example, if a person was pushed to go over the edge, and then he sits down and says: “What was all that about?” – he may need not to go over the edge, but not to go over it. Maybe now it is more important for him to ignore his secondary process, disagree with it, resist it and sort out his relationship with the spirit. Accordingly, the client's broader therapeutic goals emerge. Is he looking for help to solve the problem? Does he want support in his relationships or in the challenges the world throws at him? Is he interested in developing his second attention and his inner therapist? These deeper needs determine his individual relationship with his edges. Therefore, we as therapists need to consider not only how to move clients across their edges, but also how to help them establish relationships with their edges. When working with people, we should pay attention to their curiosity about themselves; the state of their metacommunicator, notice who it is - the one who works with the process; on the client’s own interest in developing second attention; and finally to their underlying goals of therapy. This is the difference between mindfulness facilitation and therapy. The larger goal of process work is less about helping people access their secondary material and more about facilitating their relationship with their own process. Facilitation means noticing the way people are on the edge, interacting with it, and working with the edge. Keeping your attention on the edge of the negotiation process helps develop your second attention. In situations where a person is working on long-term processes or a life myth, or in a learning context, helping one get over the edge is temporarily helpful but not sustainable. If the therapist begins to try his best - changing channels, offering role-plays, coaxing, using all the abundance of skills in order for the person to grasp the secondary process, the person can have an amazing experience, the meaning of which he is not able to understand, is not able to use, or cannot will be able to reproduce in ordinary reality. Facilitation may seem less useful, more difficult and more distant, compared to therapy and our idea of ​​​​what therapy should be. While helping someone through a chronic crisis may seem beneficial, over the long term it can leave the person feeling insecure and even dependent on the therapist or facilitator. The therapist's involvement in pushing the client over the edge can obscure the relationship between the client and his process; It is on the edge, in a collision with the spirit, that our true nature appears. When we are learning ourselves or training others to be therapists and facilitators, one of the central points of training is to direct the therapeutic focus on the development of the second attention, on the person's relationship with his own nature and his relationship with his surroundings, on his ability to maintain attention, the "alert state ”, being in the midst of the most difficult altered states or complexes. Conclusion The ideas presented here revolve around understanding chronic edges, such as addictions, that require us to develop a second attention. Behavior on the edge is like an addiction, a pattern of unconscious behavior that digs tunnels around a sticky point. If we jump over the edge of the negotiation process, we will never fully develop the skills.