What is Optimal Performance?
What is Optimal Performance?
The Optimal Performance Program provides long-range help and training for people with specific brain, mind or body limitations or ailments who need to improve, correct or manage the condition. People entering this program are here to improve themselves and become the very best they can be. In essence, we help children and adults to become “Stars in their Own Lives”.
In particular, the program is designed to address:
What the Inner Act Optimal Performance Program Offers:
- Improved focus and attention
- Reduced fear and anxiety
- Improved ability to shift focus and to self correct
- Ability to self regulate attention and manage emotions in the presence of change and turbulence
- Improved inner management of tone and emotional responses
- Improved inner organization
- Ability to quickly return to the present
- Ability to more readily accept change
- Ability to mediate your inner critic
- Reduced irritability
- Greater connection to self and others
 Can Neurofeedback Therapy Help the Young?
The answer to this question is a resounding yes! The Inner Act approach balances the use of Neurofeedback with a series of relaxation and physiological techniques specially tailored for children and young adults. The young brain responds rapidly and comprehensively to the training, allowing long lasting resolutions to functional issues.
The Inner Act approach is “child friendly”. Every child is treated as “special”. Each child walks through our door knowing they are coming for optimal performance training. They share their concerns and worries, and practice relaxation while sitting in a comfortable chair. The process takes one hour, twice a week.
For part of the session, they are able to listen to their favorite music, read, play cards or watch a movie. Whenever they are daydreaming, fidgeting, worrying or locked into a fixed brain pattern, the feedback is interrupted. Soon, they learn that the more consistent their breathing is and the more relaxed they become, the easier it is to keep the feedback going.
“I have come an incredible distance since the time when I felt depression was the only truth in my life. I have an immense amount of gratitude for Rae, for my own uniqueness, which I once hated, and for my simple existence on this planet.."
—"Jennifer"
Click here to read a story about a client who suffered with severe depression and anxiety, Jennifer's Story.
 ADD & Attention
Inner Act’s system is well suited to children and adults with ADD and attention issues. In the case of children, it is immediately apparent when they have difficulty focusing and staying on task.
How does Inner Act’s Treatment Method Differ from Conventional Treatment of ADD?
In conventional medicine, the standardized treatment for ADD is to prescribe stimulant medication exclusively to remedy all behavioral and academic problems. This approach may cause unwanted short or event long-term side effects.
There are very effective alternatives to drugs when treating ADD. The Inner Act approach has had great success utilizing Neurofeedback (link), Interactive Metronome™ (link) and other modalities to create permanent improvement.
What separates the Inner Act Optimal Performance System from other performance training is the centrality of EEG Biofeedback or Neurofeedback into the training framework. Biofeedback or Neurofeedback are used either instead of or along with medication. Instant and specific feedback on the qualities of brain/mind allows the client to dissolve obstacles to full achievement.
This clinically effective program teaches ADD clients to control their brain waves, regulate specific levels of arousal and awareness within the brain, and sustain those changes indefinitely. It makes the brain more “flexible” and improves its ability to enrich cognitive/intellectual functioning, and enhance relaxation, concentration and focus. In countless cases, ADD clients have been able to reduce their use of psychotropic drugs, or eliminate them altogether.
“For the past five years, the teachers have complained James wasn’t focused. This year he received a glowing report card: He’s attentive, focused, and organized! Compared to past reports it’s almost as if they are talking about a different child, and I suppose in a sense they are! Thank You!”
—A West Hartford Parent
At Inner Act, we are interested in the client’s experiences with attention over a period of time. Of most importance is how the client feels about difficulty in attending and their identification as someone who is “different”. While we are interested in all of the efforts the individual has made, our primary focus is their willingness to engage and commit fully to the training, because this is a major determinant of a successful outcome.
 Stress and Fear
Anxiety and Depression
Everyday life is filled with pressure, deadlines, and uncertainty. While you may be able to “handle it” most of the time, there is often a cost ranging from a general inability to truly enjoy life, to the extreme of living with mood shifts that make it nearly impossible to live a happy, productive life.
Anxiety, depression, stress and fear are the body and mind’s response to any pressure that disrupts its normal balance. It occurs when our perception of events doesn’t meet our expectations and we are unable to manage our reaction. It may seem as though outside events are the source of the disturbance, but in fact these imbalances are really caused by our emotional reactions to events.
Inner Act’s Optimal Performance Program will show you how to open your mind and conquer anxiety, depression, stress and fear safely, without drugs, using advanced Neurofeedback techniques.
Take This Simple Test:
- Do you have trouble sleeping, or, on the other extreme, do you hate to get out of bed and face the world?
- Do you lack energy?
- Do you frequently or always feel anxious, nervous, or panicky?
- Have you lost interest in things you once enjoyed?
- Do you feel sad, depressed, or “down” most of the time, especially when you are unoccupied?
- Do stressful situations give you headaches, body aches, or an upset stomach?
- Do you dread social contact? Do you think that you don’t “fit in”?
- Do small things “set you off”?
- Do you have uncontrollable feelings of hopelessness and despair that last for long periods of time?
- Do you cry easily and often?
If you answered yes to many of the above questions, then you should seek treatment.
How Does Inner Act’s Program Help?
Anxiety, mood swings, sadness and fear become entrenched patterns in the brain. Repetitive thoughts, irritations, sadness, judgments and patterns are “locked” in the brain’s timing. Thus the initial response to change and to the environment becomes “fixed”. Most people see these reactions as normal or unchangeable but, in fact, it is quite possible to reprogram your responses and clear out these old, stuck patterns.
In the Optimal Performance Program, you will learn the Relaxation Process and concurrently begin your Neurofeedback training. Your brain will use visual and auditory information to re-organize itself and release old patterns of “stuckness”. The result is effortless. Fears, anxieties and mood instabilities will begin to diminish. You will feel more clear and present in your daily life, experiencing a greater ability for focus and awareness and an increased sense of lightness and joy. The training also utilizes Mental Imagery, Open Focus®, Inner Journey work, and Coaching. To learn more about these components click here. (Link to The Inner Act Program section)
 The Stressed Child
Stress and anxiety are not limited to adults.
Pressure to succeed, frequent exposure to graphic violence, low self esteem and an unrelenting array of social pressures are causing children to experience the harmful effects of stress - and it’s happening earlier and earlier in their lives. Psychologists and psychiatrists across the nation have attributed this growing phenomenon to the unrelenting pressure being exerted on today's youth by the society they live in.
In his four part series for the Hartford Courant (December 15 -18, 2006) entitled "Generation Stress," Andrew Julien explains that children are showing up “close to tears in the offices of psychologists, psychiatrists and social workers” or worse, in hospital emergency rooms. He states that these children are “debilitated by depression, overwhelmed by anxiety, desperate to get back to the simple joys of childhood."
"If this were an infectious disease, we would call it an epidemic." says Joseph Woolston, Chief of Child Psychiatry at Yale-New Haven Hospital.
Components of the Six-Step Inner Act Program
The Relaxation Process teaches you to enter and hold at will a relaxed state of readiness.
Open Focus® teaches flexibility of attention, reinforces your ability to enter a state of readiness while inhibiting self judgment and inner dialogue. Click here to hear an excerpt of Open Focus.
Neurofeedback Training teaches you to regulate your thoughts, attention and energy. You learn to recognize when you are drifting, overwhelmed in thought, over analyzing and stuck and gain the ability to return yourself to a balanced state at will.
Inner Journey Work teaches you how to transform negative thinking, inner commentary and failures into success using cognitive and experiential techniques.
Mental Imagery Every high achieving person imagines their achievements before they happen. Through Mental Imagery, you learn how to enter a relaxed state, narrow your focus, and hold the desired imagery in your mind’s eye.
One-on-One Coaching Each person's challenges are different. Once you have the basics the program in place, we work one-on-one to optimize and solidify your long-term success. The coaching helps you remain consistent in your “presence” during performance, and to track your pre-, during- and post-performance use of the program’s tools.
Other Training Methods and Techniques We Utilize
The Interactive Metronome combines the concept of a musical metronome with a patented technology program that accurately measures, assesses and improves a person’s rhythm and timing.
Heart Math® provides a set of tools for managing your emotions and performance. It is based on complex research on heart rate variability, the brain and the nervous system, yet very easy to understand and apply.
Balancing techniques for "mental toughness" and stress reduction
You will be introduced to and taught techniques such as autogenics, progressive muscle relaxation, and how to place yourself in a highly focused and relaxed state with the use of an auto cue.
Building Inner Resources
To make the study and execution of your area of expertise easier and more productive, it is essential to establish goals and time-to-practice strategies. Knowing how to use nutrition, exercise and mental strategy to prepare for performance is vital to success.
 How the Optimal Performance Program Retrains the Brain
Every client that comes to Inner Act receives a program plan that is customized to his or her specific needs and goals. Our programs are flexible, ranging from intensives lasting a week or two to weekly sessions over an extended period of time.
On your first visit, a trained therapist will interview you to learn about your needs, concerns and goals. Prior assessments and diagnoses are considered at this time. We then use a decision tree to identify which conditions we should approach first. Based on the chosen protocol, we then select the appropriate Biofeedback instruments and learning tools. |
