Imagine the human mind as a vast landscape: mountains rising with memory, valleys etched by loss, rivers carrying both pain and possibility. Trauma, when it strikes, is like a sudden flood that reshapes the terrain. Long after the deluge has passed, the debris still remains. Stones scattered. Trees uprooted. The river still carrying sediment that muddies the water.
Trauma-focused therapies such as EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) and Brainspotting (BSP) are two approaches designed to help the mind’s river run more clearly, to loosen what is stuck, and to allow healing currents to flow freely again. They are different in method, yet similar in spirit.
For Christians, both rivers ultimately flow toward the same ocean: the healing presence and restoration of Christ. As Psalm 23 reminds us, “He restores my soul; He leads me in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.” Both of these tools can be paths that God uses to restore the soul, tending to places where trauma has left its mark.
Let us wander along their banks together, noticing where they parallel each other and where they diverge, guided by metaphor and image.
A Shared Source: The Roots of EMDR and Brainspotting
Both EMDR and BSP spring from the same underground well: the recognition that trauma is not merely a story we remember but a living imprint woven into body and brain. Trauma is not only “in the past.” It echoes in the nervous system, woven into reflex, posture, even gaze.
Where traditional talk therapy sometimes feels like trying to describe the river without ever stepping into the water, these approaches invite us into the current itself. They access the subcortical layers of the brain — the places where words often cannot reach. They are experiential rather than purely cognitive, somatic as much as psychological.
The science and the Spirit are not in competition. God designed our brains and bodies with remarkable healing potential. Both interventions can be seen as ways of cooperating with the Creator’s design. As Philippians 1:6 assures us, “He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”
Both EMDR and BSP agree: healing requires more than talking and thinking differently. It requires touching the very places where memory has frozen, where the river still holds debris.
EMDR Explained: The Rhythm of the Oars
EMDR was developed by Francine Shapiro in the 1980s. It is well-researched, highly structured, and recognized across the world for its effectiveness in treating PTSD and trauma.
If trauma is a river jammed with branches, EMDR offers a boat with a set of oars, helping to navigate a way through. The therapist sits with you, guiding the pace of the strokes. Back and forth. Side to side. A bilateral movement — eyes shifting from left to right, sometimes through light or finger taps, sometimes with tones or taps on the body.
This rhythmic motion is intentional, not accidental. Just as REM sleep processes fragments of experience through the flickering of the eyes, EMDR uses bilateral stimulation to open up the brain’s natural pathways for integration. The motion acts like gentle rowing: pulling us across the waters of memory, stroke by stroke, until the debris begins to loosen and flow downstream.
An EMDR session feels structured and rhythmic. There are phases: history taking, preparation, identifying target memories, desensitization, reprocessing pain, installation of positive beliefs, body scan, closure, and reevaluation. The experience can be intense. Old memories surface, accompanied by raw sensation. But as the oars continue their cadence, the distress gradually softens. Many describe EMDR as “watching the old film dissolve,” or as finally floating past a whirlpool that once kept them spinning in circles.
Brainspotting Explained: The Stillness of the Pool
If EMDR is rowing, BSP is more like finding a still pool in the river and sitting at its edge until the waters reveal what lies beneath.
BSP emerged from EMDR’s current. David Grand, one of EMDR’s practitioners, noticed something intriguing. Clients’ eyes would “stick” at certain points during EMDR, as if a hidden tether anchored them there. When he paused and allowed them to rest on that fixed gaze, profound emotional material surfaced, often more directly than with rhythmic eye movements.
From this observation, BSP was born.
Instead of rowing across the river, the therapist helps the client locate a brainspot — a point in the visual field that corresponds to an internal knot of trauma or emotional intensity. Once the spot is found, the client holds the gaze there, and together therapist and client stay present in that quiet pool of attention. The theory is that eye position connects to deep subcortical processes, and that holding this gaze opens a doorway to the body’s implicit memory.
The session is less structured than EMDR, more open-ended. The therapist provides attunement — like a companion sitting silently beside you at the water’s edge — offering presence and containment as the client’s nervous system unwinds in its own rhythm. Rather than rowing, there is watching, waiting, allowing the depths to surface on their own.
Some clients find BSP gentler and less directive, like letting the river teach you its own song. Others find it more intense, since there is nowhere to row — only to sit with what arises, in stillness, until the body releases it.
Shared Currents: What EMDR and Brainspotting Have in Common
- Have a somatic focus and honor the body’s wisdom: They recognize that trauma lives in the nervous system, not just in memory, and that healing requires engaging the body as much as the mind.
- Access the subcortical brain: Instead of relying solely on conscious thought, they touch the deeper circuits where trauma is stored — limbic and brainstem layers that hold implicit memory.
- Bypass the overthinking mind: Words alone often cannot free trauma. These approaches move through sensation, gaze, rhythm, and awareness, allowing experiences to shift without needing elaborate verbal explanation.
- Use nonlinear healing: Both recognize that healing is not a straight line but a spiral, with waves of emotion rising and falling.
- Utilize therapist as a guide: In both, the therapist is not the “healer” but a steady presence, facilitating the client’s own innate healing mechanisms.
- Lead toward integration: This is so important! Whether through the rhythm of bilateral stimulation or the stillness of a brainspot, both approaches seek to unfreeze what is stuck and reintegrate fragments of experience into a coherent whole. Fractured parts coming together into wholeness.
If we extend the river metaphor, both EMDR and BSP help remove debris so the waters may run more freely. Both believe the river already knows how to flow; therapy’s task is to support the release of what blocks it.
Diverging Springs: Where EMDR and Brainspotting Differ
- Movement vs. Stillness: EMDR uses rhythmic bilateral movement to stimulate processing, like oars propelling the boat across. BSP holds a still gaze, allowing depth to rise like fish surfacing in a quiet pool.
- Structure vs. Fluidity and Openness: EMDR follows a set protocol with defined phases. BSP is less linear, more improvisational, guided by the therapist’s attunement and the client’s unfolding process.
- Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up: EMDR involves both cognitive reflection and bodily processing. BSP leans heavily into bottom-up processing, bypassing thought and letting the body lead.
- Directive vs. Non-Directive: EMDR often requires the therapist to guide and direct the process. BSP leans on relational presence, with the therapist tracking subtle cues and holding space more than steering.
- Conscious Cognition vs. Felt Experience: EMDR integrates cognitive elements — identifying negative beliefs and installing positive cognitions. BSP emphasizes somatic and emotional release, less tied to explicit reprocessing of thoughts.
Neither is “better.” They are different vessels for different travelers. Some may need the rowing (the rhythmic structure, the clear path across). Others may need the still pool (the quiet attunement, the gentle depth). And some may benefit from both in different chapters of their journey.
How It Feels: Choosing Between EMDR and Brainspotting
EMDR may suit those who:
- Feel reassured by structure and step-by-step guidance.
- Like having a clear map and rhythm to follow.
- Benefit from an evidence-based, widely recognized approach.
This client steps into the boat, guided by the therapist’s steady rowing. The stones are lifted one by one, examined, and set back into the river where the current carries them away. “It felt like moving through an old film reel,” they might say. “The scenes lost their grip, like they were no longer mine to carry.”
BSP may suit those who:
- Are comfortable with stillness and deep body awareness.
- Want a less directive, more exploratory process.
- Struggle to put experiences into words but can feel them deeply.
This client sits beside the quiet pool, eyes fixed on a point where the water darkens. At first there is silence. Then bubbles rise feelings long buried, sensations unnamed. The stones begin to dissolve, not through motion but through presence. “It was like my body remembered for me,” they may whisper. “I didn’t have to think it through. I just let it happen.”
So there you have it. Two rivers. Two ways of release.
Both leading to lighter hands and freer hearts. Ultimately, it is less about choosing the “right” river and more about finding the one whose current feels most natural. EMDR and BSP may differ in rhythm and style, but both honor the truth that the body holds stories the mind cannot tell, and both trust in the profound resilience of the human spirit.
Written by Kegan Mosier, M.A, LPC, Clinical Supervisor, Internship Program Director
Take the Next Step in Your Healing Journey
Talking to someone who understands can make a world of difference. At Cornerstone Christian Counseling, we believe that asking for help is a reflection of God’s plan for us to live in the freedom He’s called us to.
If this blog resonated with you and you’re seeking help with anxiety, depression, PTSD, panic attacks, and other types of trauma, we are here for you. We’ll help choose the right form of therapy that best fits your needs, whether it’s EMDR, brainspotting, or another modality. With the right support, things really can get better.
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