Brainspotting is a psychotherapeutic tool that uses gaze, body awareness and focused attention to explore emotions, memories and experiences, particularly when they can be difficult to put into words.
We use our eyes more often than we realise
Have you ever noticed where your eyes tend to go when you’re trying to remember something? You might gaze into the distance, look downwards or find yourself staring at a single point while trying to retrieve a memory or think about something emotional. This happens so naturally that most of us rarely notice we’re doing it.
Studies into autobiographical memory have found that eye movements occur during the recollection of personal memories and may play a part in our ability to recall their visual details. [1] How we use and interpret gaze is also influenced by culture, and focused visual attention has appeared within contemplative, ceremonial and embodied practices across cultures for centuries. The relationship we have with our gaze therefore stretches much further back than its use within contemporary psychotherapy.
What is Brainspotting?
Brainspotting is a contemporary form of psychotherapy that works specifically with the relationship between where we focus our gaze and what we experience internally. One of its fundamental principles is that where we look can influence how we feel, so by allowing the gaze to settle on a particular point, we have another way to explore what may be happening emotionally and physically. This can be particularly interesting when words only seem to tell part of the story.
We may know that a situation affects us, or even understand exactly why it does, while still experiencing emotions or physical reactions that are harder to explain. Brainspotting allows those different aspects of an experience to be explored together rather than relying entirely on conversation.
What happens during a Brainspotting session?
A typical session begins with a challenge, pattern or trauma that you would like to explore more deeply. This might include a past event or memory, anxiety connected with something happening now, a repeated emotional reaction, a relationship difficulty or simply a feeling that you struggle to articulate. You may be asked to consider the intensity of what you’re feeling and notice whether there are any physical sensations, such as muscle tension, warmth, heaviness or discomfort, as you think about the situation. You will then be guided through different points within your visual field and asked to notice whether your response changes.
Once you find a point where there appears to be a stronger sense of awareness or connection with what you’re exploring, your gaze can remain there while you observe what follows. Although you can continue talking during Brainspotting, you don’t need to fill the session with conversation. As you remain with the experience, thoughts may emerge alongside physical sensations, emotions, memories, images or unexpected associations. This gives you time to follow what comes up without having to immediately find an explanation for every response.
Why can gazing at a specific point affect us?
The relationship between our eyes and memory is particularly fascinating. A 2025 systematic review investigating eye movements during autobiographical recall found that eye movements may reflect the retrieval of visual mental imagery and may also play a functional role in retrieving visual details from personal memories. [1] Other studies have explored the wider relationship between eye movements, attention and emotional memory.
In many ways, this connects with something we already experience in daily life. Remembering an event isn’t always a purely verbal process where we retrieve a narrative and repeat it internally. A memory can include an image, a physical reaction, an emotion or a tiny sensory detail that suddenly makes the experience feel much closer. We can also understand an event extremely well on an intellectual level while still noticing a strong response when something reminds us of it.
Brainspotting provides a way of paying attention to these different aspects of an experience together. Instead of relying solely on finding the right words, someone can notice what happens through their gaze and body alongside their thoughts and emotions. For people who recognise that something is affecting them but struggle to articulate exactly what they’re experiencing or why, that can provide another way into the conversation.
Sources
[1] Eye movements during autobiographical memory retrieval: A systematic review, 2025.
PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39904842/
Please note: This article is for general interest only. If anything you’re experiencing is concerning you, please speak with your GP.
Jo Lothian is Seed’s Brainspotting & TRE Practitioner located in Beaconsfield. For more info visit www.seedwellness.co.uk/jolothian
