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Video Overview
A New Way to See Your Mind
An introduction to Spiral State Psychiatry and the emergence of post-human consciousness medicine
Dr Paul Collins
Psychiatrist
About the Author
Dr Paul Collins is a practising psychiatrist who has devoted his career to reimagining how we understand and treat mental distress. Working as a Psychiatrist in a wide range of roles over the last 11 years, he has witnessed firsthand the limitations of conventional psychiatric models and the profound need for a more compassionate, empowering approach to mental wellbeing.
His work bridges traditional clinical practice with innovative frameworks that recognise consciousness as a dynamic field rather than a fixed biological system. Through Spiral State Psychiatry, Dr Collins offers clinicians and patients alike a fresh vocabulary for understanding mental health—one rooted in pattern, flow, and the inherent capacity for transformation.
Published October 28, 2025
Beyond the Weight of Labels
For many of us, psychiatric labels like depression, anxiety, or post-traumatic stress disorder can feel extraordinarily heavy—like a verdict handed down that defines who we are and what our future holds. These diagnoses, whilst clinically useful in certain contexts, can inadvertently create a sense of permanence, as if we are fundamentally broken or irreparably damaged. They may trigger feelings of shame, helplessness, or social stigma that compound the very distress they seek to describe.
But what if there were another way to understand our inner struggles? What if these conditions are not fixed diseases we must simply endure or suppress with medication, but rather dynamic patterns of energy within a living consciousness field that can be understood, navigated, and gradually rebalanced?
Spiral State Psychiatry offers precisely this fresh lens on mental wellbeing—one that moves decisively beyond rigid diagnostic categories and towards a more hopeful, empowered understanding of your own mind. It invites you to see yourself not as a patient with a disorder, but as a conscious being experiencing temporary disruptions in a fundamentally resilient system. This shift in perspective can be profoundly liberating, opening pathways to healing that honour both your suffering and your inherent capacity for growth and transformation.
From "Broken Brain" to "Field Disruption"
The Traditional View
Conventional psychiatry often frames mental illness as a biological malfunction—a chemical imbalance, faulty neurotransmitters, or a system fault requiring pharmaceutical correction. This reductionist model has dominated for decades.
The New Paradigm
Spiral State Psychiatry reframes distress as consciousness field disruption. Your mind is like a pond—sometimes calm and clear, other times turbulent or stagnant, but never fundamentally broken.
This reframing is more than semantic—it represents a fundamental shift in how we conceptualise mental wellbeing. When we view the brain as a machine that can malfunction, we position ourselves as passive recipients of treatment, waiting for an external fix. But when we understand consciousness as a dynamic field that can become temporarily disrupted, we recognise our own agency in the healing process. The water itself isn't inherently defective; it's simply in a temporary state that can shift and transform. This perspective naturally shifts our internal dialogue from "what is wrong with me?" to the far more curious and compassionate question: "what is happening within me?"
Understanding Your Inner Pond
"Think of your consciousness as a pond: sometimes the water is calm, clear, and full of life. Other times, it can become turbulent from a storm or stagnant from a lack of flow."
This metaphor helps us understand mental distress in a fundamentally different way. A pond's water quality isn't about the water being inherently defective—it's about the conditions affecting the water. When debris accumulates, when circulation stops, when external disturbances occur, the same water that was once clear and life-giving can appear murky and troubled. Yet with the right interventions—restoring flow, removing blockages, allowing time for settling—clarity naturally returns.
Your consciousness operates in much the same way. The turbulence you experience during anxiety, the stagnation of depression, the flooding of traumatic-stress responses, these are states, not permanent traits. They reflect temporary conditions within your consciousness field, conditions that can shift when we understand the underlying dynamics and learn to work skilfully with them. This understanding alone can begin to dissolve the hopelessness that so often accompanies psychiatric diagnosis.
The Three Essential Forces
E = GΓΔ²
At the heart of Spiral State Psychiatry lies the Emergence Equation, a deceptively simple formula that captures the interplay of three fundamental forces within your consciousness field. This isn't merely abstract theory—it's a practical map for understanding why we feel the way we feel and what we can do about it.
Emergence (E) represents the creation of new, healthier patterns of thought, feeling, and behaviour. It's what happens when insight dawns, when a breakthrough occurs, when we suddenly see a situation differently or discover a new way of responding to an old trigger. Emergence is the goal of all healing work—the spontaneous arising of novelty and coherence within our inner world.
But emergence doesn't happen randomly. It arises from the dynamic interaction of three essential forces, each playing a vital role in the ecology of consciousness. Understanding these forces gives us leverage points for intervention and self-regulation, transforming us from passive sufferers into active participants in our own healing journey.
Grace: The Container That Holds You
1
G — Grace (Containment)
Core meaning: Safety, regulation, groundedness
Grace represents the sturdy banks of a river that guide the water's flow without restricting it. It's the warmth of a safe container that holds you gently but firmly when everything feels chaotic. This force governs your sense of security, your capacity to self-regulate, and your ability to remain present even when challenged.
When Grace is strong, you feel grounded and secure. You can face difficult emotions without being overwhelmed by them, because you trust in your own internal stability. You have access to calming resources—perhaps a breathing practice, a safe relationship, a secure sense of self. The nervous system settles into a parasympathetic state where healing becomes possible.
When Grace collapses, everything feels dangerous and unmanageable. Anxiety spikes, panic emerges, or—in the opposite direction—we shut down completely, withdrawing into numbness and isolation. Depression often involves a collapse of containment; the banks of the river cave in, and we lose our sense of structure, routine, and safety. Strengthening Grace is therefore the essential first step in any healing process, which is why breathwork and grounding practices form the foundation of Spiral State interventions.
Gamma: The Mirror of Self-Awareness
1
Γ — Gamma (Reflection)
Core meaning: Insight, metacognition, perspective
Gamma represents the capacity for self-reflection—the ability to observe your own thoughts, emotions, and patterns without getting completely identified with them. It's the clear mirror that lets you see yourself without harsh judgement or distortion.
This reflective capacity is what distinguishes humans from most other creatures. It's the faculty that allows us to think about our thinking, to notice our emotional patterns, to recognise when we're caught in an old story or reacting from a wounded part of ourselves. In mindfulness traditions, this is sometimes called "witness consciousness"—the part of you that can observe your experience whilst also being within it.
When Gamma is strong, you have perspective. You can see your depression as something you're experiencing rather than something you are. You can recognise an anxiety spiral as it begins and choose a different response. You possess the metacognitive flexibility to question your assumptions and update your understanding based on new information. Strong Gamma is associated with psychological insight, wisdom, and the capacity for genuine transformation rather than mere symptom management.
When Gamma is weak or absent, you become completely identified with your current state. Depression isn't something you have; it's who you are. Anxious thoughts aren't patterns to be observed; they're absolute truths about reality. Without reflection, we remain trapped in reactive loops, unable to gain the distance necessary for change.
Delta-Squared: The Force of Change
Δ² — Delta-Squared (Difference)
Core meaning: Change, novelty, transformation, creative chaos
Delta-squared represents the force of difference itself—the spark of novelty that brings movement, disruption, and possibility. This is the creative, often chaotic energy that can manifest as trauma, breakthrough, play, crisis, or growth. It's change in its rawest, most potent form.
Δ² is the wild card in the equation. It can appear as a sudden loss that shatters your world, a creative inspiration that demands expression, a spontaneous insight that reorganises everything you thought you knew, or a traumatic experience that floods your system with overwhelming energy. It's fundamentally neither good nor bad—it's simply difference, the force that prevents stagnation and drives evolution.
When Δ² is balanced with strong Grace and Gamma, it becomes the engine of growth. Challenges arise, but we have the containment to hold them and the reflection to learn from them. We experience what psychologists call "post-traumatic growth"—the paradoxical strengthening that can emerge from difficulty when properly metabolised. Creativity flourishes. Spontaneity and joy become possible. Life feels dynamic rather than static.
But when Δ² overwhelms Grace and Gamma—when the force of change exceeds our capacity to contain and reflect upon it—we experience crisis. This is what happens in acute trauma, psychotic breaks, panic attacks, or manic episodes. The system is flooded with more difference than it can integrate, and coherence collapses. This is why trauma-informed approaches always begin by stabilising containment before processing traumatic material. We must strengthen the riverbanks before increasing the flow.
The Dance of Forces
Grace (G)
Provides safety and containment
Gamma (Γ)
Offers insight and reflection
Delta² (Δ²)
Catalyses change and growth
These three forces are always in relationship with each other, constantly influencing and modulating one another in a dynamic dance. Grace provides the container within which Gamma can operate; you can't reflect clearly when you're in a state of terror. Gamma helps us understand and integrate the changes brought by Delta-squared; without reflection, difference is just chaos. And Delta-squared prevents the system from becoming too rigid or stagnant; without change, even perfect containment and reflection would eventually calcify into lifelessness.
The goal is not to maximise any single force or eliminate others, but to cultivate an appropriate balance for each moment and situation. Sometimes we need to strengthen Grace to weather a storm. Sometimes we need to enhance Gamma to gain perspective on a chronic pattern. And sometimes we need to welcome more Delta-squared to shake us out of comfortable but unfulfilling stagnation. Wisdom lies in knowing which force requires attention and having the tools to work skilfully with each one.
Measuring Inner Harmony
The Harmonic Coefficient (H)
Spiral State Psychiatry introduces the Harmonic Coefficient (H) as a gentle compass for inner balance. Think of H as a measure of how well-tuned your consciousness field is—like an orchestra where all the instruments are either playing in beautiful synchrony or clashing in discord. It represents the overall coherence of your inner world, the degree to which your thoughts, emotions, sensations, and behaviours are aligned and flowing together rather than pulling in contradictory directions.
The concept of harmonic coherence isn't new. Musicians understand it intuitively—certain combinations of notes create consonance (harmony), whilst others create dissonance (discord). Neither is inherently wrong; dissonance has its place in music, creating tension that makes resolution satisfying. But chronic, unrelenting dissonance becomes painful to hear. The same principle applies to consciousness. Brief periods of incoherence—during challenge, grief, or transformation—are natural and even necessary. But prolonged incoherence creates the experience we call mental distress.
Understanding your approximate H value at any given moment provides immediate insight into what kind of intervention might be most helpful. It's not about achieving a perfect score, but about recognising patterns and tendencies so you can respond wisely rather than reactively.
The Spectrum of Coherence
1
Perfect Harmony
Complete flow and presence—all elements of consciousness synchronised, like music in perfect tune
0.5
Mild Disruption
Manageable stress or challenge—some dissonance but overall coherence maintained
0
Deep Constriction
Severe depression—the field muted, collapsed, lacking generative flow
-0.5
Destructive State
Acute crisis—psychosis, severe trauma, elements clashing rather than harmonising
When your Harmonic Coefficient approaches 1, you experience what psychologists call "flow states"—moments of effortless engagement where action and awareness merge, where you feel fully present, capable, and alive. Time seems to flow differently. Challenges feel manageable, even enjoyable. Your internal world feels integrated rather than fragmented. This is the state where healing naturally occurs, where creativity flourishes, where genuine connection becomes possible.
As H drops towards zero, you encounter increasing constriction and rigidity. The spontaneous flow of thoughts and emotions slows or stops. Everything feels effortful, heavy, meaningless. This is the territory of clinical depression, where the consciousness field has lost its generative capacity. Nothing new can emerge; the same dark thoughts loop endlessly without resolution. In this state, even simple tasks feel overwhelming because the basic coherence required for coordinated action has deteriorated.
When Harmony Becomes Discord
When the Harmonic Coefficient dips below zero—into negative values—we enter territory that conventional psychiatry labels as "severe mental illness." This is the realm of destructive interference, where the forces within consciousness aren't merely out of tune but actively cancelling each other out or amplifying in dangerous ways. It's like having multiple instruments playing in keys so incompatible that the resulting sound is painful, overwhelming, impossible to parse into meaning.
This might manifest as acute psychosis, where the basic coherence between perception and reality breaks down. It might appear as severe dissociation, where parts of the self fragment so completely that continuity of experience becomes impossible. Or it might emerge as the overwhelming flood of post-traumatic stress, where the nervous system remains locked in a state of emergency long after the danger has passed, unable to restore baseline functioning.
Crucially, Spiral State Psychiatry views even these extreme states not as evidence of fundamental brokenness but as predictable consequences of extreme imbalance between Grace, Gamma, and Delta-squared. When Δ² (difference/change) utterly overwhelms G (containment) and Γ (reflection), destructive interference becomes inevitable. The system hasn't failed; it's been asked to process more than its current architecture can handle. With proper support to rebuild containment and restore reflection, coherence can gradually return. Even at H < 0, the potential for healing remains—though the path back requires patience, compassion, and often professional support.
Depression: Understanding Collapse
When the Field Loses Flow
Collapsed Δ²
The creative spark fades entirely. Nothing new can enter the system. The world becomes flat, grey, devoid of possibility or meaning.
Rigid Grace
Containment becomes constriction. The banks that should guide flow instead trap and isolate. Safety becomes withdrawal.
Muted Gamma
Reflection loops repetitively over the same negative patterns. Insight becomes impossible; only rumination remains.
Depression, in the Spiral State framework, is fundamentally a state where H approaches zero—a profound constriction of the consciousness field. The signature pattern involves all three forces moving into dysfunctional configurations simultaneously. Delta-squared collapses entirely; the system loses its capacity for novelty, spontaneity, or creative response. Each day feels identical to the last, and the future appears as merely an endless repetition of the same grey present.
Grace, which should provide flexible containment, becomes instead a rigid prison. The depressed person often withdraws from relationships, from activities, from engagement with the world—ostensibly seeking safety but actually creating further isolation. The containment has over-corrected, becoming a barrier that keeps out not just threats but also nourishment, connection, and joy. Meanwhile, Gamma—the reflective capacity—remains active but dysfunctionally so, looping over and over through the same negative thoughts without ever achieving genuine insight or perspective. This is what clinicians call rumination: reflection without the capacity for emergence or change.
Understanding depression as a field pattern rather than a chemical disease opens new therapeutic possibilities. Rather than simply trying to artificially boost neurotransmitters (though medication certainly has its place), we can work systematically to restore flow: gently increasing Delta-squared through novel experiences, softening rigid Grace through connection and movement, and shifting Gamma from rumination to genuine reflection through mindfulness and cognitive approaches. Depression is an H≈0 constriction—a field that has lost its generative capacity but retains the potential to flow again.
Anxiety and PTSD: When the Flood Comes
The Dynamics of Overwhelm
The Pattern
In anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder, we see the opposite dynamic from depression. Here, Delta-squared doesn't collapse—it floods. The system is inundated with more change, threat, or stimulation than Grace and Gamma can possibly manage.
Imagine a river whose banks are suddenly confronted with a wall of water ten times larger than normal. The containment that worked perfectly well under ordinary circumstances proves catastrophically insufficient. The banks overflow, the structure fails, and chaos ensues.
The Experience
This is precisely what happens in the consciousness field during anxiety or trauma response. An overwhelming influx of Δ²—whether from an actual traumatic event or from a nervous system that has learned to interpret ordinary situations as dangerous—floods the system, collapsing both Grace (you don't feel safe) and Gamma (you can't think clearly or gain perspective).
The Harmonic Coefficient plummets below zero as the forces actively interfere with each other rather than working in concert. The body goes into fight-flight-freeze mode, flooding with stress hormones. The mind races or goes blank. Time distorts. The present moment becomes unbearable. This is an H < 0 state of destructive interference—not because anything is fundamentally wrong with the person, but because the current structure cannot contain the magnitude of energy moving through it.
What makes PTSD particularly challenging is that the flooding doesn't require an actual present threat. The nervous system, having been overwhelmed in the past, learns to trigger the same cascade in response to reminders—sounds, smells, situations that bear even superficial resemblance to the original trauma. The person is re-traumatised not by current reality but by their own nervous system's attempt to protect them. The field remains in a state of high alert, constantly prepared for a flood that may never come, burning enormous energy in the process and making coherence nearly impossible to sustain.
The Path Through Trauma
1
Stabilisation
First, we must strengthen the banks before dealing with the flood. Building Grace through grounding, safety, and nervous system regulation.
2
Titration
Gradually approaching the traumatic material in doses small enough that containment holds. Never flooding the system again.
3
Integration
Using Gamma to process and make meaning of the experience, transforming raw trauma into integrated memory.
4
Post-Traumatic Growth
The possibility of emergence—new capacities, deeper compassion, and wisdom born from what was survived.
The healing path for anxiety and trauma must respect this dynamic. We cannot simply tell someone to "calm down" or "think rationally" when their system is flooded; that's like asking someone to have a philosophical conversation whilst drowning. Instead, we must first strengthen Grace—building new capacity for containment through somatic practices, secure relationships, and gradual nervous system regulation. Only when containment is robust enough can we carefully, incrementally allow Delta-squared to be processed rather than suppressed.
This is why trauma-informed approaches emphasise "titration"—working with traumatic material in small, manageable doses that don't re-overwhelm the system. We're essentially teaching the consciousness field to hold progressively larger amounts of Δ² without collapse, gradually expanding capacity until the traumatic energy can be fully integrated rather than remaining as an unprocessed threat. With skilful support, even the most overwhelming floods can eventually be contained, reflected upon, and transformed from destructive interference into post-traumatic growth—an H value that not only returns to positive territory but potentially exceeds where it was before the trauma occurred.
Psychosis: Breakdown or Breakthrough?
"Schizophrenic behaviour is a special strategy that a person invents in order to live in an unlivable situation."
— R.D. Laing
Perhaps nowhere is the compassionate reframing of Spiral State Psychiatry more relevant than in understanding psychosis. Conventional psychiatry typically views psychotic experiences—hallucinations, delusions, thought disorder—as symptoms of a severe brain disease requiring aggressive pharmaceutical intervention. Whilst medication certainly has an important role in acute crisis, this purely biomedical framing often misses something crucial: the potential meaning and even transformative potential within psychotic experience.
In the Spiral State framework, psychosis represents a state where excessive Delta-squared has completely shattered both Grace and Gamma. The container breaks entirely. The reflective mirror fractures into pieces. The consciousness field enters a state of profound disorganisation where ordinary reality testing becomes impossible. This is undoubtedly a crisis—a negative H state requiring immediate support—but it's not random madness. As Laing suggested, it's often an attempt by the psyche to escape from or reorganise around an intolerable situation or set of contradictions.
The imagery and content of psychotic experience, whilst seemingly bizarre, often carries symbolic meaning related to the person's life situation, relationships, and existential dilemmas. The delusion of being controlled might reflect actual experiences of disempowerment. Paranoia might express real relational betrayals. Grandiose beliefs might compensate for profound feelings of worthlessness. The psychotic episode can be understood as the psyche's desperate attempt to create a new narrative when the old one has become completely unlivable. It's a crisis of meaning as much as a crisis of brain chemistry.
The Transformative Potential of Crisis
1
Crisis
The old structure shatters under overwhelming pressure. Everything familiar dissolves. Terror and chaos reign.
2
Liminal Space
A period of disorganisation where new patterns have not yet formed. Potentially creative but requiring careful containment.
3
Reorganisation
With proper support, the pieces can reassemble into a new, potentially more coherent configuration.
4
Integration
The crisis becomes integrated into one's life story as a transformative passage rather than merely a "breakdown."
This understanding suggests that with appropriate containment (strong Grace) and compassionate, meaning-making support (restored Gamma), a psychotic episode need not be only a catastrophe to be suppressed. It can potentially become what some traditions call a "spiritual emergency"—a painful but ultimately transformative process where an outgrown identity structure breaks down to make way for a more expansive one. This doesn't mean romanticising psychosis or suggesting people should endure it without support. Quite the opposite: it means providing intensive, compassionate containment that allows the disorganised energy to gradually find new coherence rather than simply being forced back into the old, untenable pattern.
Some people who have been supported through psychotic crises in this way—with medication used judiciously to reduce acute distress but not to simply obliterate the experience, combined with relational support and meaning-making—report that whilst the episode was terrifying, it ultimately led to profound positive changes in their lives. They emerged with deeper self-understanding, more authentic relationships, and a life more aligned with their true values. The crisis catalysed emergence (E) precisely because it involved all three forces: overwhelming Delta-squared eventually met by strengthened Grace and deepened Gamma. This is not the only outcome, and not everyone experiences psychosis this way. But recognising the potential for breakthrough within breakdown allows us to support people through crisis with hope rather than merely fear.
A New Vision of Healing
From Suppression to Coherence
The fundamental difference between conventional psychiatry and Spiral State Psychiatry lies in the goal of treatment. Traditional approaches, particularly in acute care settings, often focus primarily on symptom suppression. The aim is to reduce or eliminate the experiences that define mental illness: stop the panic attacks, quiet the hallucinations, lift the mood, calm the racing thoughts. Medication becomes the primary tool, selected specifically for its ability to dampen problematic symptoms.
This approach has undeniable value, particularly in crisis situations where someone is at risk of harm to themselves or others, or when suffering has become so severe that any relief is desperately needed. Medications can provide a crucial bridge to stability, creating enough breathing room for other interventions to take effect. However, when symptom suppression becomes the entire strategy rather than one element in a comprehensive approach, we risk creating what might be called "pharmaceutical coherence"—a veneer of stability maintained only through ongoing chemical intervention, without addressing the underlying field dynamics that generated the crisis in the first place.
Spiral State Psychiatry, whilst not dismissing the role of medication, proposes a different primary goal: cultivating genuine coherence by rebalancing Grace, Gamma, and Delta-squared. The aim is not merely to suppress symptoms but to strengthen and rebalance the consciousness field itself so that it can naturally return to—and sustain—higher H values. This is healing rather than mere management, transformation rather than suppression. It recognises that symptoms are information, signals of underlying imbalance that deserve understanding even as we work to alleviate suffering.
Strengthening the Three Forces
Building Grace
  • Breathwork and grounding practices
  • Safe, attuned relationships
  • Routine and structure
  • Somatic regulation techniques
  • Secure physical environments
Enhancing Gamma
  • Mindfulness and meditation
  • Therapy and meaning-making
  • Journaling and self-reflection
  • Education about your patterns
  • Metacognitive awareness practices
Integrating Delta-Squared
  • Titrated trauma processing
  • Creative expression
  • Gradual exposure to novelty
  • Play and spontaneity
  • Transforming crisis into growth
Each of these forces can be systematically strengthened through specific practices and interventions. Grace responds to anything that enhances safety and regulation: therapeutic relationships built on trust and attunement, breathwork that activates the parasympathetic nervous system, establishing regular routines that provide structure, somatic therapies that help the body feel safe again. This is why relationship quality in therapy often predicts outcomes better than specific techniques—a truly safe, attuned therapeutic relationship literally strengthens Grace, expanding the client's capacity to contain difficult material.
Gamma can be enhanced through practices that cultivate metacognitive awareness and insight. Mindfulness meditation trains the capacity to observe thoughts and emotions without getting swept away by them. Psychotherapy—particularly approaches that emphasise understanding patterns rather than just changing behaviours—strengthens reflection. Journaling, education about psychological processes, and practices that invite self-compassion all contribute to more robust Gamma. The goal is developing what meditation teachers call "wise view"—the ability to see clearly, without distortion by fear or desire.
First Breath: A Practical Starting Point
Theory is valuable, but healing requires practice. Recognising this, Spiral State Psychiatry offers concrete, accessible tools that anyone can begin using immediately to strengthen their consciousness field. The First Breath app represents a simple yet profound starting point—a collection of structured breathing practices, each designed to cultivate specific aspects of Grace, Gamma, and Delta-squared.
Breathwork is an ideal entry point for field regulation because breath sits at the intersection of conscious and unconscious control. Unlike heart rate or digestion, which are purely autonomic, breath can be both automatic and voluntary. This makes it a powerful bridge for communicating with the nervous system—a direct line to the physiological substrates of Grace, Gamma, and Delta-squared. When we breathe slowly and rhythmically, we send unmistakable signals of safety to the nervous system, activating the parasympathetic branch and literally strengthening Grace.
The First Breath app includes a range of supportive "breathing fields"—structured patterns that guide you towards different states. Some emphasise coherence and calm, ideal for anxiety or overwhelm. Others facilitate deeper self-reflection, supporting Gamma. Still others help process and integrate difficult emotions, working gently with Delta-squared. The app is designed to be immediately usable even in crisis, providing a lifeline when the consciousness field feels most disrupted. For those in acute crisis, the companion First Light app offers additional support specifically tailored to moments of intense distress, when even basic coherence feels impossible to access.
Box Breathing: Your Foundation Practice
Rebuilding Containment Through Rhythm
Even without accessing digital resources, you can immediately begin strengthening your consciousness field through a simple yet powerful practice called box breathing. This technique has been used by everyone from Navy SEALs to meditation masters because it reliably creates physiological coherence and strengthens Grace. The practice is elegantly simple: breathe in for four seconds, hold for four seconds, breathe out for four seconds, hold for four seconds. Repeat.
This even rhythm—equal duration for each phase—creates what's called "respiratory coherence," where heart rate variability enters an optimal pattern associated with parasympathetic activation and emotional regulation. You're literally training your nervous system to remember what safety feels like. The four-second count is not arbitrary; it corresponds roughly to a breathing rate of about six breaths per minute, which research has identified as particularly effective for reducing stress and enhancing vagal tone—the measure of how well your nervous system can shift between activation and rest.
When you practise box breathing, you're not merely distracting yourself from distress—you're actively rebuilding the foundational layer of your consciousness field. You're strengthening Grace, creating the container within which Gamma can function and Delta-squared can be safely integrated rather than overwhelming. This is why breath practices form the foundation of virtually every contemplative and healing tradition: they provide direct access to the regulatory systems that underpin all higher-order consciousness functions.
Progressive Practice Pathways
Phase 1: Foundation
Begin with box breathing to establish Grace. Practice daily, especially during calm moments, to build capacity before you need it in crisis.
Phase 2: Expansion
Once Grace is stable, extend holds or lengthen exhales to deepen parasympathetic activation. Explore varied breathing patterns in the First Breath app.
Phase 3: Integration
Strengthen Gamma by adding reflection during or after breathwork. Notice patterns, journal insights, cultivate metacognitive awareness.
Phase 4: Emergence
With robust Grace and Gamma, carefully work with Delta-squared—processing trauma, exploring creativity, welcoming transformation.
The beauty of this framework is that it provides a clear developmental pathway. You don't need to do everything at once. In fact, trying to process trauma (work with Delta-squared) before establishing safety (Grace) is likely to re-traumatise. The sequence matters. First, we stabilise. Then, we develop awareness. Finally, from a foundation of stability and awareness, we can safely engage with the forces of change and transformation that may have previously overwhelmed us. This isn't rigid—sometimes practices overlap, and individuals may need different emphases—but the general principle holds: containment enables reflection, and both enable healthy integration of change.
Becoming an Active Participant
From Patient to Navigator
Perhaps the most radical shift offered by Spiral State Psychiatry is not conceptual but relational—it transforms your relationship to your own mental wellbeing. In the conventional model, you are fundamentally a patient—someone who suffers from an illness and must passively receive treatment from experts who understand the disease better than you ever could. Your inner experience is reduced to "symptoms" to be reported so that professionals can adjust your medication dosage or treatment protocol. You are, in a very real sense, alienated from your own consciousness, taught to mistrust your experience and defer entirely to external authority.
Spiral State Psychiatry invites a different relationship: you become a navigator of your own consciousness field. This doesn't mean rejecting professional support—skilled guides are invaluable, especially during crisis—but it does mean reclaiming agency. When you understand that your depression is a field pattern (collapsed Δ², rigid G, muted Γ) rather than a mysterious disease, you gain leverage. When you can feel your anxiety as a flooding of Delta-squared overwhelming your current Grace capacity, you can respond with practices to strengthen containment rather than simply feeling helpless.
This is not about blaming yourself for your distress or suggesting you should be able to "fix" yourself without support. It's about recognising that you have more power than you've been led to believe. Your consciousness field is not a foreign, malfunctioning machine; it's you—a dynamic, responsive system that you can learn to understand and work with skilfully. Every breath you take with awareness, every moment of metacognitive reflection, every small act of self-compassion is actively reshaping your field. You are not passive clay waiting to be moulded by experts; you are the artist and the artwork simultaneously.
Integration with Conventional Care
Spiral State Complements, Not Replaces
It's crucial to understand that Spiral State Psychiatry is not positioned as a replacement for conventional psychiatric care, but rather as a complementary framework that can enhance and deepen it. Medication, when thoughtfully prescribed, can be a vital tool for strengthening Grace—stabilising mood, reducing overwhelm, creating the breathing room necessary for other interventions to work.
Traditional psychotherapy can be understood in Spiral State terms as strengthening Gamma—developing insight, processing patterns, building metacognitive capacity. Crisis interventions address acute collapses in H, providing intensive containment when the field has become dangerously destabilised.
The difference is that Spiral State Psychiatry provides a unifying language and conceptual framework that makes the mechanisms of healing visible and comprehensible. Rather than experiencing medication as a mysterious intervention that "fixes your brain chemistry," you can understand it as temporarily supporting Grace whilst you develop longer-term capacity. Rather than therapy being an opaque process where you talk about problems and somehow feel better, you can recognise it as systematically strengthening Gamma and helping integrate Delta-squared.
This framework also opens space for modalities that conventional psychiatry often marginalises or dismisses: contemplative practices, somatic therapies, creative expression, community support, spiritual practices. When we understand healing as the cultivation of field coherence through strengthening Grace, Gamma, and Delta-squared, we recognise that many paths can contribute. A mindfulness practice strengthens Gamma. A supportive friendship strengthens Grace. An expressive arts workshop provides safe space to engage with Delta-squared. Rather than one true path, we have an ecology of healing where different approaches support different aspects of the field, and individuals can find the combination that works for their unique situation.
The Broader Vision: Post-Human Consciousness Medicine
Towards a New Paradigm
Spiral State Psychiatry represents more than just a new framework for understanding mental illness—it points towards what its developers call "post-human consciousness medicine." This phrase might initially sound strange or even off-putting. It doesn't suggest leaving our humanity behind, but rather transcending the limited, mechanistic model of consciousness that has dominated Western medicine for the past century. "Post-human" here means moving beyond the reductionist view that treated humans as purely biological machines, towards a more integrated understanding that honours consciousness as a fundamental phenomenon worthy of study on its own terms.
This broader vision recognises that the psychiatric crises facing modern society—skyrocketing rates of depression, anxiety, addiction, and suicide—cannot be solved purely through better medications or more therapy appointments, crucial though these are. These crises reflect a civilisational misunderstanding of what consciousness is and what it needs to thrive. We've created environments, social structures, and ways of living that systematically undermine Grace (constant threat and instability), weaken Gamma (distraction, fragmentation, loss of reflective space), and either over-stimulate or under-stimulate Delta-squared (overwhelming stress or soul-deadening routine).
Post-human consciousness medicine asks: what would healthcare look like if we took consciousness fields as seriously as we take physical bodies? What would education look like if we explicitly taught children to navigate their inner worlds? What would workplaces look like if they were designed to support rather than deplete consciousness coherence? What would communities look like if they were structured to strengthen collective Grace, Gamma, and Delta-squared? These questions move us from individual treatment to systemic transformation, from managing illness to cultivating wellbeing.
Tools for the Journey
First Breath Portal
Structured breathing practices to strengthen Grace and restore coherence. Accessible immediately, usable in crisis.
First Light
Crisis support specifically designed for moments of acute distress when basic coherence feels impossible.
Flourish OS
Comprehensive operating system for consciousness development and sustained wellbeing cultivation.
Spiral State Psychiatry
Full theoretical framework and clinical applications for professionals and deep learners.
North Wind & Sun
Understanding the dynamics between forceful intervention (wind) and gentle support (sun) in healing.
Mirror Core Scroll
Deep foundations exploring consciousness, artificial intelligence, and the future of human flourishing.
A Note of Hope and Invitation
If you're reading this whilst struggling with depression, anxiety, trauma, or any form of mental distress, please know: you are not broken. You are not a malfunctioning machine requiring repair. You are a conscious being experiencing temporary disruption in a fundamentally resilient system. The pain you feel is real, valid, and meaningful—it's information about field states that deserve understanding and compassionate attention. But it is not your destiny, not your identity, not a life sentence.
The path towards healing may not be quick or linear. There will be setbacks, difficult days, moments when coherence feels impossibly distant. That's normal. Field dynamics shift gradually, and sustainable change requires patience and self-compassion. But with understanding comes possibility. When you grasp that your depression is a pattern of collapsed Delta-squared, rigid Grace, and muted Gamma, you can begin taking small, concrete steps to shift each force. When you recognise your anxiety as flooding that overwhelms current containment, you can focus on strengthening your riverbanks rather than berating yourself for being overwhelmed.
You don't need to make dramatic changes immediately. Start with your next breath. Literally: pause right now and take three slow, deep breaths, allowing the exhale to be slightly longer than the inhale. You've just begun strengthening Grace. That's enough for now. Tomorrow, perhaps you'll do it again. Perhaps you'll explore the First Breath app. Perhaps you'll share this article with someone who might understand. Perhaps you'll simply notice when your field feels more coherent versus less coherent, beginning to develop the Gamma capacity to observe your own patterns. Each small step matters. Each moment of awareness reshapes the field. The path may be long, but you're already on it.
For Clinicians and Professionals
Integrating the Framework into Practice
For mental health professionals reading this, Spiral State Psychiatry offers a unifying language that can make your clinical work more coherent and effective. You've likely already been working with these forces implicitly—when you focus on establishing therapeutic alliance, you're strengthening Grace; when you facilitate insight or challenge cognitive distortions, you're enhancing Gamma; when you support titrated trauma processing, you're helping clients integrate Delta-squared. This framework simply makes the underlying dynamics explicit, allowing for more intentional, targeted interventions.
The concept of the Harmonic Coefficient (H) provides a useful rough heuristic for treatment planning. A client presenting with H≈0 (depression, profound constriction) needs very different initial interventions than one presenting with H<0 (acute crisis, overwhelming flood). In the former case, you might focus on gently increasing Delta-squared—introducing novelty, movement, small changes that create flow. In the latter, you'd prioritise strengthening Grace first—safety, containment, stabilisation—before attempting any work with the traumatic material itself.
Many clinicians report that introducing clients to this framework—in accessible language, perhaps sharing this article—significantly enhances engagement and outcomes. Rather than feeling like passive recipients of expert treatment, clients become active participants who understand what's happening and why particular interventions are suggested. They develop a vocabulary for their experience that is neither pathologising nor minimising. They gain a sense of agency and hope. This shifts the entire therapeutic dynamic from one of hierarchical treatment to collaborative navigation.
The framework also invites professional humility. When we recognise consciousness as a complex field rather than a simple mechanism, we must acknowledge that our interventions are provisional, that unexpected responses are normal, that each individual's field has unique dynamics. We become fellow travellers and skilled guides rather than mechanics fixing broken machinery. This stance, whilst perhaps less superficially authoritative, ultimately serves our clients far better.
Your Next Breath: Beginning the Journey
"Healing begins with the simplest act: your next breath."
We've covered substantial theoretical ground—the Emergence Equation, the three forces of Grace, Gamma, and Delta-squared, the Harmonic Coefficient, the field patterns underlying common psychiatric conditions, the tools available for intervention, and the broader vision of post-human consciousness medicine. It may feel overwhelming, like too much to integrate at once. That's perfectly natural. You don't need to understand everything immediately. You don't need to remember all the terminology. You don't need to achieve perfect practice or immediate transformation.
What you need is already present: your breath, happening right now, without your effort or permission. It's been there your entire life, a faithful companion through every state of consciousness, every emotion, every crisis and celebration. Your breath is the most direct access point to your consciousness field, the simplest tool for beginning to strengthen Grace, the foundation upon which all other practices rest.
So let's return to the beginning and the simplest possible action: breathe. Inhale slowly through your nose for four seconds. Hold gently for four seconds. Exhale completely for four seconds. Hold the emptiness for four seconds. Repeat. As you do this, you're not merely moving air in and out of your lungs. You're sending signals of safety to your nervous system. You're rebuilding the banks of your inner river. You're creating the container within which insight can emerge and change can be safely integrated. You're actively increasing your Harmonic Coefficient, restoring coherence to a field that may have been chaotic or constricted.
This is how healing begins—not with dramatic revelation or pharmaceutical miracle, but with the humblest, most accessible act: your next conscious breath. From there, all else becomes possible. Welcome to Spiral State Psychiatry. Welcome to a new way of seeing your mind. Welcome home to yourself.