TNMI Conference in Tampa, Florida

Last month I had the privilege of attending the This Naked Mind Institute Conference in Tampa, Florida, led by Annie Grace, the founder and author of This Naked Mind and several other books.

Annie’s had an unusual life. She grew up in a one-room log cabin without running water or electricity outside Aspen, Colorado. She discovered a passion for marketing and after graduating with a Master’s of Science (Marketing) she embraced corporate life and at the age of 26, she was the youngest vice president in a multinational company. Drinking was part of the corporate culture and within a few years, in a global C-level marketing role, she was responsible for marketing in 28 countries and drinking almost two bottles of wine a night. Knowing she needed a change but unwilling to submit to a life of deprivation and stigma, Annie set out to find a painless way to regain control.

Her meticulous research formed the basis of her book, This Naked Mind. Originally created as a PDF to share amongst her friends, it went viral, and soon tens of thousands of people were downloading it. She decided to quit her job and self-publish the book, which went on to sell over a million copies.

In my view, the secret of the success of Annie’s book and subsequent programmes is down to the combination of high-quality scientific research into the nature of addiction combined with a deep understanding of human behaviour. The result is a programme that invites people with drinking problems to extend grace and compassion to themselves and move towards an emotion-based goal, which is a life where alcohol is a small and insignificant part of their lives. Moreover, Annie’s work as a coach, and by extension her family of coaches in the Institute, aims to help people build more fulfilling, peaceful, loving and creative lives.

Since writing This Naked Mind, Annie has evolved and broadened the methodology, taking into account the most recent thinking in neurology and psychology, and she presented the ‘state of the art’ at the conference in Tampa.

One of the core tenets of This Naked Mind Institute is the belief in the innate wisdom within each individual to navigate their own path towards a fulfilling, joyful and peaceful life. At the heart of our methodology is a deep-rooted belief that each individual carries within them not only the most valuable wisdom for directing their lives, but also the inherent peace, joy, and love of life that we witness in small children. This innate sense of wonder and self-love, although often obscured by life’s challenges, pain, traumas, and societal expectations, never leaves us. It remains a constant presence within each one of us, waiting to be rediscovered and embraced.

Now I know some people reading this will feel very far from ‘a sense of wonder and self-love’. I recall very vividly going to a yoga retreat a couple of weeks after I had my last drink, nearly six years ago. The retreat was wonderful, and as well as yoga included fitness classes and workshops discussing all kinds of topics to help people with their growth and development. The concept of ‘self-love’ kept coming up and it made me feel a little uncomfortable. The truth was that I had spent so many years beating myself up for not being able to drink moderately that the idea of loving myself seemed preposterous. I didn’t even like myself particularly.

I now understand that this original state of self-acceptance and love never leaves us, but can get obscured by layers of self-doubt, self-criticism and external judgements. It is our mission at TNMI to guide people back to this inherent wisdom, joy and love of life.

These layers manifest themselves as aspects of ourselves, which can sometimes feel like different people living in our heads. I used to be permanently confused by the fact that the person I was at 9.00 am who wasn’t going to drink and was absolutely going to the gym that evening was so often replaced by another Paul at 5.00 pm who was definitely not going to the gym but was rather going to crack open a couple of beers.

Annie playfully refers to these personas as ‘selfies’ and it’s important to understand that they are aspects of ourselves that don’t mean us any harm—they are just using the wrong tools to soothe, comfort and help us out with our lives.

So why do we develop these ‘selfies’ or personas? They form as a defence mechanism in response to the challenges of life, with all its intensity, pain, emotional turbulence, traumas, and desires. These trials have the effect of disconnecting us from ourselves and obscuring our true nature.

These disconnections and distortions can take the form of internalized belief structures, thought patterns, attitudes, self-perceptions and the stories we tell ourselves.

The effect of these distortions is to affect our perceptions of ourselves and the world, which can lead us to behaviours of escape, such as drinking alcohol or using other drugs, gambling, pornography, doom scrolling or control, such as over-working.

The brilliant news is that what has been made can be unmade. Our method for helping clients rediscover their true natures is called the Liminal PATH (TM) with PATH being an acronym for Perspective, Awareness, Transformation and Healing. This PATH is grounded in the principles of Liminal Affective Psychology (TM).

So that’s a very brief overview of Liminal Affective Psychology, but I am sure you will understand that there’s a lot of work behind this, which Annie presented for us over five days in Tampa. There were also a lot of experienced coaches in the room, and, of course, everyone brought their life experiences to the conference, so there were plenty of incredibly insightful shares from the delegates.

Annie Grace presenting at the conference

I came away from the conference inspired and feeling really privileged to be a part of such a powerful and important movement. It was also fantastic to meet with my fellow coaches in person. I’ve met many of them on Zoom calls but there is something special about meeting people in person, sharing hugs and socialising together in the lovely restaurants on the Tampa shoreline.