The Black Box.

The person using denial will create an altered reality.  It will be an interlocking web of denial statements and narratives.  They will import reasonable arguments to support their unreason.  They will use deception. They will re-frame using kindly terms for cruel words or actions.  And they will tell you again and again how nice and reasonable they are being... I don't think that it is possible to remain sane when your legitimate request for something to change, is met with denial! But understanding what might happen, knowing just how bad things can get if you complain, will help you to remain on your own side.  Here are some of the reasons why people don't speak out. When a person finds themselves in a relationship ( partners , work, with an institution) that is beginning to feel off, or hurtful, it is easy to either blame yourself for being too sensitive, or blame them for being insensitive. My advice? Go read Marshall Rosenburg's book: Non-Violent Communicat...

As my eyes fill with tears... Listening to the track that is my song of the month. [+] Thinking, what is it about the story of this tragic therapy with Kit that matters so much? So much that I have to find a way through this. In other words, where does the energy for all these words come from? The pain in my heart from the unknowing, the lack of clarity or resolution with Kit is one thing. My 'problem' with the conduct of some therapists is another. It is time for me to think clearly about my own Factor Xs.  Factor 1. 'Mrs Stable'. My first marriage was to a gentle and kind man. But his shame, secrecy, out of control spending, and OCD behaviour were too much for me. We had two small children, and his credit card repayment each month was more than the mortgage. I said that we needed therapy.  What resulted was terrible therapy - from a highly qualified psychotherapist.  I'm not sure now that is the case - but esteemed yes, and in private practice.  My husband wou...

Every so often I think that writing this blog is cowardly! Then I think I should make a complaint to his ethical body. That I should step forward and see how the judgment goes.  Then I remember exactly why I'm not doing that, and why it can't happen.  Denial works, it blocks resolution. It freezes repair. It keeps the anger going...When I forget anger and start feeling as if I really should make all this official, I read his published articles. They don't provide any definitive answers but there are enough of the things he said to me, expressed through his fictional case study characters, enough to diagnose an underlying misogyny.    Yes I know ... I'm 'diagnosing'. Back to denial! Denial has become one of my favourite subjects as a result of my experiences with Kit - so let's have a brief run through of how denial operates over and over in a thousand different companies, relationships, yada yada. Denial begins with the complaint. Person A tells person B ...

  This was probably during our third or fourth session? I was feeling shame, humiliation, loneliness, and betrayal. Talking about my husband's  choices. As the penny dropped, and Kit realised what had been happening in my life - his response, was to say "f*** me!" and to mime falling off his chair.  You know what?  It was probably supposed to be a comedy moment. Perhaps. It sounded like outrage... It looked like outrage. And I was  grateful. In retrospect this is another of those moments, similar to when he called me a minx. And both times his misaligned responses really had an effect on me. This one, Kit's explosive expletive - it felt personal. It felt as if it was about Kit judging my husband. And I felt the sweet sensation of being validated. A part of me was saying, 'yes it really was that bad, thank you for getting it!'  But you know?   I don't think he did . The Brian Thorne uproar  gives the clue.  It was all about  professional ...

Horn Ur Marken by THE JANITORS So far I have focused on spirit.. Soul is different... "From the intimate, inner and psychological point of view, the forest is the place of the soul's operations, of inner transformations and purification". Cirlot, Figuras del destino, 43. All I know is that during the year before I told him about my feelings,  I was haunted by the song at the top of this page -  And when I was thinking of asking for my session notes, I was haunted by another song. CRAWLER by IDLES Erik Davis explains the divide. By soul, I basically mean the creative imagination, that aspect of our psyches that perceives the world as an animated field of powers and images. Soul finds and loses itself in enchantment; it speaks the tongue of dream and phantasm, which should never be confused with mere fantasy. Spirit is an altogether different bird: an impersonal, incorporeal spark that seeks clarity, essence, and a blast of the absolute. Archetypal psychologist James Hill...

The process by which experience arises is the same whether we are dreaming or awake. The world is a dream, the teacher and the teaching are a dream, the result of our practice is a dream; there is no place where the dream breaks until we are liberated into pure rigpa. Until then, we continue to dream ourselves and our lives in both the dream and the physical dimension. Wangyal, Tenzin . In the Tibetan view, the body is full of channels (tsa), and mind (tigle) rides on air-currents (lhung) all through the body. So how one sits, one's posture, matters. Exercises such as prostrations stretch out the channels making it easier for mind to flow through the body. In Tibetan theory, during sleep there is little or no input from the body, therefore to observe dreaming is to observe - in Jungian terms - one's spirit unaffected by the external, physical world. Dream yoga is the practice of lucid dreaming - being awake inside your own dream.  A way to observe soul through Spirit. The term...

Before I head back into the subject of Eros and psychotherapy, I want to investigate the confusion in meanings attributed to the concepts of soul and spirit . We are shaped by the beliefs embedded in our language, so it is worth taking a look at the ideas underpinning our experience of being human. Not least because I find it difficult to understand the difference between spirit and soul. So many writers have used the term soul for both - or spirit for both! So let's start where I left off in my last post. In Jungian thought , we have soul (sulphur) and spirit (Mercury). Sulphur is Soul, the seat of desire, fiery and alive, It is the ability to act. It is energy. Think of it as inner fire. Mercury is Spirit, it is changeable, communicative, reflective. It is 'the world-creating spark hidden within all matter'. Think of it as the light of enlightenment . For it interfaces soul and body and enables consciousness. The mode of communication created by spirit is imagination, th...