Adrian Scott Counsellor Supervisor MBACP Accred

Palmyra is an ancient Semitic city on route for travellers across the Syrian desert. It is over 2000 years old and is    presently being destroyed by Isis. It is seen as a symbol of Idolatry and against their religion.

The city’s prosperity allowed it to build monumental projects. The city was enriched by the trade caravans. The Palmyrenes were merchants who had created colonies along the Silk Road, and worked across the Roman Empire. They were a combination of Amorites, Aramenas and Arabs including a Jewish minority.

The social structure of the city was tribal and created its own art and architecture. The city dwellers worshipped local, Mesopotamian and Arab Gods.

To use the word ironically is an understatement but ironically Palmyra in 634 was separated by the Rashidun Caliphate and became part of Homs Province. It became an Arab Caliphate.

Unfortunately all through out world history  – part of the religious process is that the incoming religion to reinforce its message, tries to destroy the old religion including its temples and artefacts. The new religion is insecure and wants to demonstrate its power and influence. So it tries to wipe out the old religion’s existence.

This happens so repeatedly but Humans do not seem to recognise that. One: you cannot completely destroy a race or religion: there will always be a believers somewhere left. Two: that it always increases the resolve of the victimised race or religion to survive.
What is it about Humans – mainly men – that they want to totally destroy. Is it in the process of destroying that men can only realise that what is being destroyed, ultimately can never be destroyed?

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2015
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This weblog is the view of the writer and for general information only.
This article is designed to provoke argument and critique

The Middle Classes thrive on achievement and success. Focus on education and attainment in early family life creates an environment where the achievement comes first and the achiever/person comes a long second. Start a new project and a bevy of middle class types want to write it up and publish a paper.

Driven by a false and arbitrary set of standards the middle classes hoover up opportunities to prove themselves, and create a success of themselves that their families have set them. Parents compensating for their own failures or wanting to maintain a standard of living push their kids along to achieve greater measurable success.

The middle classes are being squeezed between the super rich and the working class, and under class below. The middle classes are no longer so secure in employment and retirement. There is less to go round increasing the determination and will to succeed and progress.

Of course this at the same time is laudable. This is progress. Innovation, research and writing to publish, pushes civilization forward to improve and understand itself and what it is going through. Advances in technology and medicine create a better world for us all to live in? But there again does it?

There seems to be little acknowledgement that fear and insecurity motivate the Middle Classes to do what they do. It is not the project that is important but the way it heightens the perception from the outside world that the person is successful because of their successful project. They are secure. No project no security.

Can we imagine a world where progress was planned and thought out rather than guided by insecurity and fear? There seems to be no place for progress without drive or mania.  Everyone is out to prove themselves driven on by their family’s expectations.

To live in a world where we are happy in the value of ourselves would revolutionise progress. There were would be less need for external validation. For the moment this world seems unimaginable.

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2015
All rights reserved Disclaimer:
This weblog is the view of the writer and for general information only.
This article is designed to provoke argument and critique

Remote Relationships are more common at any time of the world in the digital age. People are on the move more then ever before. People relocate to be educated and return home, or take a fantastic job offer far away. The chances of being in a remote relationship in 2015 are greater now than at any other time. The world is shrinking.
Before PCs and smart phones which was not that long ago depending on your age, the speed of communication was slower.

Travelling around the world on a budget in the 1980s you were really on your own. Letter writing was the norm but was slow and unreliable. If you were on the move and knew you were heading for a large city you could pick up poste restante mail at the main post office in the city. Sending telegrams was expensive and charged per letter, but you could contact somebody in an emergency within hours.

You could ring anywhere in the world at great expense. You would never ring from a hotel phone with extortionate hotel call rates. You had to to ring from a phone shop, or phone box on the street. You could ring your girlfriend living in London from Indonesia, but would she be in? All phones were fixed to the wall! Nobody could carry their phones around with them. You had to take your chance, and leave a message if there was an answering machine on the line, or speak to her mother who would tell you she was out. She could not ring you as there was no allocated personal number of your own that you could give her.

It gave travelling a liberation of feeling that there was nothing behind you, and only the route ahead. Your parents couldn’t text or email you to see if you were ok, and you could not check your bank balance online. You could not book a hotel ahead and only had guide books-which were constantly going out of date-to tell what the town was like you had just arrived in.

Travelling around the consensus and anecdotal evidence with other travellers was that you could keep a relationship going like this for 12-18 months. After this time the intervals of communication could not keep the relationship going in any meaningful way. Well that was then. But this is now. In 2015 digital communication is instantaneous, and free. We all accustomed to a smaller world where distance is diminished, and efficient.

But the interesting question is what impact does digital communication have on remote relationships? Does instant communication make the remote relationship more durable, or longer lasting? Or are relationships defined by face to face contact of facial expression and touch? Does seeing the person on the Skype screen go some way to replacing or at least extending the life of a remote relationship? If so for how much longer?

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2015
All rights reserved Disclaimer:
This weblog is the view of the writer and for general information only.
This article is designed to provoke argument and critique

We all need emotional connection to someone or somebody in our lives. Some people choose partners, friends, family, hobbies, pets, or even inanimate objects like cars, works of art, or anything that triggers a strong feeling.

How we make this depends on the role models of emotional connection we have
witnessed early in our lives, shaping our resistance to starting an emotional connection.
If emotional connections cause us pain then we adapt: we make connections that don’t connect, avoid connections or connect inappropriately.

This takes time, patience and energy. You can debate whether humans are altruistic but we usually give to receive. We have to get something out of it. Love, recognition, value, need, are some of the strong motivators to create an emotional connection. It gives us comfort and warmth in our lives or can drive us mad.

Some emotional connections can be bad for us. They can be addictive, co-dependent, unavailable, or abusive. They can also be dangerous. Making an emotional connection to a friend can be construed as a an act of love when it isn’t intended. The problem with an emotional connection is that it can be whatever you want it to be: but might not be taken by the other in the same way.

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2015
All rights reserved Disclaimer:
This weblog is the view of the writer and for general information only.
This article is designed to provoke argument and critique

Inside Out is a cartoon film about a girl who is traumatised by a move from the Mid West of America to San Francisco. It shows the inside of her mind represented by emotional characters. The cleverness of the film is that to be happy the girl has to be sad. That realising her sadness gives her a depth of feeling that is fitting to the sadness that she feels in relocating.
Doesn’t sound like much?
But yet it goes against the current culture of buying happiness with stuff. Couples want each other to be happy. Parents want children to be happy. Yet on further reflection it isn’t clear exactly what this means.
Does happiness literally to be happy all the time? To be excited with life? To be on an all time high?

For most of us this would be unlikely. The remote kids truck example makes it clearer. Good feelings turn the truck to the left. Bad feelings turn the truck to the right. Notice the language: the description of some feelings as bad already envisages a wanting to get rid of, divert from or suppress. There appears to be no existing word to describe bad or painful feelings in a positive way.

To return to the example: if you could only turn left with out turning right, or vice versa you would end up going around in circles. Same with feelings. If you only allow good feelings to influence you, you are only using half of your emotions to guide you. You end up going around in circles. Also it seems not possible to have only good feelings, as we all have bad feelings, which we can try to avoid and deny. This takes a lot of energy which makes us tired. But in the end we cannot get rid of them: so we we might as well use them to guide through the ups and downs of life.
Inside Out

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2015
All rights reserved Disclaimer:
This weblog is the view of the writer and for general information only.
This article is designed to provoke argument and critique

Loneliness affects everybody at different times of their lives. Young people are prone to loneliness just as old people are. We all have a pretty good idea of what it is, but not very clear about how to deal with loneliness.

One of the strongest characteristics of 21st Century life is to fill time. To be occupied and be surrounded by people is where it’s at. But we are social animals – yes we are. But we also need solitude and quiet to reflect on ourselves and allow our emotional compass to fully guide us.

Loneliness cannot usually be filled by the presence of other people. Drugs, alcohol, and sex are behaviours used to fight loneliness by filling up and distracting us from ourselves. So what to do?

An understanding of why we are feeling lonely might be helpful. Are we good at making connections with people or is trust an issue? Do we think we are going to be judged? Look at your original family. What was the attitude of making connections there? Did your parents have friends? Did they emotionally support their friends? Did their friends emotionally support them? What we are told in our families is insignificant, compared with what we saw our families doing.

People come into the counselling room asking why can’t I have a relationship? Other people less attractive, who earn less money, seem to do it. So why can’t I? With some reflection and pain what can come up is a hidden strategy which undermines the wish to have a relationship. Like not finding somebody good enough, or not being available emotionally to take on another person’s feelings. These coping mechanisms are learnt early on, were effective – but now hamper us in what we want.

But it is hard and painful to look at ourselves: so no wonder we do not want to do it.

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2015
All rights reserved Disclaimer:
This weblog is the view of the writer and for general information only.
This article is designed to provoke argument and critique

How do you pronounce the principal town of Shropshire – Shrewsbury or Shrowesbury?     
In the latest poll 81% of people asked – said it was pronounced Shrewsbury like in “shrew”.
But then there is no real correct answer.

Shrewsbury nestles on the welsh border: the town’s castle closing off the natural loop of
the river severn. This made the town difficult to capture using the river severn as a natural defence.

Until recent times the town was not well heard of. Before the digital age, and wealth moving in from Birmingham and Manchester it was a one horse town. Even now walking up the high street in the early evening it is empty like a ghost town.

Like parts of middle England at the right time of day it is caught in olde england of the horse and cart, and Kings and Queens. Have a drink in the Loggerheads pub in the centre of town next to the Prince Rupert Hotel, and you are taken back into a time of cobbled streets, black and white houses, and clock chimes from church spires.

Drink a pint of Bass formerly the traditional real ale of the town in the Cross Foxes or in the Crown in Abbey Forgate. Visit the ancient Abbey in Abbey Forgate while you are there.

Take a walk in The Bog or wander across the Long Mynd at Church Stretton. Eat in Ludlow home to a Michelin starred restaurant.
Please don’t advertise the beauty and splendour of Shrewsbury & Shropshire – lets keep it for ourselves!

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2015
All rights reserved Disclaimer:
This weblog is the view of the writer and for general information only.
This article is designed to provoke argument and critique

Uxorious is an interesting word. It also comes as an adverb uxoriously, and the noun uxoriousness.   
It s origin is from the Latin word uxor – wife. It means a husband’s excessive fondness or love for his wife. It was first used in the 16th Century.

The clue to the negative connotation is the word excessive. To have an excess of love doesn’t automatically mean that this is a bad thing. To have a bit over in itself doesn’t conjure up anything negative. But to have some more love to spend on someone else might do! For the word excess it all depends on context.

Yet for the word excessive there is no such flexibility of context. Excessive means there is too much and its not a good thing. Too much love from a husband to a wife is a bad thing. Too much love from a husband to a wife demeans the husband. He appears weak and submissive. Less of a man.

What a shame that a man should not have a lot of love for his wife. The sexism in language is insidious, and almost unnoticeable. Go to the thesaurus and words like loving, affectionate, devoted, fond, amorous, tender, and rapturous come up. Nothing to remind or connect us to the excessive.

And to have a word that expresses the excessive love from a wife to a husband is not possible. there isn’t one. Is it not worth mentioning? Is it not worth having?

Perhaps it is to be presumed? A wife should always have an excess of love for her husband. This is her role?
Yet even for a wife to have an excessive love for her husband doesn’t sound as bad as a husband’s excessive love for his wife. Here lies the power of patriarchy and sexism in language.
Uxorious

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2015
All rights reserved Disclaimer:
This weblog is the view of the writer and for general information only.
This article is designed to provoke argument and critique

Chris Squire (4 March 1948 – 27 June 2015)

There was always something very privileged and public school about progressive rock. It was spawned out of nice middle class children having music lessons and being in the school choir in the early 1970s. There was a classical Englishness about it. Classical musicians let off the leash to twiddle and play as fast and as long as they could. There was always the 5 minute drum solo, keyboard wizardry or lengthy guitar solo to endure. It was part orchestra, part spectacle and usually ostentatious and pretentious.
Groups (not bands) such as Emerson Lake and Palmer, Genesis, Jethro Tull, Gong, Pink Floyd and Yes typified the progressive rock group which the ideal of punk kind of killed off.

Yet out of the progressive rock genre came a genius: a genius of the Bass Guitar – Chris Squire. The classic Yes albums where he can be really heard are Fragile, the Yes album and Close to the Edge followed by the double album of Tales from Topographic Oceans and finally the rockier Relayer.

It could be argued that the pop bass guitar in the 1960s combined with the drums was the backdrop to the melody like on Motown records. The only bass guitar that was allowed equally footing but still low in the mix was the jazz double bass and bass guitar.

But Chris Squire developed a sound on his Rickenbacker bass that combined bass and trouble sounds to produce a unique bass buzz that could be instantly recognised. If you ignore the context and just listen to the sound of the bass, playing under and over the melody in a way that had never been heard of – except the bass playing of
John Entwistle of The Who.

Chris Squire developed a virtuosity on the Bass Guitar that was unrivalled. He played with a pick, and ran the Rickenbacker Bass through a guitar and bass guitar amp. Listen to the track Roundabout from the album Fragile as an introduction to his unique sound where the bass supports the drums and then takes off on flights of fancy like an electric guitar solo. The trick he had was that he still supported the song and the drums but managed to entice you into wondering when was he going to go off on one – supporting the song while sounding like a bass solo. At times sparse and minimal while at other times thunderous and over the top.

His influence on other bass players can still be heard. Read all the tributes! Ironically punk brought the Jam whose bassist Rick Butler played a Rickenbacker bass and had a similar sound to Chris Squire. Flea from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers also acknowledges him as a big influence.

He was a big complex man who in his twenties sounded like a school choir boy and as a mature adult more like a cockney taxi driver who was really funny.

Condolences to his family, especially his children and friends and the millions of fans worldwide.

Chris Squire (4 March 1948 – 27 June 2015)

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2015
All rights reserved Disclaimer:
This weblog is the view of the writer and for general information only.
This article is designed to provoke argument and critique

The eighth London cyclist died at a busy junction in the city of London. Seven out of the eight of these fatalities  involved an HGV. Perhaps this is not surprising but what is surprising is that most of these cyclists are women.
Why are women cyclists more in danger than men?

There are many factors in a complex situation like this: women are less confident on the road. They keep to the left, start slowly off the lights keeping them in the blind spot danger zone. Women generally feel less confident competing with traffic for road space.
Men on the other hand cycle more aggressively, go ahead of the bike boxes and can be easily seen by the lorry driver. They also speed of at the lights reducing the inconvenience for the lorry driver turning left.
Or do they?

Presumably all the HGV drivers are men? Younger men? They are driving all day 5-6 days a week. Their view of the road is from a high vantage point. They are driving a large vehicle, several tons larger then most other vehicles in small urban streets. They have a timetable to do as many loads as possible.

Of course none of this adds up to anything: but it is another way at looking at the problem. The HGV driver is all powerful. Vehicles, cyclists, & pedestrians all trying to avoid them.
To vehicle drivers in London cyclists are a nuisance. They are in the way. But like car drivers – do male and female who discriminate against each other? – perhaps this is what happens with the HGV driver: that women cyclists are subtly discriminated against. Women cyclists generate a different reaction than male cyclists.
Take a look at the overdue interest in womens’ football compared to male football!

Women are deemed to be slower, less able and weaker cyclists than men.
Does this mean male HGV drivers are targeting women cyclists? – of course not!

But discrimination impacts in hidden ways. Women cyclists know they are discriminated against: so feel more intimidated and less confident on London roads. Discrimination is hidden and powerful with far reaching impact.
Perhaps this is another example of good old fashioned sexism on the roads.
Women Cyclists Die