Adrian Scott Counsellor Supervisor MBACP Accred

3 Books

Would you read 3 books in your life time? Of course not. You would want to read many more.
Alain de Botton in his book Religion for Atheists argues that Education does not equip us to lead better lives but that religious rituals and teachings do.
He makes the point that a humanities under graduate might read 800 books, where as a wealthy family in the 12^th Century would have 3 books (albeit very expensive) – the Bible, a collection of prayers, and a compendium of the lives of saints. The issue for the 21^st Century is the guilt people feel in not consuming as many books as possible, not in how they are absorbed. It is the re-reading of religious texts that confirm the rituals not only of the mind but of the body too. 3 Books.

For example the Bhuddist Tea Ceremony is not practiced to teach again and again to but to relive and deepen the experience of the ritual. Participants have gained an intellectual grasp of the ceremony and its meanings, but are also given the opportunity of renewal and an openness to more subtle understandings of the basis of the ritual.
The idea that we should train our bodies like our minds has led to the founding of retreats where people can take time out of their everyday lives to re-establish their spiritual selves.

De Botton goes onto to talk about the difference between secular and religious education. Can you imagine a university having a Department for Relationships? No .. but wouldn’t it be interesting!? His point is that Academia today is interested in ideas confirming our independence and maturity that are easily forgotten.

Religious education is more focused on a way to comfort and guide our souls. Not believable? He makes the point that in the secular world we are reading the right books but not asking the right questions which address our needs. Yet Christianity looks at our more childlike selves. It wants to give us little pieces of information and guidance which are digestible and not big wholes.
Anything written on religion in competition with the secular world creates a polemic on the same topic which is considered by others as sustaining and nurturing.
Hopefully through this process we can pick and choose what meets our needs.
3 Books

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2014
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.

Tired Skin

The cosmetics industry is now marketing a cream for women to combat tired skin. This has been going for a while and is being advertised now on the TV. The marketing of the lack of sleep by the cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries is big business with the US in the lead.

The increasing number of older people is a huge population suffering from sleep problems. Selling drugs to alleviate sleep problems is big business. Expect more marketing of sleep products.
One of the central points of the market is it is able to produce an immediate solution to a problem. The problem is complex, with all sorts of influences, biological, physiological and psychological. The quick fix bypasses this complexity and short cuts to a solution.

Take depression. If you are depressed you can go to your GP and get anti-depressants.
In some cases this is a good quick short term solution. But the problem is that the quick fix never actually tackles the central issue. The depressed person can avoid their problems. The quick fix pill alleviates the symptoms but not the origins or the source of the problem. Same with sleep. What stops someone sleeping? Lack of Exercise? Worry? Stress? Drugs? Drink? None of this is addressed by the quick fix. It remains dormant but ruthlessly giving energy to the symptoms which affects the persons’ life.

The market encourages the quick fix because it creates profit.
The slow fix which actually addresses the problem is more expensive, not easily packaged, and gives less profit.

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2014
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.

Bion Unemployed

The Princes Trust research shows that “ that long-term unemployed young people are more than twice as likely as their peers to have been prescribed anti-depressants. One in three have contemplated suicide, while one in four have self-harmed.
The findings are based on interviews with 2,161 16-to-25-year-olds and show that 40 per cent of jobless young people have faced these symptoms of mental illness – including suicidal thoughts, feelings of self-loathing and panic attacks – as a direct result of unemployment.
Long-term unemployed young people are also more than twice as likely as their peers to believe they have nothing to live for.”

Sigmund Freud stated that “love and work are the cornerstones of our humanness.” Many of us would not be surprised at this summary. To love and be loved is one of the central parts of our culture. Books, movies, media are full of references to love and being loved. We all need love in some form or other.

To be occupied in something worthwhile is also part of our culture. To be creative or fulfilled is what 21^st century parents dream for their children. The emphasis on education and good schools in the UK is a constant talking point. Being educated can mean work can be fulfilling and a good living earned too. Yet how many people are happy at work? How many people work to be stuck in poverty?

Are we defined by work? When you first meet someone do you ask them what they do? It seems to always be in work, and be happy in work is difficult to achieve. If this is the case why do we define ourselves by what we do but not by who we are? Capitalism ensures that, depending where we are on the economic cycle, there are still a number of people unable to find work. Across the world this is multiplied by whole sections of the world’s poor unable to find work.
Again perhaps it is the nature of groups. The more powerful – those in work – define the experience of work. Wilfred Bion wrote in his book Experiencing Groups that in all groups there are two basic groups. The work group which is to do with the primary task (eg of being in work). And the basic assumption group describes the underlying forces that defines the behaviour of the group (eg only some people are in work!)

However loud politicians and charities protest there will always be unemployment and poverty.
The only thing we try to control is that we are not one of them.

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2014
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.

President Selfie Transference
Barak Obama, President of the United States, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, Prime Minister of Denmark, (bizarrely also is the daughter-in-law of former Labour leader Neil Kinnock) and a David Cameron the British Prime Minister joined together to take a photograph (selfie) of themselves on a mobile phone. Not acting like statespersons or just a bit of fun?

We have a strong relationship to leadership. We expect leaders to be confident, strong, decisive and competent. We wish to follow leaders. Who we follow and how we follow is laid down in our past.
Freud discovered that his patients or followers fell in love with him. Men or women: it did not matter. To Freud’s intelligence and credit he realised it was nothing to do with him. His patients were recreating early relationships – usually parents. Freud’s patients were transferring past relationships and experiences onto him.
He called this transference.

The leadership transference can be positive and negative. Put simply if in your early relationships if you were well led by your ‘leaders’ you might find it easy to trust leadership as an adult. If it was a difficult experience –  mistrust and doubt creep into your relationships with leaders.
Being managed or supervised at work brings out this transference in staff. People will like managers with different  management styles. A manager who is clear and direct to one person is cold and ruthless to another. A warm manager to one person is suffocating to another.

Our reaction to the President Selfie might be motivated by our transference to leadership. Unstatesperson like or funny? It was all there:- Leaders, Power, Death, & Sex!
Cameron in a rare piece of humour joked it would be rude to say no to a relative of a Kinnock.
President Selfie Transference

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2013
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.

Unconscious Mandela

Just when we thought there were no more heroes anymore Nelson Mandela dies.
In him the world has found a hero. This heroism hinges on him surviving 27 years in prison and returning to political life without retribution or bitterness.
The term unconscious mind was created by Sigmund Freud. The unconscious mind is full of thoughts that we are unaware of and unable to be scrutinised. Unconscious thoughts have a strong influence on our behaviour laid down in our experiences in childhood. Painful events which hurt us in early life are “forgotten” and repressed in the unconscious. We cannot avoid them as they did happen. But as a defence mechanism we can avoid the pain they caused us by burying them.

This mechanism would be ok if it worked. It does in a way: but the unconscious has a nasty habit of popping up when we least expect it. Take a painful event like bereavement. If the feelings of the bereavement are avoided and not dealt with at the time they will force themselves up from the unconscious into the everyday life of the conscious. For example you might feel overwhelmingly sad at a distant bereavement which is inappropriate to the relationship you had with that person. Not only are hurts locked in the unconscious but also dreams, wishes and desires.
Our desire to have heroes has never waned. We live in a world when every part of peoples’ lives is exposed. It is difficult to have heroes when all human weaknesses are laid bear. We want our heroes to be unlike us. Dynamic, successful, moral and with no uncertainty or hesitation. We want heroes to look up to. To tell us how to lead our lives. To solve the unsolvable.

Few in the 21^st Century transcend the scrutiny to the status of hero. Perhaps when they do they become more heroic? Nelson Mandela has done this. He suffered graciously for the cause of democracy against apartheid. He gave his freedom to an idea of a free South Africa. Never mind the cronies, his marriage to Winnie and his role of Father.
The role of the unconscious mind has a large part in this. We need to dream of the hero to avoid the pitfalls of our own flawed characters. We need to wish that there are heroes who will conquer all. We need the hero to have something to aspire to.
Unconscious Mandela

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2013
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.

Black Friday

Black Friday is here!
The term Black Friday in the 1880s was used to describe a stock market crash. Then in 1960s it became a term for police traffic officers in Philadelphia complaining about congestion on Thanksgiving Friday. Only in the 21^st Century has it become synonymous with Christmas shopping.
Steely Dan wrote Black Friday about the Friday, September 24, 1869 where investors attempted to corner the gold market, and the market collapsed.
The obvious theme of Black Friday is a stampede of consumers rushing for a bargain, or quick profit.
A similar incident happened at IKEA in Edmonton in 2005 on the opening day of the store.

The stampede at Mecca in 2006 was nothing to do with buying products. It was one of a series of accidents where people were crushed in the movement of huge crowds. Apparently pilgrims tripped over luggage from buses causing a halt in the multitude queuing. Could there be something consumerist about visiting Mecca, like a label or badge? One of the upsides of the internet is that Black Friday creates a cyber stampede. Less risk. No harm done. The worst that can happen is you are put on a waiting list for your chosen product!

We all like reduced price goods. The rationale this year is that people are poorer in the recession. They are waiting for the cheaper prices to stretch their budgets further. It takes a lot of discipline to have the idea that you want a product and wait for the price to drop. The seduction of an object that you don’t want but is 50% cheaper is hard to resist. We are fixated on the reduction rather than having the object itself.

Consumerism is good at compartmentalising. We disconnect. Nothing is for free. We are not good at integrating the market in our heads. To make a profit a loss leader has to be compensated for by an expensive or full price item. Cheap products are made abroad by workers earning low wages. Cheap services are provided by staff on zero hour contracts.
As long as we cannot integrate or connect all the complexities of modern life together we can be fooled.
Black Friday is a loss leader. But we all pay in the end.

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2013
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.

Feminism? Where?

Apparently the Top Teleword this year 2013 describes a dance. Popularised by a 21 year old American recording artist: daughter of a famous country singer. This has caused pundits to wonder about where’s feminism?

Feminism grew out of the 1960s/70s inn reaction to male oppression of women and their role in the family.  Basically feminism is an ideology or set of ideas that gives equal rights to women in education, and work. Feminism aims to support women against continuing discrimination. In the home (domestic violence) and work (sexual harassment, assault and rape).

A sex obsessed media with younger women using their bodies in sexually explicit ways could be seen as side-lining feminism. The popular view is that young women today have rejected the ideology of feminism for making the most of their bodies to promote their products.
Ideology versus the marketplace! No contest.
Technology and media have speeded up the pace of life so it is difficult to reflect or think about anything. This is convenient for humans:  thinking about something involves complexity, no answers and painful feelings. Hopelessness and being powerless. It’s much better not to think.

The discussion of issues such as race, colour and misogyny are difficult and emotive.
The reaction to the dance popularised by a 21 year old American recording artist by another former Irish singer was dismissed by the younger singer as a mental health issue. Another misunderstood area of human behaviour.

To be optimistic we are going through a phase (like Kevin) where the market exploits everything it touches. There is now more than ever the idea that there is something seriously wrong with global capitalism on many fronts.
It’s just that nobody knows what to do about it.
The times will change. Perhaps time for some more thinking and reflection?
Feminism? Where?

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2013
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.

Being Vulnerable 

We all seem to avoid being vulnerable. In the 21^st Century it used in the context of computers being vulnerable to attack. Women avoid short cuts home to prevent being vulnerable to attack, getting mugged or raped. Charities work with vulnerable adults. Aid is being targeted at the most vulnerable in the Philippines.       DONATE HERE!!
Nothing can compare to the vulnerability of having everything taken away from you in a natural disaster. Emotionally vulnerable is linked to all of these situations.
Being vulnerable can occur in a crisis. The end of a relationship. A relationship unable to begin, or a bereavement. We feel stripped bare. Exposed: protective layers pulled back showing the deeper hurts: our inner selves. We feel anxious at this exposure unable to protect ourselves from the daily hustle and bustle of our lives.
To see being vulnerable is an opportunity is a challenge.But it is.
We can trick and delude ourselves into hoping we are somebody we are not. We would like to be clever, positive, fearless, and capable individuals: but invariably we are not. We are fallible. We stumble, we fall. We don’t cope well in particular situations. To lead a life for who you would want to be and not who we are is potentially miserable.
Vulnerability gives us a clearer picture of who we are. The mist of denial and hope has risen to reveal a more realistic landscape of ourselves.
To be present with our true selves, and to lead our lives with who we are with all our imperfections is hard but better mental health.

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2013
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.

Anger in Organisations
Anger in Organisations is rife. A lot is written about the subject with little practical application. Organisations working in mental health, drugs and alcohol, domestic violence  are all dealing with anger.
Arguably every organisation centred around a group of individuals working together is going to have issues of anger to deal with. Organisations working with client groups who are angry carry double load of internal organisational and external client group anger.
Many people coming into mental health organisations particularly with abusive backgrounds have polarised views of anger. For example two common positions are the opposite positions of No Anger and violence. Violence is unacceptable so no anger is the only safe position. Violence is the anger being acted out. Uncontained, spontaneous and unpredictable – violence is a taboo (depending on your place in the world) most would agree with.
So what happens if the person is angry? They have to depress it. Put it away. Make it hidden. Anger like this is collected, and builds up. If it is unaddressed it can burst out: usually on nearest and dearest.
The organisation works in the same way. Staff who are not angry are rewarded with power and influence. Staff who are angry and challenge the organisation are treated like a threat. The identification of violence and maleness makes the organisation suspicious of male staff with assertiveness and potency.
Anger collects up and groups of staff leave. Anger which cannot be expressed – builds and then is acted out.

The other common form of anger in people and organisations is passive anger or aggression. Anger which cannot be directly accessed seeps out in the form of blocking or behind the scenes manoeuvring.
The verbal expression of anger is repeatedly misunderstood. The interpretation of anger as a helpful energy to protect or a motivator for good is a new concept. Owning feelings of anger and expressing them calmly in a way which can be heard and acknowledged sounds abstract and muddled.
How do we own our feelings? The first big step for the person or organisation is to be aware that their anger exists. Perhaps this is the biggest step: after that looking at anger and understanding it is possible.
Organisations working with people who are angry find it hard to deal with their own anger issues. It is too close; to threatening and undermines the notion of the help being provided.
It takes a brave organisation or person who looks at their own issues of anger.

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2013
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

Merkels Mobile
The US is spying on Europe. Tapping phone calls all over the world including the German Chancellor’s Merkels mobile.
Apparently this is all related to Edward Snowden’s campaign to out the US’s covert behaviour to protect itself from its enemies.
Why is anyone so surprised? Whatever you read about this – the writer makes the same point. Why is anyone so surprised? What is all the fuss about? Partly media hype? And partly somebody was found out? Everyone knows it’s going on. Countries snoop on each other. They always have and they always will.
Merkels mobile
It is the difference between knowing something is going on, but being able to ignore it as there is no real evidence. Then when the evidence arrives it brings the thought into reality. A form of denial?
Denial happens a lot in relationships. One partner suspects that the other is doing something. You immediately jump to the idea of an affair? Try more mundane? Eating chocolate alone. Drinking alcohol? In a veggie household sneakily eating meat in restaurants? We all suspect things of the other. We are not sure of them. Is it important? Is it worth bringing up? Will what we are doing be exposed in retaliation?
Denial can be damaging. But denial can protect us from the hurts of life. It gives the other the benefit of the doubt. It makes the difference between what is liveable with and what we cannot tolerate. The fear of couples going into therapy is that their denial will be exposed. They will hear something in front of the therapist witness that will expose them. It can never rest in denial again. A one way trip.
Merkels Mobile

Copyright Adrian Scott North London Counsellor Blog 2013
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.