Psychotherapy
If music be the food of love...
21/10/08 18:16
During my never-ending adult education, I once had the gift of an amazing teacher. The name in which he published was R. D Laing. He was a clever, insightful, perceptive, wonderful, loving, radical and often unruly man. He was a psychiatrist of the best sort. Like many who are sensitive, perceptive and gifted, he may have drowned his emotions in excess and drink from time-to-time. A search on “Google” will tell you more about him. I knew him as Ronnie. For a year, he was my psychotherapy tutor. Sadly he died from a heart attack a couple of years later. I missed him.
I struggled with all this "talk" psychotherapy stuff. So I asked Ronnie one day, how one might tell what someone else was truly feeling. They may not say after all. They might not know the truth of how they felt themselves. He replied, “That’s simple, laddie.” He made me laugh. He always called me “laddie”. “Find out what music they’re listening to. That will tell you how they feel soon enough.”
He went on to tell me that if the music didn’t help me, then I should get them to write stories. If that failed, I should ask them to paint pictures, but never to rely on talk, if I wanted to discover their true emotions.
This post is inspired by and dedicated to a friend, a fellow abuse recoverer. She lives over 5,000 miles away. Last night, I was deeply concerned for her. Today, having heard what music she listened to last night, I feel so much better, if not envious. I would have enjoyed that same music too.
Ronnie’s wisdom about music, though simple, is profoundly true. Music is a powerful connection in our lives. It says deep things about us as people. It crosses nations, politics and social divides. I feel true to Ronnie’s view to this day. Music also tells me about another person and how I might feel about them, even whether we’d get on. Think about it. So you love Mozart, Bach and Joni Mitchell, whom she hates. She loves Whitney Houston, Metallica and Westlife. Better think again. What more can I say?
I struggled with all this "talk" psychotherapy stuff. So I asked Ronnie one day, how one might tell what someone else was truly feeling. They may not say after all. They might not know the truth of how they felt themselves. He replied, “That’s simple, laddie.” He made me laugh. He always called me “laddie”. “Find out what music they’re listening to. That will tell you how they feel soon enough.”
He went on to tell me that if the music didn’t help me, then I should get them to write stories. If that failed, I should ask them to paint pictures, but never to rely on talk, if I wanted to discover their true emotions.
This post is inspired by and dedicated to a friend, a fellow abuse recoverer. She lives over 5,000 miles away. Last night, I was deeply concerned for her. Today, having heard what music she listened to last night, I feel so much better, if not envious. I would have enjoyed that same music too.
Ronnie’s wisdom about music, though simple, is profoundly true. Music is a powerful connection in our lives. It says deep things about us as people. It crosses nations, politics and social divides. I feel true to Ronnie’s view to this day. Music also tells me about another person and how I might feel about them, even whether we’d get on. Think about it. So you love Mozart, Bach and Joni Mitchell, whom she hates. She loves Whitney Houston, Metallica and Westlife. Better think again. What more can I say?
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Against psychotherapy...
29/07/08 14:01
I wanted to say a few words about questions that I am asked all the time about psychotherapy.
First, I am not a therapist. It’s not what I do for work nor would I wish it to be. I have worked in mental health and I hold a recognised qualification in analytical psychology. I have in the past spent brief periods doing relationship and marriage counselling. I chose not to work as a therapist.
I have been asked if “I believe” in psychotherapy. My answer is that I don’t, which is not the same as saying that I do not approve of therapists or necessarily, disapprove of their work.
I believe that therapists face terrible and enormous pressures in their work resulting from our social, political and economic failures. Many work hard and receive little or no credit for all that they do. The problems that they face frequently come from areas they cannot possibly address.
What I dislike most about psychotherapy is that it turns all the problems in on the individual. You are the one that is wrong. It can also produce a victim culture, one where if I’m only a result of past causes, then I’m a victim of those causes when my life goes wrong. I believe that we are all more than the products of our past.
I’ve been writing this blog in various forms for many months now. I have joined blog social networks, like blog catalog. I have made a few friends there too! But it gave me the opportunity to see a new world full of different types of therapist.
In correspondence with a friend here, we talked about “quick fix” merchants. Quick fix merchants reflect our culture, where we treat ourselves like we treat our cars. We take our cars to the garage and we want to know ‘what’s wrong with it, how much will it cost and how long will it take?’
On the internet, these people are everywhere. They promise health, seven steps to success, happiness and self-esteem, sometimes for prices as low as $29.99!
They are generally American and perhaps they are part of the cultural tradition of that country, where snake oil salesmen and travelling circus quacks originated.
There are far worse examples on the net, and they are often called “Doctor”. They promote psychological dependency and “appropriate” medication with an enthusiasm that I might reserve for a good night out. I find those the most terrifying of all.
It’s something about our state of mind and our culture. People feel bored, alienated and sick at heart. They feel like life has lost its purpose. So they are fast to jump at all these quick fixes.
Psychology has tried to gain respectability in the medical world by resorting to scientism. I do not believe all aspects of our lives are accessible to science, nor would I trust science to tell me how I should feel, believe or experience the world.
Perhaps I should say more about economics. I have skirted around any direct comment on economics before, but it dominates our thinking and our way of life. Its maxim is ‘More, more, more!” It’s nothing less than a slave driver. No one has free time, no one has leisure, no one has time to feel or think; we don’t have time to live anymore. Our very existence is under pressure and it’s fraught with anxiety.
In my post here, Beyond Psychology, I was grappling with my own uncertainty. I still am. I talked about a new philosophy. Perhaps I might have talked about a therapy of ideas that would have been equally valid. But I’m not sure of either expression. I’m concerned about a world dominated by intellect, where feelings, emotions and creativity are subjugated by thought, especially scientific thought. I question to what extent economic man is also one-dimensional intellectual man.
There’s something else I want to say before concluding about psychotherapy and good psychotherapists. It’s something I struggled with when I thought I might become a therapist. Psychotherapists may fill a gap in our lonely and alienated lives that I feel may be better attended by lovers and close friends with whom we can talk and share intimate understanding. I suspect that the best psychotherapists are little more than paid surrogate friends and lovers. There are profound complications in the psychotherapeutic relationship when the psychotherapist assumes the role of a lover. He or she is treading on very dangerous ground.
In summary, I am against psychotherapy. It is being held accountable for that which it cannot possibly apprehend. Further, it individualises many problems that are the product of our society. It makes every problem, an inner problem and that’s not where problems come from. They come from a world which we have created, and which we can choose to change.
A footnote about suffering
None of what I have written is intended to deny the reality of psychological suffering. It is very real and very painful. Sometimes a therapist or medicine may help in the remediation of this suffering…that I do not deny.
My experience, however, is that ultimately the sufferer who recovers, recovers more as a result of their own courage and determination, than the application of therapy or the use of medication.
The best therapists, in my opinion, are those who enable sufferers to find answers within themselves, which will necessarily entail looking beyond themselves, and beyond their personal histories for the source of their difficulties.
First, I am not a therapist. It’s not what I do for work nor would I wish it to be. I have worked in mental health and I hold a recognised qualification in analytical psychology. I have in the past spent brief periods doing relationship and marriage counselling. I chose not to work as a therapist.
I have been asked if “I believe” in psychotherapy. My answer is that I don’t, which is not the same as saying that I do not approve of therapists or necessarily, disapprove of their work.
I believe that therapists face terrible and enormous pressures in their work resulting from our social, political and economic failures. Many work hard and receive little or no credit for all that they do. The problems that they face frequently come from areas they cannot possibly address.
What I dislike most about psychotherapy is that it turns all the problems in on the individual. You are the one that is wrong. It can also produce a victim culture, one where if I’m only a result of past causes, then I’m a victim of those causes when my life goes wrong. I believe that we are all more than the products of our past.
I’ve been writing this blog in various forms for many months now. I have joined blog social networks, like blog catalog. I have made a few friends there too! But it gave me the opportunity to see a new world full of different types of therapist.
In correspondence with a friend here, we talked about “quick fix” merchants. Quick fix merchants reflect our culture, where we treat ourselves like we treat our cars. We take our cars to the garage and we want to know ‘what’s wrong with it, how much will it cost and how long will it take?’
On the internet, these people are everywhere. They promise health, seven steps to success, happiness and self-esteem, sometimes for prices as low as $29.99!
They are generally American and perhaps they are part of the cultural tradition of that country, where snake oil salesmen and travelling circus quacks originated.
There are far worse examples on the net, and they are often called “Doctor”. They promote psychological dependency and “appropriate” medication with an enthusiasm that I might reserve for a good night out. I find those the most terrifying of all.
It’s something about our state of mind and our culture. People feel bored, alienated and sick at heart. They feel like life has lost its purpose. So they are fast to jump at all these quick fixes.
Psychology has tried to gain respectability in the medical world by resorting to scientism. I do not believe all aspects of our lives are accessible to science, nor would I trust science to tell me how I should feel, believe or experience the world.
Perhaps I should say more about economics. I have skirted around any direct comment on economics before, but it dominates our thinking and our way of life. Its maxim is ‘More, more, more!” It’s nothing less than a slave driver. No one has free time, no one has leisure, no one has time to feel or think; we don’t have time to live anymore. Our very existence is under pressure and it’s fraught with anxiety.
In my post here, Beyond Psychology, I was grappling with my own uncertainty. I still am. I talked about a new philosophy. Perhaps I might have talked about a therapy of ideas that would have been equally valid. But I’m not sure of either expression. I’m concerned about a world dominated by intellect, where feelings, emotions and creativity are subjugated by thought, especially scientific thought. I question to what extent economic man is also one-dimensional intellectual man.
There’s something else I want to say before concluding about psychotherapy and good psychotherapists. It’s something I struggled with when I thought I might become a therapist. Psychotherapists may fill a gap in our lonely and alienated lives that I feel may be better attended by lovers and close friends with whom we can talk and share intimate understanding. I suspect that the best psychotherapists are little more than paid surrogate friends and lovers. There are profound complications in the psychotherapeutic relationship when the psychotherapist assumes the role of a lover. He or she is treading on very dangerous ground.
In summary, I am against psychotherapy. It is being held accountable for that which it cannot possibly apprehend. Further, it individualises many problems that are the product of our society. It makes every problem, an inner problem and that’s not where problems come from. They come from a world which we have created, and which we can choose to change.
A footnote about suffering
None of what I have written is intended to deny the reality of psychological suffering. It is very real and very painful. Sometimes a therapist or medicine may help in the remediation of this suffering…that I do not deny.
My experience, however, is that ultimately the sufferer who recovers, recovers more as a result of their own courage and determination, than the application of therapy or the use of medication.
The best therapists, in my opinion, are those who enable sufferers to find answers within themselves, which will necessarily entail looking beyond themselves, and beyond their personal histories for the source of their difficulties.