The circular weave

Writing for the book draft has slowed. What started pre-retreat as a sense of edginess transmuted post-retreat into a conscious decision to step back from the keyboard. The edginess was a tectonic plate-like meeting of my drive to finish and my need to break this summer. Speaking with Rinpoche on retreat brought the “high lung” …

Fully BeINg

Back from retreat, and spending my days settling back into “reality”. I haven’t found the transition as steep this time around. Maybe a testament to practice pervading more deeply into life and less “this” (normality) versus “that” (the container of retreat)? I certainly feel a little more practiced in the shift between worlds: a developing …

Letting it sink in

I am landing at my desk after a celebratory bike ride and breakfast at my favourite local cafe: The celebration? The publishers Routledge are offering me a contract for my book: “Weaving the paths of Buddhism and psychotherapy: the practice of human being”. I heard on Wednesday, and since then I have been too busy …

Words

There is one song (outside the back catalogue of Wham!) that comes back to me as an anthem of my childhood in the 1980s – “Words”, by FR David (please only click that link after a deep breath, and forgive the 10 year old me). I found it enchanting, playing it over and over again…something …

Being a reflective practitioner

Each year, a psychotherapist on the UKCP register needs to submit an account of their training updates and detail the continued professional development activity. Given I am a self-confessed “CPD junkie”, it takes some time to go back over my activity in the past 12 months – the reading, the workshops, the courses, the podcasts, …

CTR falling

The celebration of not knowing

On Saturday I was at the University helping behind the scenes as we got our CPD programme at Brighton up and running. Our inaugural event was led by Dr Greg Madison: a Chartered Psychologist and Registered existential Psychotherapist renowned in the UK (and indeed worldwide) for his work with Focusing. I’ve done a fair bit …

MindTheGap

Minding the gap

This week, University staff across the UK are on strike, their action pointing towards pensions, pay and conditions. Not being a UCU member, I am still at work this week – not a straightforward decision. In fact, in the past 2 weeks I have felt a growing sense of anxiety. A child growing up in …