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26/6/2016 Seeing Things That Aren't There. Back in the 70’s it became fashionable to tell parents to praise their children all the time. After two devastating World Wars what was left of Britain had put its shoulder to the wheel and created the NHS, decent social housing for all, and was in the forefront of technology and positive social change. Psychologically, however, Britain has always valued hard work over quality of life.
The 70’s are remembered as a time of political upheaval and power strikes but, for the first time in our history, a huge majority of ordinary families were living in secure, good homes. For the first time in our history we had disposable income – remember all those board games, television programmes, cars, hostess trollies, Curly Wurlies, bad wine and holidays to Spain? Many other positive social changes happened in the 70’s and the psych professions began to wonder how people might begin to adapt to a life that wasn’t consumed by toil. Crushing any creativity out of the working class was a way of keeping them at work, but since the working class had embraced foreign holidays and, as always, improvements in education, psychs wondered if that creativity couldn’t be nurtured rather than stifled. As with so many complex ideas many people dumbed it down until it became a matter of praising children at all costs. It has kept generations of people in an infantilised state. The US has shown us the way in terms of entitlement over contribution – and this has nothing whatsoever to do with paying taxes. People believe that they are customers in the shop that is their life and make ludicrous demands of other people whose existence is to serve them, whether that’s someone in McDonalds or a doctor, a neighbour, a partner or a child. Politicians play to that theme. We’ve been told that we can make a decision about a huge, complex machine that hardly anyone can operate. I don’t know how to manage a trade deal with emerging economies, do you? I don’t know the true extent of the diplomatic relationships that have been built up over many years with many different nations or how they have benefitted me – but I’m beginning to get an idea. Britain lost the Empire, if not within living memory then within family narrative. I am the first person in my family not to have been born in India for several generations. They moved to Britain after the Raj fell and they missed India terribly, but aside from reminiscing about the weather and some guilty nostalgia for a lost lifestyle, they let it go. They knew that things had changed; they knew that those changes were complex and not all for the better in the short term, but they knew, without rancour, that the world had moved on. If we are cats that look in the mirror and see lions then we have lost touch with reality. When a person with anorexia looks in a mirror and sees an obese person, or an abuser sees a strong person, or someone with depression sees a worthless person that is a signal that help and treatment is necessary. Most of therapy is helping a person to come to terms with reality. Any therapist who tells you that you’re always right is a liability. Instead, therapy supports the process of renegotiating life under new, unfamiliar and often unchosen conditions. Not everyone can cope with therapy. It’s often less frightening to remain in a delusion that nothing has changed and the pain can be worked off or drunk away or eased by offloading it onto someone who can’t fight back. We are now in uncharted waters. Many of us will increase our grip on an idea of England that is based in the fairy tale of King Arthur and his noble knights (which, please remember, ended in disaster and death.) Many of us who have most to lose will take the opportunity to spit out some hatred while the going is good. Many of us will be confused and distressed when our idea of democracy is called mob rule - and who can blame us when people we voted for told us we were entitled to this? Many of us will hold on to inspirational quotes as a guide to life. Some of us, who have been told we were right and entitled to make decisions that we are not qualified to make, will begin to examine our concept of reality. A little curiosity can often overcome other, very powerful, feelings. Curiosity – not yearning or even a genuine interest - about different ways of doing things can be what moves people forward. But first there has to be some recognition that we’ve been looking in the mirror and seeing something that isn’t there. 16/6/2016 Take A Step Back Jo Cox MP is dead. Despite rumours, we have no confirmation about what motivated Jo Cox’s attacker but instinctively campaigning for the EU referendum has been halted.
It has taken the murder of a woman to shock people into realising how ludicrous, how heated and dangerous things have become in Britain. Add that to what’s happening in France, America, the Middle East . . . it’s all horribly toxic. Every single one of the people I’ve spoken with socially in the last week, in cafes and libraries, online, over the phone and at bus stops, has said how stressed they feel, that they’re anxious and have a sense of impending doom. We are in a terrible mess. Most of us want very similar things: for our loved ones to feel safe, a decent way to make money, a bit of relaxation and fun, enough food on the table . . . there is more that unites us than divides us. I strongly urge you to purposefully take time out today to remember that. If that means not going to work tomorrow and spending a day with the kids then do that. Yes, I am suggesting you pull a family sicky. The world will not come to an end. If it means allowing your staff to kick back a bit, then first recognise that you have the power to allow your staff to relax or to prevent them from relaxing – then just purposefully be a decent boss. If an hour together sharing a bit of down time will bring your business to its knees then you have bigger problems than working your staff into the ground will solve. If it means buying your gobby friend a pint then do it. You will gain more respect than you lose. And you’ll feel better about yourself. We are living in dangerous times. Recognising that, standing back, shaking off this near-hysteria that’s been growing across neighbourhoods, cities, across England especially, will just take the temperature down a bit. If you’ve been feeling unusually anxious or been waiting for something bad to happen then it may not be anything to do with you and still, you can do something about it. Don’t wait for another catastrophe. RIP Jo Cox. |
CategoriesAll Abandonment Abuse Ancestors Anger Anxiety Ash Wednesday Attitude Banking Bereavement Birthday Bravery Breivik Bystander Effect Camila Batmanghelidjh Carnival Cbt Challenger Charlotte Bevan Childbirth Childhood Children Christmas Coaching Compassion Contemplation Control Counselling Culture Dalai Lama Death Death Cafe Democracy Denial Depression Domestic Violence Dying Eap Earth Day Empathy Employment Eric Klinenberg Ethics Exams Existential Failure Family Annihilation Founders Syndrome Francis Report Gay Cure Genocide George Lyward Goldman Sachs Good Death Greg Smith Grief Grieving Grooming Groupthink Happiness Hate Hungary Illness Interconnectedness Jason Mihalko Jubilee Kids Company Kitty Genovese Life Light Living Loneliness Love Mandatory Reporting Meaning Men Mental Health Mid Staffs Mindfulness Money Mothers New Year Nigella Lawson Optimism Organisational Collapse Oxford Abuse Panama Papers Panic Panic Attacks Parenthood Petruska Clarkson Pleasure Politics Positivity Post Natal Depression Power Priorities Priority Productivity Psychotherapy Ptsd Red Tent Reflection Rena Resilience Riots Rites Of Passage Ritual Robin Williams Sad Sales Savile Scared Seasonal Affective Disorder Self Care Self Preservation Self-preservation Shock Sin Singletons Sport Spring Status St David St Georges Day Stress Suarez Suicide Support Talking Terry Pratchett Time Transition Trauma True Self Truth Understanding Unemployment Valentines Day Viktor Frankl Violence Whistleblowing Who Am I Winter Blues Women Work Archives
July 2018
CategoriesAll Abandonment Abuse Ancestors Anger Anxiety Ash Wednesday Attitude Banking Bereavement Birthday Bravery Breivik Bystander Effect Camila Batmanghelidjh Carnival Cbt Challenger Charlotte Bevan Childbirth Childhood Children Christmas Coaching Compassion Contemplation Control Counselling Culture Dalai Lama Death Death Cafe Democracy Denial Depression Domestic Violence Dying Eap Earth Day Empathy Employment Eric Klinenberg Ethics Exams Existential Failure Family Annihilation Founders Syndrome Francis Report Gay Cure Genocide George Lyward Goldman Sachs Good Death Greg Smith Grief Grieving Grooming Groupthink Happiness Hate Hungary Illness Interconnectedness Jason Mihalko Jubilee Kids Company Kitty Genovese Life Light Living Loneliness Love Mandatory Reporting Meaning Men Mental Health Mid Staffs Mindfulness Money Mothers New Year Nigella Lawson Optimism Organisational Collapse Oxford Abuse Panama Papers Panic Panic Attacks Parenthood Petruska Clarkson Pleasure Politics Positivity Post Natal Depression Power Priorities Priority Productivity Psychotherapy Ptsd Red Tent Reflection Rena Resilience Riots Rites Of Passage Ritual Robin Williams Sad Sales Savile Scared Seasonal Affective Disorder Self Care Self Preservation Self-preservation Shock Sin Singletons Sport Spring Status St David St Georges Day Stress Suarez Suicide Support Talking Terry Pratchett Time Transition Trauma True Self Truth Understanding Unemployment Valentines Day Viktor Frankl Violence Whistleblowing Who Am I Winter Blues Women Work |
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