I’ve sat with a lot of couples where one partner’s anger doesn’t fit the moment. The row is about something small: dishes left in the sink, a plan changed at the last minute, and the reaction is enormous. The partner on the receiving end genuinely can’t work out what just happened. Often, neither can the person doing the shouting.
I’ve come to recognise this as one of the clearest signs of compliance trauma showing up in adult life.
What compliance trauma actually is
Compliance trauma comes from growing up having to fall in line, not because you agreed, but because the alternative was worse. Maybe that was outright punishment. Maybe it was a parent going cold and withdrawn until you fell back into line, or a household where the mood could tip without warning and the only safe move was to comply before it did.
It doesn’t need to look dramatic from the outside. Plenty of people carrying this grew up in homes that looked perfectly ordinary. What made it compliance trauma wasn’t the severity of any one incident, it was that saying no, or even just having a visible reaction, was never really an option.
Where the explosiveness comes from
A child in that position doesn’t stop having a reaction. They just stop being able to show it. The anger, the protest, the “this isn’t fair” doesn’t go anywhere; it gets swallowed because expressing it was too costly.
What gets swallowed in childhood doesn’t stay swallowed forever. It tends to surface later, in adulthood, often with the people who feel safest, which is usually a partner or close family. That’s why the shouting can look wildly out of proportion to the dishes in the sink. The dishes aren’t really what it’s about. The nervous system has been carrying an old, unresolved protest, and something small has finally tipped it over the edge.
What it’s like on the other side of it
If you’re the one living with this, it can be genuinely disorientating. You raise something minor and get a reaction that feels like it belongs to a different, much bigger argument. Over time you start managing around it: choosing your moments, softening how you say things, sometimes staying quiet altogether rather than risk it.
That’s a form of compliance also. Two people can end up in the same pattern from opposite directions: one complying as a child and exploding as an adult, the other complying now, in the relationship, to keep the peace.
This isn’t about blame
I want to be clear that understanding where the anger comes from isn’t the same as excusing its impact. Both things are true at once. The explosive reaction has a history and a logic to it, and it still lands on the person in the room, who didn’t cause it and doesn’t deserve to carry it.
Relational therapy holds both of those at the same time. It doesn’t ask you to forgive the anger before you’ve named what it’s actually costing you, and it doesn’t ask the person doing the exploding to just try harder without understanding what’s actually happening.
Where change actually happens
The work isn’t about learning to suppress the anger better, that’s just compliance again, dressed up as progress. It’s about building the capacity to notice the reaction as it’s rising, understand what it’s really protecting, and find a way to have the protest, the no, the disagreement, without it needing to detonate.
For the partner or family member on the other side, the work is often about recognising where they’ve been complying too, quietly, out of habit, and finding their own way to say what actually needs saying.
Look at the image at the top of this post. Have you ever felt stuck in a pattern, just like this image suggests?
On the left, a skull, chained and padlocked, sealed inside a glass case. On the right, a living brain, richly coloured, roots trailing like a nervous system still reaching, perched on a surfboard.
I’ve been sitting with that image all week. It does something that a thousand words of neuroscience struggle to do. It says it in one frame.
What neuroscience is telling us about trauma and the brain
Recent advances in our understanding of the brain have given us a useful idea. In a healthy mind, neural networks move fluidly between states, integrating, separating, reconfiguring in response to what’s happening. The system is flexible. It can be surprised, moved, changed by experience, and return to itself afterwards.
Neuroscientists call that metastability.
Trauma destroys it. The brain locks into a narrow loop, stuck on one channel, unable to shift. Not because something is stored in the tissue, but because the system has learned that movement itself is dangerous. Stay still. Stay defended. Stay right.
That’s the skull in the glass case. And the padlock, if you look carefully, is on the inside.
The ocean, the board, and what I learned before I had words for it
I grew up in Bude. The sound of the ocean was a constant companion; I could just peek it from my attic window. I learned to read weather in it before I knew what I was doing: the ebb and flow, the change in rhythm before a storm. There was information in that sound, and something settling in it too. I didn’t have the word for it then, but I was learning something about what it means to move with what’s coming rather than brace against it.
Many of my clients surf. It would surprise me if they didn’t. We live on the North Cornwall coast, and the sea is always there. I understand the flow state they’re describing, that quality of complete absorption where thinking stops and something else takes over. For me, it’s jazz piano. Facing the technical demands of the music, at a certain point, I’m no longer planning or deciding. I’m simply in it, and whatever wants to come out comes out. The board and the keys are different instruments for the same thing: the brain finding its way back to the freedom of childhood imagination.
When guilt becomes the padlock
Can you imagine a client whose flow state is surfing, and yet he can barely get to the beach? Not because of injury or illness. Because the responsibilities of work and family have slowly closed around him, and somewhere in that closing, pleasure started to feel like selfishness. The paddle out, the hour in the water, the thing that restores him most reliably, now arrives wrapped in guilt. So he doesn’t go. The padlock goes back on, this time not from trauma in any clinical sense, but from the accumulated weight of obligation and the gradual withdrawal of giving himself permission to be fully alive.
That’s metastability collapsing in ordinary life. The system can’t move toward what would restore it because moving has come to feel dangerous, self-indulgent, and wrong.
When being right becomes a matter of survival
And then there’s a different kind of locked brain. Can you imagine a client who must never lose an argument? Not because they’re arrogant, but because somewhere along the way, losing ground came to feel like losing themselves entirely. The self is too fragile to risk contact without armour. So arguments get created where none exist. Positions get defended past the point of reason. And the people around them, partners, friends, colleagues, gradually stop trying to reach them. The very rigidity designed to protect the self ends up isolating it.
That’s the glass case with the padlock on the inside. The system can’t be moved, can’t be influenced without feeling annihilated, and can’t lose an argument and still find itself intact on the other side.
Two very different people. The same image.
What the therapy room actually offers
What the therapy room offers, when it’s working, is a place where movement becomes possible again. Where the client who’s locked out his own pleasure can sit with someone who takes his aliveness seriously. Where the client who can’t lose an argument can be genuinely met without being beaten, and discover that the ground doesn’t disappear when they yield a little.
That’s not technique. It’s not cognitive retraining or processing stored content. It’s the therapist being present enough, free enough in themselves, to model what metastability actually feels like in a human body, in a room, in a relationship. The surfer who knows how to ride uncertainty rather than lock it away.
Healing isn’t excavation. It’s the return of movement.
Neuroscience is catching up with what relational practitioners have always known. Flexibility, genuine contact, the productive uncertainty of real relationship: these aren’t nice extras. They’re the thing itself.
The brain on the surfboard isn’t free because nothing bad ever happened to it. It’s free because it has learned to move again.
A personal account of what personal therapy makes possible in the consulting room
Eight years ago, my daughter died by suicide. I have written publicly about her death, including on this website. It is not something I hide, nor something I have resolved. It is part of what I carry into the room.
As a relational counsellor, I use self-disclosure consciously when I believe it may serve the work. Some of my long-term clients know about my daughter’s death. Part of my responsibility is to remain aware, at any given moment, of how I am carrying it and how it may be present in the therapeutic relationship.
This article is about one occasion when carrying it became difficult, what happened next and why I believe the answer to “Do I really need personal therapy?” is, for most therapists, yes.
Something in the room
During one piece of clinical work, a client was speaking about a traumatic bereavement. They knew something of my own experience of loss because I had chosen to disclose it during our work. The disclosure formed part of the relationship we had built and had been useful in helping us explore their experience.
As the conversation progressed, I became aware of growing anxiety in my body. It was not thought-level anxiety—the kind that can be reasoned with—but something lower and more physical. I sensed that the account was moving towards graphic details about the death.
I asked them to pause for a moment.
I needed to regulate and understand what was happening in my nervous system. I explained that I was finding it difficult to receive some of the details and asked whether we could approach the material differently.
Together, we considered what they needed to express and how I could remain present without closing down the conversation. We found a way for them to speak about what mattered without focusing on details I couldn’t safely receive at that moment.
That was possible because trust had already developed between us. I named what was happening rather than trying to manage it covertly, and we negotiated how to proceed without asking the client to take responsibility for my feelings.
The boundary was necessary, but the encounter left something unfinished in me.
What the body was holding
In my personal therapy, we explored my nervous system’s response: the anxiety, the physical signal and my decision to pause the client’s account.
The connection led to my daughter’s death. As we followed it, I recognised something I had not consciously registered before: I had never spoken aloud about some of the most difficult circumstances surrounding how she was found.
Not to my therapist, my supervisor or anyone else.
I am not going to share those details here, but I want to describe what happened when I finally spoke about them in therapy.
I asked my therapist whether it was all right to go through what I remembered. She held the space while, with a great deal of shaking and trembling, I told her what had happened.
As the account came out of me, something began to shift in my body. By the time I had finished, it felt as though something in my nervous system had dissolved, or at least loosened its grip.
The memories had not disappeared, but the weight of carrying them alone had changed. What had remained silent for years had finally been witnessed.
My supervisor could not have done that work with me. Supervision holds the clinical work: I bring ethical questions, relational dynamics, and aspects of practice I cannot see clearly on my own.
But when something is lodged not only in my thinking but in my body, supervision is not always the right container. That work belongs in personal therapy.
What this makes possible
Afterwards, I recognised that I had more room to listen.
The boundary I had set in the clinical encounter was not wrong. Therapists must notice when their capacity is being compromised and respond responsibly. Remaining silent while becoming overwhelmed would not necessarily have served the client.
But processing my own material gave me greater freedom. I could make future clinical decisions with less interference from an unprocessed response and more attention to what the client needed.
If similar material arose again, I would have more capacity to remain present. I could make decisions about how to proceed collaboratively, without placing responsibility for my emotional wellbeing on the client.
This is what personal therapy makes possible.
It does not remove our responses. Therapists are human beings, and the work affects us. Personal therapy can, however, help us stay present with difficult material rather than being pulled under by it.
The difference between a nervous system that can remain with a client’s experience and one that cannot is not simply intelligence or clinical training. It also depends on how much we have attended to our own unprocessed material.
If we are carrying something without giving it a proper place to land, it may find expression in the consulting room. It can appear in what we cannot hear, what we avoid, what we redirect or what we subtly invite the client to protect us from.
Clients may feel that shift even when neither person can immediately name it.
A professional necessity, not a personal indulgence
Some therapists treat personal therapy as a requirement to complete during training, then quietly set it aside.
I understand the logic. Time is limited, therapy costs money, and once we are qualified, much of the external pressure disappears.
But the argument for continuing personal therapy is not about compliance. It is about the quality of what we offer in the room.
I have been practising for a number of years, and material still surfaces unexpectedly. I still have dreams that connect directly with my clinical work. I still need a space where I am the client and someone else holds the frame.
That is not a sign of inadequacy. It recognises that this work asks something of us and that professional development isn’t limited to acquiring knowledge or technique.
I do not go to therapy purely for my own benefit.
I go so that my history is less likely to restrict what another person can bring into the room. I go to understand my responses, respect my limits and return to the work with greater freedom.
Kintsugi is an art form that celebrates breakage and repair as part of an object’s history rather than as something to disguise.
As a therapist specializing in trauma, I often work with individuals who have reached a crisis point after trying to hide or suppress their traumatic experiences.
Healing begins when we explore the emotions surrounding these events and understand that embracing our authentic selves involves acknowledging the learning and growth that come from processing these feelings.
Like with Kintsugi, we acknowledge our history as an integral part of ourselves.
I had the experience of losing my daughter to suicide six years ago. It catapulted me into almost constant therapy for recovery, but it also became a wake-up call and launched me into training as a counsellor. An act of extreme trauma also became a point of transformation in my personal journey.
What is Kintsugi?
screenshot from wikipedia re Kintsugi
Behind Kintsugi is Wabi-sabi, a Japanese philosophy that finds beauty in imperfection, impermanence and authenticity. Kintsugi is the art of repairing broken pottery with a lacquer mixed with gold, silver, or platinum. Something broken becomes celebrated as an art form.
We can learn to see our “cracks” and “scars” not as defects to be ashamed of or hidden but as unique parts of ourselves which have contributed to our growth.
The process of healing ourselves can be compared to repairing broken pottery with precious metals. By celebrating the scars that come from healing trauma, we honour our history as an integral part of who we are. This perspective allows us to embrace our imperfections, recognize our resilience, and find beauty in our journey toward wholeness.
Image by the author
What are your broken pieces?
Do you hide them away or accept them as part of your rich history? Have you a trauma, a loss or a significant life transition point that could do with being re-examined and polished up?
There is a perceived stigma in society around imperfections and vulnerability. Social media promotes a particular idea of perfection, flawless appearances, unerring decisions and emotional invincibility. This becomes a pressure that leads us to hide parts of our true selves, fearing judgement and rejection.
We use terms like “dark secrets” or “skeletons in the cupboard” to describe parts of ourselves that must be kept secret from others.
Being abandoned
My first wife left me in true abandonment style back in the 70s at the ripe old age of 24. No note, no attempt at contact, just an empty flat when I returned home one night and the bizarre experience of being contacted by a local solicitor a year later to sign divorce papers.
My confidence was knocked for six. I had no idea anything was wrong. We ate food together, slept and had sex together. What was missing? Obviously, something was missing for my wife, but she chose to leave without explanation rather than articulate it.
I quickly drowned my sorrows with excessive drinking and fairly wild sexual adventures. I was ashamed of not being what a husband should be, yet I had absolutely no idea of what that was. I tried to put a brave face on as if I was having the time of my life, but the truth was I was broken and struggling from day to day.
Images created by the author.
Kintsugi and the therapeutic process
Kintsugi:
Find the broken pieces
Prepare them for repair
Apply the gold lacquer and glue them back in place
Allow time for drying and setting
Polish the finished article
Therapy:
Recognise the hidden and broken parts of ourselves
Seek help through therapy, support groups or self-reflection
Accepting our history, developing self-compassion, and choosing a new pathway.
Allowing time and space for healing to take place
Get used to living as your new authentic self
The things to watch out for
Unlike Kintsugi, the therapeutic process is not singularly linear. With a ceramic pot, you would gather everything together at the start and work through each stage with all the parts.
In therapy, it is more likely to be a process where each broken part becomes visible and is processed individually to some degree. Spurred on by your success with one issue, you reach back, and another becomes visible.
Is it ever complete?
There is usually a constant supply of difficult circumstances in life. With each episode, we develop resilience and self-awareness. The more we work towards living authentically, the more we notice places where we unconsciously hold ourselves back.
Looking at My School Days in a New Light
One piece of my life that remained unexplored for many years was my journey through grammar school. Society viewed it as a failure, and so did I. Now, as I pick up those memories and polish them off, I see them quite differently, much like a Kintsugi repair that transforms brokenness into beauty.
I entered Year 7 at age 11, was at the top of my class and was captain of the rugby team. However, I was also hyperactive and quite confrontational, always wanting explanations for everything. At the time, these behaviours were seen as symptoms of anxiety, and I was treated with strong sedatives that effectively switched my brain off. Even when the medication ended, I remained disengaged. It seemed that was what they wanted: a compliant student who didn’t question the system.
I went through the motions, attending classes but not truly participating, and left school at 18 with a tattered collection of qualifications. For years, I saw this as a personal failure. But now, reexamining this “broken” piece of my past, I realize that I inadvertently gave myself space to explore my interests and passions by not fully engaging with the socially prescribed education system.
Those seven years, once viewed as a time of struggle and failure, were when I developed my artistic vision and sensibilities. My musical passions were forming, and I was reading widely — unfettered by the need to adhere to curriculum guidelines. While some school friends who were fully engaged with the system found themselves locked into debilitating career paths and yearning for retirement, I have happily bounced around in teaching, musical facilitation, and psychotherapy.
Now, past retirement age, I ask myself why I would ever retire. I love my passions: work, music, and writing. Like a piece of pottery repaired with Kintsugi, the cracks and imperfections of my past have been filled with the gold of experience and self-discovery. Because of these so-called flaws, I have become more whole and authentic, and I will continue pursuing what I love for as long as I can.
Using the lessons
In the end, Kintsugi teaches us that our brokenness doesn’t diminish us, it defines us. Each crack is a testament to our struggles, how we have survived, the lessons we’ve learned, and the strength we’ve gained.
These moments, though painful, give our lives depth and texture, just like the gold-filled veins in a repaired pot. Looking at my own life, I see that every failure, every loss, and every misstep has shaped me into who I am today.
It’s not about erasing the past or pretending the cracks aren’t there; it’s about honouring them as part of our story. So, as we gather our broken pieces, let’s remember: the beauty isn’t in perfection but in the courage to keep piecing ourselves back together, over and over again.
All images created by the author using traditional and AI tools.
I once made a seemingly irrational decision that puzzled everyone, myself included. It wasn’t thought through or premeditated, and there were no logical justifications, but it changed the course of my whole life.
The moment comes back to me on many occasions, particularly on my self-awareness journey through therapy. It was a peak experience, and I chose to step away. Why would I do that?
I have worked with several clients who cannot decide what they want to work on in therapy. I suddenly realised that what they needed to work on was obvious. They were unable to make decisions. They knew something was not right but had no idea what it was. Their body was screaming out to them to make a change, but they could not access what was causing them pain.
So, I will tell my story and see if it helps me to help them choose—to decide something for no reason, to choose because not making a choice consumes vast amounts of energy and keeps us in a place of stagnation.
Choosing to step away from my career as a musician.
I walked into the Green Room after the best gig of my life. I was playing a duo gig with someone who became an International star. An audience of over 1,000 people were still clapping us. I had been playing an exquisite Grand Piano, and Andy soared alongside me on tenor and soprano saxophones.
We danced through our set of spontaneous improvisations held together by pieces I had composed. I wallowed in the care, integrity and undivided attention Andy was giving me through the music. I recently attended one of his concerts with his European Trio, and I went straight back to that place, reliving those extraordinary feelings by observing him interact with his current musical collaborators.
My wife greeted me with glowing smiles, and we hugged around our one-year-old daughter, who was strapped to her front and sleeping peacefully. She poured a cup of chamomile tea from the silver Thermos, knowing I would need something to bring me down from the giddy heights I had been scaling.
We shared with her our mystical experience of feeling as though the audience was guiding us as if a greater creative force had swept through and was playing the music through us. She handed me a doorstep sandwich of some kind as if she were the only person on the planet who knew exactly what I needed at that point.
It was then that I made the decision. On the surface, I decided to stay with my wife and daughter and drink herb tea rather than ride this adrenalin wave and run around the City bars chasing further excitement. I can see it was much deeper than that from a distance of nearly forty years.
The Build-up
I left home at the age of 18 and went to London to become a Rock Star. It didn’t work out. I became obsessed with improvisation and jazz music, which was already declining as a popular art form. I found top London jazz musicians willing to give me piano lessons. I wallowed in the jazz scene, frequented clubs and pubs, and spent many nights at Ronnie Scott’s.
I worked in a 10-piece function band to earn some money from music. My relationships were a mess, and I was drinking too much. My soon-to-be wife rescued me from all this and drew me to Bristol.
I went back to University to train as a teacher, and I loved being part of the Bristol Jazz scene playing wine bars and hotels, teaching courses in jazz improvisation and helping set up a jazz club.
Eventually, I began teaching and started a family. Soon after that concert, I accepted a job in a residential therapeutic community for boys with serious behavioural difficulties. By accepting that job, with long hours, including evening and weekend work, I had made it impossible to continue any Jazz career.
The legacy
I eventually found my vocation in therapeutic work, although it took me on a roundabout route until I qualified as a psychotherapeutic Counsellor thirty-five years later.
Jazz composing and piano playing are still regular hobbies. Teaching music became my main career thread in many manifestations, and I have mostly been living the life I love.
At first, I felt resentment that I had given up on my jazz performing career, but I found creative ways to make a living from music that fit better with family life. Now, I have nothing but glowy, warm feelings about the way I have woven music into a stable career.
That night forty years ago, my heart was giddy with emotion and potential, yet I could listen to my inner voice. I embraced my intuition and ignored my excited, rational mind, which was screaming at me to go with Andy to meet promoters and soak up the praise and acknowledgement that was sure to come my way.
At the height of what could have been a bustling International music career, I chose the warmth and stability of family life. This decision, made in a heartbeat over herb tea and a comforting sandwich, was a pivotal moment defining my future.
It wasn’t just about choosing to stay physically present with my family that night; it was about choosing a life where I could continue to be emotionally present for my loved ones.
How Music and passion has driven my personal growth
Music never left my life. It transformed from my profession into a way of being in whatever I chose to do. In therapeutic work and teaching, I have deeply intertwined those principles I loved in music — Spontaneity, improvisation, sensitivity and unscripted connections with others.
Personal growth often requires us to forgo immediate rewards for deeper, more fulfilling sustenance.
Embracing the Intuitive Leap
It is not always easy to listen to your intuition and connect to that inner voice that whispers quietly behind the incredible racket of the rational thinking mind, but that moment of quiet reflection can shape your destiny as it did mine.
From that moment, I crafted a life rich with fulfilment and purpose, balancing passion with responsibility. If you stand at a crossroads, unsure of which path to take, weigh up the logical chattering of your mind and the whisperings of your heart. Sometimes, the best decisions we make are those we cannot explain. We cannot put our finger on the logical reason why, but we know we have been guided by our intuition.
Great leaders make smart decisions, even in difficult circumstances. From Albert Einstein to Oprah Winfrey, many top leaders ascribe their success to having followed their intuition. New research shows how going with our gut instincts can help guide us to faster, more accurate decisions
Life is unpredictable, and I hope my journey inspires you to ride those unpredictable waves spontaneously. Know that following the pathway that is yours exclusively, following unexplainable currents, and sometimes drifting in the unknown can lead to profound personal growth and unexpected happiness.
The author created the image using digital and AI tools.
We live in unprecedented times. We exist in a dimension with unlimited access to ancient mysteries and wisdom alongside the emergence of extraordinary scientific tools. Studying both can give us a universal overview from which there is the possibility of creating a sustainable future for humanity and our planet.
The 21st Century is a unique turning point in history in terms of technological advancement, communication and interaction on a global scale, environmental awareness and social and political change.
The 20th Century saw remarkable changes, which set the scene for the next 100 years as being the time humanity either harnesses its extraordinary power or is destroyed by it in the longer term.
How can we open our minds to embrace these massive global and universal perspectives without seeing it as a conflict between opposing forces?
Two coexisting Realms
I work in the Creative arts and the world of Psychotherapy. Ancient wisdom and scientific discovery exist as references in all of my work, regardless of its nature.
The title image represents this in several ways. Creativity is the process of absorbing ancient wisdom and building on that to produce an original expression of your own emotional and spiritual world.
The woman meditates in an ancient temple, and superimposed on the image is a technical, scientific illustration of energy within the body and how it affects the immediate environment.
I created the image by interacting with AI Art Generators. These tools use technology to combine wisdom from the past with cutting-edge tools of the present.
The AI Art controversy
Just as historical Luddites opposed the Industrial Revolution, the Musicians Union sought to ban synthesisers, educationalists resisted online learning, and healthcare professionals expressed reluctance towards adopting AI-assisted diagnostic tools. Similarly, some artists voice concerns about AI-generated art. These instances highlight an enduring pattern — a natural resistance to change that persists as part of the human condition.
The controversy around AI art arises from the fact that it began by analysing a massive dataset of images. Art, photography and everything in between that has been uploaded to the internet. Now I can enter some text and it creates an image to reflect that text.
an image of peace and harmony in colour light and texture
Image created by the author in Midjourney — Prompt: an image of peace and harmony in colour, light and texture
Some artists and photographers see it as theft of their work. Illustrators and graphic artists see their skilled jobs disappearing overnight.
I asked Chat GPT to expand on the connection between ancient wisdom and cutting-edge science in AI Art:
AI art generators represent a unique intersection of ancient wisdom, scientific progress, and technological advances. These tools leverage cutting-edge technologies, particularly artificial intelligence and machine learning, to analyze and understand patterns, styles, and themes from various sources, including ancient art and contemporary works. The combination of these technological capabilities allows AI to generate original artworks that may reflect a fusion of historical influences and modern aesthetics.
In the context of combining ancient wisdom, AI art generators can be programmed to learn from and emulate artistic styles from different time periods, incorporating elements of cultural and historical significance. This fusion of ancient wisdom with modern technology enables the creation of art that bridges the gap between tradition and innovation.
Moreover, AI art generators can offer a fresh perspective on creativity by introducing new possibilities and combinations that might not be immediately apparent to human artists. The process involves the machine learning algorithm identifying and adapting artistic features, leading to the production of novel and sometimes unexpected artistic expressions.
In summary, AI art generators represent a fascinating synergy between ancient wisdom, scientific understanding, and technological progress, offering a glimpse into the potential for collaborative creation between human and machine intelligence.¹
Where scientific language will never be sufficient.
I would defy any scientist to pin down or quantify the qualities that define the difference between a world-class Jazz musician and a professional musician who plays jazz. They get more work, but that’s not what I mean. I find more clarity when exploring ancient wisdom related to this.
Recently, I was at a local Jazz quartet gig. I went there because a couple of the musicians were known to me for a long time, and I respected their abilities. I expected a great night but had a fantastic, almost transcendental experience.
What stood out for me was that throughout the evening, the bass player and the drummer were completely connected with each other musically and energetically. The other two musicians were well-supported by them and played at a technically similar level, but I didn’t feel their connectedness in the visceral way I did with the bass and drums.
At first, I thought it was just me because I am a musician and can sense these things. However, this was the first thing my wife mentioned as we departed. Later, I checked in with three other friends who had been there, and this feeling of connectedness between the two was the first thing that was mentioned.
It was not measurable in scientific or musical terms, but members of the audience became aware of it through their experience in the moment with the musicians. In scientific terms, my observations were not evidence-based. Does that make them invalid?
The Eastern philosophies of mindfulness and the interconnectedness of everything are at work here. We witnessed musicians being connected and present in the moment, being creative and spontaneous in responding to that moment. Unmeasurable and impossible to describe in anything other than subjective, ineffable terms.
I am a writer, artist, musician and psychotherapist. When I can be present in the moment and create a connection with my audience/client, that is when the magic happens. When I am in the flow, following my instincts and intuition and allowing myself to experience freedom and spontaneity, I do my best work.
This quality of connection is what really makes a difference, not my adherence to theoretical evidence-based models in whatever world I am functioning in.
The Marvels of Modern Science
If the 20th Century saw the rise of the machine, the 21st Century is already seeing the rise of Artificial Intelligence as a significant bringer of change. As a writer, 15 years ago, I had to pay an editor to check my work before publishing. Now, my entire writing process has changed.
As I type, I have an AI spelling and grammar check going on in the background.
A pic of the text before I changed it
That red line under the text informed me a comma might be appropriate. Any misspelt words are corrected in the same way.
another mistake pic
If I phrase a sentence clumsily, then AI makes suggestions as to how I might improve the readability of the sentence in question.
a clumsy sentence pic
AI assisted in every step of writing this article. I roughed out a headline and ran it through a headline analyser to see if I could improve it to attract more attention. I wrote the first two paragraphs and was quite excited at getting stuck into writing the whole thing, but a brick wall to my progress immediately came up.
I could be better when it comes to structuring articles. I like to write in a stream of consciousness, which can become very messy towards the end of the process. Some articles are so chaotic they never make it to publishing.
AI-generated image created by the author with the prompt: a writer facing a brick wall separating him in the present from his finished masterpiece in the future
Now, when I find myself facing that brick wall, I copy and paste what I have written into ChatGpt and ask it to map out a possible structure for my article based on those words and some specifics about my writing style.
I rarely stick rigidly to the suggested structure, but it gets me started. If I were better educated as a writer, I would have these possible structures imprinted on my neural pathways. But I’m not, and I haven’t.
There is one further step. When I finish writing this article, I may run parts of it through ChatGpt again and ask for feedback. I choose to follow suggestions or not.
Note: I have just asked for that feedback, created a second draft based on it and you are now reading the third draft. All the constructive feedback was about improving the structure of the piece.
Scientific progress in the form of AI is enabling me to enjoy and earn some money from being a writer. Several hundred people read my work every day; my ideas and creative process ultimately keep people reading. Without AI I may well have given up long ago. It eases the process, speeds things up, and allows me to tap into thousands of years of progress and development in literature without having to attend an expensive university course for four years.
Image created by the author using AI tools
Where Ancient Wisdom and Science meet.
I first worked as a therapeutic counsellor in 1985. My training lapsed, and I retrained again in 2020
In my first job in a Psychoanalytic environment, I was aware of the tension between us and those working in the behavioural sciences. I worked with severely disturbed boys and was able to observe the differences between our way of working and a nearby establishment working with a similar cohort in a completely different way.
Both claimed to be working in line with scientific research. Our boys lived in a nurturing environment where everything was designed to meet their individual needs and allow them to follow their interests and develop insight into their difficulties. The other boys were locked up under a reward and punishment system and trained to manage their problematic behaviours.
Both claimed success and cited evidence. Alongside this, I was following my interests in Humanistic Psychotherapy, which worked for me.
In the intervening years, I have explored mindfulness, meditation, and a whole raft of experiential approaches to psychology emerging more from mystical than scientific sources. Many, like Psychosynthesis, Gestalt and Person-centred therapy, are now firmly embedded in Integrative and holistic approaches to psychotherapy.
In some ways, the many branches of psychology have come together, but there is still evidence of conflict. This is most clearly seen in how the NHS uses the phrase “Evidence-based” to justify using cheaper quick-fix therapies rather than deeper-reaching long-term therapies.
“Evidence-based” has become the scientific world’s clarion call to draw everyone to their way of thinking. This seems to forget that the scientific method has only been around for 300 – 400 years, whilst mindfulness and meditation practices have been passed on globally for between 2500 and 3000 years. Is that not evidence enough of their efficacy? Does collecting ticks on a reductionist questionnaire trump those thousands of years of lived experience?
The world of psychotherapy is actively involved in finding a point of balance where both scientific and ancient wisdom approaches can coexist.
Relating to Climate change.
The climate change debate is where ancient wisdom and science finally come together. Science and industry have ploughed forward, ignoring ancient knowledge about the environment and the connectedness of all things. Now the tide has turned, and the majority of the science establishment has done their tests, thrown up their hands and said “Oh **** They were right all along.”
The problem now is changing the whole paradigm within which we all live. It was 150 years ago that Darwin coined the phrase “survival of the fittest,” most of humanity took it to mean that they had to fight for their individual survival and could justify any means towards that end. This is a complete misunderstanding of Darwin’s meaning of the phrase. The concept of natural selection is about reproductive effectiveness, not about the survival of the individual. It is about the survival of the family, community or species.
We are faced with a dilemma where we have to sacrifice our personal comfort or habits for humanity itself to survive. Technology has driven us to this precipice, and ironically, technology is the only thing powerful enough to apply the brakes and reverse us back to a sustainable future. The voices of ancient wisdom can guide us to this place of balance where the future of humanity is in tune with the future of the planet and everything that shares it with us.
Harmonising Knowledge and Wisdom
In music, this is all about finding a point of connection for disparate musical elements. This is something you can feel as a musician. You feel the connection, tension, harmony, and separation in every moment, and then you feel the moving on to a different emotional space. This is carried along by the knowledge of the music and your instrument, its strengths and its limitations.
In my counselling room, the same thing occurs. There is a therapeutic relationship where the same process of feeling my way, being spontaneous, and being able to hold tension and anxiety is happening. I am effective as a counsellor because I am non-judgemental and present in the moment with the client, but also because I have had 40 years of questioning and exploring my own inner world in the context of modern psychological theories.
In jazz I have 50 years of experience feeling and sensing those harmonies and rhythmic journeys and it all rides on the back of the musicians that have gone before me, studied and lived in the music and passed that on through their playing.
My hope for humanity is that there are enough people connected emotionally to the heartbeat of the planet who can become guides for those amazing scientists and technologists who forge pathways of understanding across the globe and generations. Can you find this balance within yourself? Do you have the strength to show up and witness this balance for others?
Our only hope for a sustainable global future is in achieving this balance. Hearing the voices of our ancestors strengthens our connection with ourselves, each other and all living things. Using advanced AI tools to harness that wisdom and combine it with science to find a way forward for humanity that harmonises us with the physical and natural world. We must change the paradigm of life from “survival of the fittest” to something more appropriate, like “sustainability through connection.”
If you can think of a better phrase for a new paradigm, pop it in the comments below.
I finish with the words of the great jazz pianist, Herbie Hancock.
We all have natural human tendency to take the safe route — to do the thing we know will work — rather than taking a chance. But that’s the antithesis of jazz, which is all about being in the present. Jazz is about being in the moment, at every moment. It’s about trusting yourself to respond on the fly. If you can allow yourself to do that, you never stop exploring, you never stop learning, in music or in life.²
Thanks for reading to the end. Have you an example of a situation where you experience that balance between theory and intuition or Knowledge and wisdom? Use the comments box to ask any questions or share observations. Often, responses can inspire a whole new article.
Please show your appreciation by clapping, responding, following and subscribing. Thanks.
2. Possibilities (2014) by Hancock, with Lisa Dickey, p. 2
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Christmas can be trickysome. Create an Advent Calendar of Self-Care. At least one thing, moment or time every day that is entirely devoted to your wellbeing.
Here are some suggestions from my trusty ChatGPT friend.
Mindful Breathing or Meditation:
Set aside a few minutes each day for mindfulness or meditation. Focus on your breath, clear your mind, and create a sense of calm amidst the holiday hustle.
Holiday Reading:
Pick up a book you’ve wanted to read but haven’t had the time for. Whether it’s fiction, non-fiction, or a holiday-themed book, reading can be a great way to relax.
Nature Walks or Outdoor Time:
Take a break from indoor activities and go for a walk in nature. Fresh air and a change of scenery can do wonders for your mental well-being.
Digital Detox:
Designate specific times to disconnect from electronic devices. This break from screens can help reduce stress and promote more meaningful connections with loved ones.
Creative Time:
Engage in a creative activity you enjoy, whether it’s painting, writing, crafting, or playing a musical instrument. Expressing yourself creatively can be therapeutic.
Quality Time with Loved Ones:
Schedule dedicated time with family and friends. Whether it’s a game night, a movie marathon, or a simple gathering, spending time with loved ones can bring joy and fulfillment.
Relaxing Bath or Spa Time:
Treat yourself to a soothing bath or a home spa session. Use your favourite scents, candles, and calming music to create a peaceful atmosphere.
Exercise Routine:
Maintain a consistent exercise routine, even if it’s just a short workout. Physical activity is a great way to reduce stress and boost your mood.
Gratitude Journaling:
Take a moment each day to reflect on the things you are grateful for. Keeping a gratitude journal can shift your focus to the positive aspects of your life.
Holiday Music and Festive Decor:
Create a festive atmosphere in your home with holiday decorations and music. Surrounding yourself with the spirit of the season can enhance your mood and make the holidays more enjoyable.
Have you got a way of blocking out all the seasonal stress and noise that has a negative effect on your well-being? Are you able to plan your time, foresee obstacles and sidestep them? Can you recognise those feelings of guilt and responsibility and consign them to the recycling bin?
Firstly let’s look at some of the things that may be causing stress.
You may like to give each a score of 0–5 0 means that it causes no stress at all 5 means it causes extreme stress.
This list was generated by ChatGPT which is good at that sort of thing.
Gift Shopping and Wrapping: Selecting and purchasing gifts for family and friends, followed by the task of wrapping them.
Decorating: Putting up holiday decorations both inside and outside the home, which may include setting up a Christmas tree, hanging lights, and other festive decor.
Meal Planning and Cooking: Preparing and cooking holiday meals for gatherings, which often involves planning a menu, grocery shopping, and spending time in the kitchen.
Hosting or Attending Events: Arranging and hosting holiday gatherings, parties, or dinners, or attending such events hosted by others.
Travel Planning: Coordinating and planning travel arrangements if you’re visiting family or friends or hosting guests during the holiday season.
Holiday Cards and Correspondence: Sending out holiday cards or newsletters to friends and family, which may involve taking family photos, writing personalized messages, and addressing envelopes.
Charitable Activities: Participating in or organizing charitable activities, such as volunteering at a local shelter, donating to food drives, or contributing to other community initiatives.
Winterizing the Home: Taking care of tasks related to winter weather, such as ensuring the home is well-insulated, preparing for potential snow or cold weather, and maintaining outdoor spaces.
Cultural or Religious Observances: Participating in religious or cultural activities associated with the winter holidays, which may include attending services, ceremonies, or other traditional events.
Budgeting and Financial Planning: Managing finances to accommodate holiday-related expenses, including gifts, decorations, travel, and entertaining.
Gift Exchanges: Participating in gift exchanges at workplaces, social groups, or with extended family members.
School and Community Events: Attending or organizing events at schools or within the community, such as holiday concerts, plays, or parades.
Reflection and Gratitude: Taking time for personal reflection, expressing gratitude, and setting intentions for the upcoming year.
Health and Wellness: Prioritizing self-care and maintaining physical and mental well-being amidst the busyness of the season.
If you scored below 10 you needn’t bother reading the rest of this article. You are obviously having a great time, keep it up.
If you scored 60 to 70 you need more help than this article can adequately provide. Maybe find a therapist.
Anything between 10 and 60 you can probably tweak it a bit and give yourself a much easier time. Read on for some tips.
First Step: Stop doing things that aren’t working for you.
Maybe identify the top three things on this list.
These things are not working for you. If something is not working for you then you should consider stopping it or changing it in some way so that it does work for you.
For example: For years big family gatherings have not worked for me for a variety of reasons. Through illness, I lost hearing in one ear so a room full of chattering relations is completely exhausting to me. I can only hold a conversation 1 to 1 by cupping my hand around my ear and lip reading to try and decipher the one voice above all the background noise.
I have a big family so trying to speak individually with up to 35 people was impossible. My first strategy was to tell myself that talking one-on-one with my mum and dad was the priority. A conversation with anyone else would be a bonus. This worked for a couple of years.
I then had a personal bereavement and being in a room with lots of joking and present-giving became a stressful ordeal. This year I have decided to go on holiday abroad for the whole two weeks. Job done, stressful family parties no longer possible.
Second step: Do more of the things that are working for you.
Identify the things on your list that scored 0. They cause you no stress at all. Do more of them. Ramp them up. Make this part of the holiday your specialism, your sweet spot.
For me, it is cooking. I love getting a big meal together, the planning, the execution and sitting down together to enjoy it, all bring me joy. One year I found myself making chocolate truffles by hand for everyone. It killed two birds with one stone. I hated buying and organising presents. I loved making handmade chocolates, learning a new skill and executing it.
Image created by the author
Third Step: Deal with the fallout of stopping doing something you have done for years.
You may find obstacles in your way. You may have guilt, voices telling you that you are upsetting others, and others blaming you for upsetting them. This is all noise. If you are reducing your stress levels then there is nothing but good that can come from that.
Guilt is something generated by your inner critic. Ask that voice to take a holiday too. Maybe give your inner critic permission to take a holiday. “Hey, critical judgemental voice in my head! Take a break, you deserve it, you’ve been working overtime we all deserve some time off.”
Another part of the fallout that may occur is that there could be parts of you that were in a way getting their needs met by being stressed out over the Christmas Season. It could be a pattern of survival you created within your family during childhood. You have been repeating this pattern unconsciously ever since.
Changing a lifelong pattern of relating is bound to bring with it some withdrawal symptoms. Recognise them for what they are and keep focused on doing the things you want to do and not doing the things you don’t want to do. If you find the stress creeping back in, change your tactic in some way.
Notes about planning and foreseeing obstacles.
I have worked with a few clients on this part of the process. They describe family events they feel obliged to attend and then feeling trapped in this space where someone may be drinking excessively and becoming obnoxious, or a judgemental relation is haranguing them with bigoted views or a parent is talking to them as if they were still 12 years old and not a fully functioning adult.
What we work on is a strategy to attend the event in a way that fulfils your feeling of obligation, but gives you a get-out clause as soon as you feel those elements of stress or discomfort creeping in.
One very simple solution might be rather than sharing a ride to an event or offering a lift to another member of the family, to drive there alone. This means you can leave whenever you are ready to and don’t have to wait around for someone else.
You might want to pre-prepare an exit excuse. In my case, I feel perfectly happy sharing a downright lie. “Sorry, I have to go to meet — —. It’s the only time we could both fit in. Bye”
Embrace the Joyful season
I encourage you to put your well-being at the top of your priority list. You have no responsibility to keep others happy and attempting to can be a never-ending and ultimately fruitless task.
Focusing on your own feelings of peace and well-being permits others to do the same. Follow some of the strategies above and you may discover that you can embrace the qualities of peace and goodwill that are supposed to be embedded in the season.
Remember if you only change one small thing this year, next year you can build on that. Striking a balance between compassion for others and self-care is key, allowing you to foster genuine connections without compromising your mental and emotional health.
I was walking the cliffs near my home on a beautiful sun-baked afternoon. I noticed the skylarks were not singing. I chatted with my wife about the life cycle and habits of these melodious beauties. Had they fledged all their chicks and abandoned those nests in the long grass? As I searched the sky for any signs of them, I noticed two young women walking towards us.
As I rested my eyes on one of them. A wave of sadness hit me in the chest. Tears sprung from my eyes, and my knees felt a little weak. As my body registered this emotional disruption, my mind began to catch up. I registered the face of a woman in her late twenties with blonde hair scraped up into a ponytail, talking animatedly to her friend.
My body had registered some resemblance to my daughter Holly, who died three years ago. My emotions had been triggered, and a wave of grief had swept over me. My wife gave me a questioning look. We had been talking about skylarks, and then seemingly for no reason, I had burst into tears.
It took me a moment. It was like a shockwave starting in my chest, spreading out through my body into my limbs. I shook my fingers and felt the energy dissolve.
“I just had a wave of sadness seeing that woman. Her hair was a bit like Holly’s.”
My wife nodded, understanding. Like me, her grief and tears can be triggered by a wide range of reminders of our beautiful daughter. A stranger’s laugh, a french plait, someone using their hands to punctuate their conversation in a certain way.
At first, these experiences would shut me down. I would be unable to talk, and I would seek solitude, step away from people, retreat to the loo or the safety of my van.
A year ago, it took me five minutes. Sat in my van, I watched transfixed as a woman chatted to her friend. My mind knew it could not be Holly, but other parts of me were not so sure. I felt immobilised, rooted to the spot. The woman entered the shop, and my mind won the argument. The grief flowed through my body and dissolved. I picked up my shopping bag and got on with my day.
I recognise the sensation as a dissolving. The trauma of losing a child to suicide is imprinted in every cell of my body. I will never forget. I will not be moving on or getting over it, but I can live with the pain. I can even welcome it as a reminder of the joy and love that Holly brought into my life.
I am not ignoring the emotion or reacting to it, and I am not just observing it or hiding it away or storing it somewhere for later. I am not controlling or managing my emotions. I am feeling the emotion, noticing the grief throughout my body. My mind recognises it. I allow myself to feel it. Once felt, I dissolve it.
On that walk on the cliffs with my wife, I described the sensations, and as I did so, I felt the sunshine flooding back into my body. Here I was, a content old man able to walk the beautiful Cornish coastline whenever he wished. What began as a wave of pain transformed into a wave of love and gratitude. The pain was still there, not denied, but acknowledged as a reminder of 28 years of having the privilege to be the father of an extraordinary child/young woman.
For this story, I would love to be able to report that as the emotions dissolved, a skylark began to sing high in the sky above me. That didn’t happen, but my senses did start picking up the sound of the waves on the shore. I noticed a lone surfer patiently waiting for a rideable wave to emerge from the calm ocean. I took my wife’s hand in mine, and we carried on with our glorious Sunday afternoon walk.
