Coping with anxiety at a time of crisis

From time to time, most of us struggle with anxiety. Unexpected and unwanted things happen, and we can become very challenged in making sense of this interruption into the daily pattern of life. Surprising events churn up feelings that we may find very confronting, and anxiety can act as a kind of ‘psychological static’ that masks […]

Demystifying therapy

Whilst there has been much more talk about mental health in the media in the last few years, telling others that one ‘goes to a therapist’ tends to be something that we shy away from, as if there is something embarrassing about needing the help of another to make sense of our struggles. It seems […]

Transitions in parenting

Whatever the stage of parenting one is at­, there is a plethora of (often conflicting) advice out there about how best to go about it. The maxim goes that we write about what troubles us: if this is the case, then clearly parenting is something that bothers a lot of us. Becoming responsible for a […]

Are we all addicted to something?

Addiction is a word that causes great fear—to be addicted indicates a compulsive need or drive towards something that promises good feelings but actually, over time as a habitual pattern develops, causes the addicted person great harm. In the past, addiction tended to be viewed as a moral weakness, experienced by some people in society: […]

Shadow and creativity

There is no light without shadow and no psychic wholeness without imperfection. To round itself out, life calls not for perfection but for completeness; and for this the “thorn in the flesh” is needed, the suffering of defects without which there is no progress and no ascent. (C.G Jung, Collected Works, Volume 12, para 208). […]

Fleeing from boredom

The unpleasant feeling we get when bored, of being in some kind of empty space where time stretches endlessly forwards, is captured well in Charles Simic’s poem: TO BOREDOM By Charles Simic I’m the child of your rainy Sundays. I watched time crawl Over the ceiling Like a wounded fly. A day would last forever, […]