beach.jpg

Authenticity and the Self

  • Human beings rarely exist in total harmony and peace with themselves. In our troubled world harmony and peace take continual practice. When we are young we learn to confuse happiness with recognition, status, money, pleasure and comfort. We learn to chase these things by self-suppression and denial, via over-consumption, conformity and rebellion, by ambition and trying to be special, by people pleasing, accumulating wealth, by attention-seeking, social status, and competitiveness. We attempt to build self-esteem on our obsessions with outward appearances, and luxury. In the long run, none of this tends to deliver the deep, lasting contentment we crave.

    Many people also believe that they must ‘fit in’ to a social group of some kind in order to be happy. As such, they may search in vain, or try in vain to adopt the group’s accepted ways, even if it means going against their own nature. Individuals who value authenticity over performing for an audience, tend to value themselves and find peace when they stop seeking external validation, embracing their unique position in society as their own original, free-thinking path with nothing to prove to anyone.

    Whatever you are struggling with it is possible to begin the work of resolving as much conflict within and around you as possible, in order to make your relationship to your self one that grows increasingly contented, deep, and meaningful.

    • “I feel low all the time”: Resolve depression, dysthymia, unhappiness in life, lack of personal joy and meaning

    • “I have physical symptoms with no medically identifiable cause”: Resolve somatoform/ conversion disorders, and other conditions described as ‘psychosomatic’.

    • “I don’t know what I feel”: overcoming numbness, dissociation and Alexithymia

    • “I’m always insecure”: Resolve developmental trauma and the childhood origins of chronic fear and insecurity, low self-esteem, poor self-image, and lack of confidence.

    • “I’m anxious or panicky a lot of the time”: Resolve PTSD, cPTSD, and other trauma-based fear states that produce chronic fear, anxiety and insecurity

    • “I have low self-esteem”: Stop comparing Self to others, people pleasing, and other self-defeating habits, and start developing the courage to be you

    • “I don’t know who I am”: Resolve chronic fear and insecurity, lack of personal identity, unstable sense of Self

    • “I’m frightened and exhausted by my own mind”: paranoia, hypervigilance, intrusive thoughts, over-thinking

    • “I don’t know where I’m going”: Clarify and strengthen your life purpose, assertiveness and direction

    • “I don’t like myself”: Resolve your struggles with appearance, body image, eating disorders, sense of identity and Self

    • “I’m scared a lot of the time”: Develop greater courage, self-empowerment and freedom from fear of, and subservience to authority figures

    • “I feel lonely and left behind”: Resolve the torments of loneliness, social isolation, feeling 'disconnected', 'not fitting in'

    • “I feel like a freak”: Learn how to survive being scapegoated* and how to stay sane in an insane family, group, workplace, society etc

    • “I just don’t fit in”: Find inner peace as an outsider, non-conformist, unique, shy, highly sensitive or solitary individual

    • “I feel numb and disconnected”: Resolve the root causes of dissociation, derealisation/ depersonalisation habits

    • “I attack myself a lot of the time”: Bring an end to chronic self-doubt, self-criticism, deliberate self-harm, self-loathing

    • “I feel tormented by my feelings”: Resolve habits driven by jealousy, resentment, anger, rage, and destructive envy

    • “People seem to get annoyed with me a lot”: Transform passive-aggression and covert-aggression habits into honest communication

    • “I just keep putting things off”: Turn procrastination and avoidance habits into meaningful action

    • “I don’t feel at home in my body”: Address body image problems, body dysmorphia and other perceptual disorders

    • “I’m not good enough as I am”: Identify and resolve the underlying causes of self-starvation, eating disorders, addictions and phobias

    • “I’m tired of conflict and failed relationships”: Bring an end to dependency and co-dependency by building self-support and self-reliance skills

    • “I want to understand my dreams”: Explore and identify the important meanings in your fantasies, dreams and nightmares

    • “I want to feel deeper peace and contentment in myself”: Come to terms with the secretive side of who you are and your 'shadow side' (narcissism, dishonesty, lying, cowardice etc)

    • “I’m sick of labels and pills”: Approach psychiatric diagnostic labels from a completely different perspective - please enquire about specific diagnoses during an Introductory Meeting

    • “I’m haunted by an abusive past”: Heal from child and adult sexual harassment, abuse and assault

    • “I want to stop being at the mercy of my impulses”: Common addictions and their causes:

      • device addiction

      • comfort eating

      • pornography and sexual promiscuity

      • gambling

      • alcohol and substances**

    • “I don’t want to live in fear”: Common phobias:

      • Social

      • Public speaking/ interviews

      • Insects

      • Flying

      • Open/ confined spaces

    **I recommend stabilising substance misuse via AA or NA groups first in order to meaningfully engage with psychotherapy to address the underlying causes of your addictions and phobias

  • Problems that I see increasingly in my practice include the following, and the interpersonal consequences people experience as a result of these problems.

    • “I feel ugly and unattractive”: Low self-esteem in relation to weight, appearance, eating habits, choices etc.

    • “I’m angry and frustrated with the world”: Narcissism: entitlement, inauthenticity, obsessions with appearance, destructive envy, a preoccupation with the desire to be noticed; free-floating frustration and anger

    • “I just can’t stop myself”: Pleasure and comfort addictions and their neurological and inter-personal consequences

    • “I can waste most of my week on my phone”: Device addictions and ‘doom scrolling’

    • “I feel like an imposter”: What people are now calling ‘imposter syndrome’: the experience of inauthenticity that comes from being more identified with an image of oneself than one’s own embodied reality and conscience

    • “If I’m scared or angry it’s your fault”: The victim identity - now encouraged by legislators - with an absence of insight into one’s behaviours.

    • “I just don’t see the point of life”: Meaninglessness, lack of purpose, and societal despair

    • “I’m ruled by my insecurities”: Chronic insecurity and anxiety states

    • “If I start being honest my life will fall apart”: Lies, deception, betrayal, with a growing lack of morality, honour, loyalty, and sincerity in relationships

    • “I just can’t cope”: Chronic regression and emotional overwhelm

    • “Why should I give when I need so much myself?”: Lack of recognition of the value of generosity of spirit

    • “I don’t feel like I belong here”: Fear and anxiety about the state of the world, and a sense of powerlessness to effect change

  • We all have a past that we try to remember, and one we try to forget. We all have ideas about the near and distant future. Our relationship to the present - where we do our living - tends to be compromised by the ways we relate to past and future. It is possible to resolve conflicts that still exist in your relation to past and present so that you can live more fully and peacefully in the here-and-now.

    • A troubled or abusive past or present

    • Childhood- and family-related difficulties

    • Living with regrets, guilt, shame, tragedy or loss

    • “I don’t know what I feel”: Difficulties in being aware of one’s emotions and expressing them

    • “I worry all the time”: Anticipatory anxiety, worry and rumination habits

    • “I’m having panic attacks”: Stress and panic attacks

    • “I think I’m depressed”: Low mood, mood instability, and depression

    • “I’m scared of flying”: Fears and phobias

    • “I take my temper out on people”: Expressing all feelings as anger and aggression, or turning everything into a joke

    • “I can’t stop crying”: expressing all feelings as tearfulness, helplessness etc

    • “I’m scared of groups”: Social anxiety and social phobias

    • “I feel like I have no life or identity now”: Retirement, loss and bereavement anxiety

    • “I don’t feel safe anywhere”: Generalised anxiety and trauma-related anxiety

    • “I wake up at 3 a.m. terrified of death”: Existential anxiety: death, isolation, freedom, meaninglessness

    • “I can’t let people get close but I want closeness”: Fear of Engulfment: being easily overstimulated or overwhelmed by others

    • “I’m all over the place”: Overwhelm and difficulty coping with emotions

    • “I just want to hide away”: Guilt, shame, dread, embarrassment, vulnerability and other difficult feelings

    • “I’ve always struggled with my weight”: Addictions, emotional consumptions habits

    • “I think I have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder”: Resolve ritualistic behaviours and other psychiatric conditions

  • To some degree, global societies have all been traumatised by the way our social hierarchies are constructed and evolve. Children are increasingly exposed to very toxic influences that society has normalised as ‘entertainment’, social conformity, citizenship, and ‘education’, for example. What it is to be a ‘good worker’, ‘good student’, ‘good friend’, ‘good family member’, and ‘good citizen’ is not necessarily conducive to being a healthy, well, self-respecting, authentic person. And to varying degrees we are, as children, brow beaten into conformity to roles that literally make us unwell.

    Adult survivors of infantile, childhood and adult trauma have their entire bodies and minds shaped by stress and adversity, which leaves individuals feeling that they are ‘just surviving’; living on edge all the time, instead of living and thriving.

    I offer a tailored approach to fear and trauma in the form of a flexible, modular protocol that can be designed according to your history, needs and presentation. This is made up of structured practices, many of which I have designed myself over decades of working with traumatised persons (and including known methods like EMDR, BioFeedback, EFT, Yoga, Meditation), much of which you can begin to do daily to start to recover nervous system balance, a more peaceful mind, and feelings of safety and security in your body and in your relationship to the world. It is possible to evolve from a state of constantly feeling insecure, hyper-vigilant, and on-edge, to feeling awake but calm, grounded, self-protecting, and at ease much more of the time.

    • Traumatic and adverse childhood events (loss, all forms of abuse, rape, physical and sexual violence)

    • Post Traumatic Stress (associated with PTSD and c-PTSD, DD, DID for example

    • Developmental trauma presenting in symptoms as ADHD, dissociation, Alexithymia, Dysthymia, ‘personality disorder’, chronic insecurity or hypervigilance, somatoform disorders, fear of intimacy, O.C.D. etc