It has been a while now that i have been feeling overwhelmed by the research process. I have been focusing on the data collection phase through conducting the research interviews, but didnt quite make the time to sit and look what i have collected, something that often makes me feel a bit ‘blur’ in relation to where am at with the PhD. It is time to stop for a bit and study the transcripts and do a bit of writing. Last week, i spent a good 2 hours with my supervisor sitting on the floor in his office with big sheets of paper, where we kind of mapped my Thesis. This felt helpful and supportive, i need to go back to those sheets of paper during the Christmas break and organise my thinking around it, in written form. I can see that i shall start producing ‘text’, even in draft form. I anticipate this to be a creative and maybe healing process, althouh not always easy to find the words for what am exploring. … Read more »

A question i pose during my research interviews is inviting the participant to think of a metaphor/image that would describe them as therapists (what they have become as a result of moving between cultures/experiencing cross-cultural transitions etc). This is something that my supervisor advised me to do in order to invite more unconscious/tacit responses to emerge, as a way of unblocking certain experiences or feelings that may be difficult to be put into words. The metaphor of a Chameleon [means "Earth lion" and is derived from the Greek words chamai (on the ground, on the earth) and leon (lion)] is one that has come up often.

William has been writing a chapter about Pittu’s work and he came up with those relevant paragraphs, that also echo my personal experience, to some extent, he calls this section “Counsellor as Chameleon”: … Read more »

there is a fellow studnet in our PhD group who is researching the topic of the counsellor as the ‘wounded healer’. I agreed to participate in her research and we had an interview today. It was quite powerful for me i shall say, there was a lot of material from my own story that came in the surface. … Read more »

am up in Durham/Newcastle to conduct a few research interviews. am aware of feelig emotional being here, this place was the gateway to my immersion to the british culture. O completed teh most important part of my counselling training up here and gained a lot of practice experience…it feels as if i was ‘formed’ in this place, at least as a counsellor – there are many personal memories related to this location of course. I remember when i was living in Durham that i had a sense that maybe i was born here (in a past life! the scenery has nothing to do with my greek homeland landscape, neither has the culture)…am wondering around the MEANING OF PLACE…as related to identity, culture, sense of at home-ness. I can see that PLACE has a heavy/important significance for me personally, but not all people put the same emphasis on that. However, a greek therapist i interviewed yesterday (she has lived in the uk for 9 years and now planning to return to Greece) was telling me that when it comes to create her own home (her family), then place becomes significant, culture becomes significant. I can see this being particularly relevant to the Greeks….or is it relevant to cultures that have strong family values and then the connection to the land becomes extremely relevant? so many dimensions to the whole thing really, too subtle…i cant come to generalisations of course and am wondering how i can claim any ‘truths’ in my PhD thesis because of that…will see what comes up, the process is still cooking

One of the themes that come out in my research is the use of a second language by those therapits that move to a host culture, including myself, and how this affect the relationship with one’s own mother tongue and generally how the two operate in the internal self-dialogue, inner space. I had an email conversation with a male friend who noted that i have the tendency to speak like an ‘academic’ often and not as a ‘woman/ person’, even when it is out of context. This lead me to reflect on my use of languages and i wrote an interesting response which hopefully describes some of this experience: … Read more »