As I am preparing for the ‘cross-cultural workshop’ to be delivered in Athens, I am reading counselling/therapy texts (books, articles etc) in my mother tongue. I observe this not to be that easy since my counselling identity is formulated via the english language, I have been practising in english since the beginning of my training and i have been exposed to related written material in english etc for so long. As i read the text in greek, i find myself trying to translate the counselling terminology in english so that i can make some sense…this is emotionally confusing I shall say, to some extent, in ways that I am not totally aware of or that i can explain. It feels as if I am Greek as a person (although even that is blurred because my person-hood is deeply influenced by the english culture…I could describe myself more as bi-cultural and bi-lingual) and I am English as a counsellor/professional. The question that inevitably emerges here is how to sit comfortably with those two (or even more, am sure) aspects of the self in a Whole, in a self that feels united and integrated…what is the me in me really? I think that this question involves quite a process at an unconscious level. I am just posing this question to the Universe for now and let it rest and maybe reveal its nature as time and self-inquiry unfolds…

Interesting book to look at by Frank Furedi:

BOOK:

Therapy Culture: Cultivating Vulnerability in an Uncertain Age (by Frank Furedi)
Frank Furedi is professor of sociology at the University of Kent, Canterbury. He is also, perhaps, the nation’s best known sociologist, partly as a result of popular books such as Therapy Culture, which has been extensively reviewed in the national press.Frank Furedi is professor of sociology at the University of Kent, Canterbury. He is also, perhaps, the nation’s best known sociologist, partly as a result of popular books such as Therapy Culture, which has been extensively reviewed in the national press.
In Therapy Culture he argues that the language and sentiment of psychotherapy have now spread outside the confines of the clinic, widely infecting society at large. As a result emotional vulnerability has become the defining feature of people’s psychology, leading to a “unique sense of powerlessness.” Furedi questions the widely accepted thesis that psychotherapy as an ideology represents an enlightened shift towards emotions. But is it really the case that people didn’t feel powerless before? … Read more »

What an excellent and inspiring article i discovered! It is so helpful both for my writing of the Book chapter around integration of original and host cultures and for the PhD literature review…as i was reading about resilience, i found that this is actually a positive concept i could focus on, sth that will give more positive flow and flavour to the project, beyond the trauma and pain involved in the experiences of ‘cultural shock’, losing sense of at-homeness, non-belonging etc. There are also some interesting reflections on the metaphor of the tortoise (also mentioned by P. Laungani). The tortoise is able to live, function and survive in two cultures: earth and water…will work on that when writing the book chapter. Here is the link of the interesting article by the norwegian Professor: Gunnestad’s article on Cross-cultural Resilience

Today I have been having many ’stories’ in my head around how many of my autobiographical STORIES may be affecting the research process. This is something I have discussed with WW during a supervision session in the past and it also came up as a theme on a number of occassions recently, one when attending Kim Etherigton’s workshop in November and another when talking with Sophia B. in Crete about her own PhD. I think it would be helpful if I did some reading on this topic. A good start would be the following books: … Read more »

I was asked to teach a session on TRANSPERSONAL APPROACHES TO COUNSELLING for the MA students on Tuesday, 6th February…how great, I love this topic!. I will present a powerpoint presentation with my beloved Jung, Wilber, Assagioli etc. Am also looking forward to the contributions from the group and their feedback.

As I was doing some reading around transpersonal theories earlier today, I saw that cross-cultural psychology has been, from its origins, multicultural and as Davis, J. (2003, An overview of transpersonal psychology. Humanistic Psychologist, 31 (2-3), 6-21. [Special edition on Transpersonal Psychology. Guest editors: Harris Friedman and Douglas Macdonald. ) highlights:

“transpersonal psychology requires us to challenge our culturally-defined views of mental health and psychotherapy and to draw cross-cultural insights into its practices and applications”. … Read more »