Reflections on WSP Summer School
June 28th, 2011 adminSee new photo gallery by clicking on the “Gallery” link at top of this page.
You’re invited to join my new 5 part extended workshop for therapists, “Intensifying Deep Affective Processing,” beginning August 13, 2011. Therapists will practice skill building exercises aimed at forming an alliance to penetrate defenses, attend to anxiety effectively and work through buried emotions. It will be held monthly on Saturdays, 11:00-4:00 p.m. (Aug. 13, Sept. 10, Oct. 15, Nov. 12 and Jan. 14) at the beautiful Skirball Cultural Center in L.A. Register soon as there are only a few remaining spaces!
I’ve missed blogging over the last few weeks as my readers do stay in my mind and I miss the contact! Whatever happened to the lazy, hazy days of summer laden with delicious excess time? It’s been more like a Santa Ana whirlwind in the last few weeks, with some amazing stuff getting stirred up at the Washington School of Psychiatry’s 6th Annual Summer Immersion Course in Intensive Short Term Dynamic Psychotherapy this past June 5 -10, 2011 in Syria, VA. Check out the wonderful photos by clicking on “Gallery” at the top of the page. This event is the brainchild of Jon Frederickson and I was thrilled to be invited back as his co-presenter. Edward Weston wrote in his daybook that he’d spent the day in a “holiday of work, but work which was play.” This is the atmosphere that Jon created in our amazing week together as we journeyed to become better therapists, inspiring our hearts, our minds and our spirits.
As Monica Urru reminded us, we were a group of therapists meeting at a lodge on Graves Mountain, apropos of the central theme of our workshop… learning to help our patients to bury the pathological, punitive superego and thereby restore hope through the liberated self. This represents victory in a battle co-fought by the patient with the assistance of the therapist against all that had been associated with abuse, cruelty, neglect, devaluation, abandonment, irrational fear, toxic guilt and shame…destructive forces that had become internalized and were perpetuated within and against the self. “We have to learn to be our own best friends because we fall too easily into the trap of being our own worst enemies. ~Roderick Thorp, Rainbow Drive.”
As we sat at U-shaped tables, with our collective unconscious focused intently on all internal processes that are destructive to the self (perpetrator watch), I began to have images of a communal burial ground in the center of our spacious meeting room overlooking the majestic Shenandoah mountains. We were directing a fiercely bright spotlight on any perpetrator activity within the psyche and it was impossible not to become acutely aware of one’s own self-destructive parts as well. There was a shared vulnerability as self-doubts, self-criticism, shame and anxieties rose to the surface. Along with the excitement of learning powerful new healing tools and the joy of sharing the journey together, pain was also palpable in our group at times… tears as well as fears.
“Am I sufficiently smart and knowledgeable enough to become skilful at this approach? (Never mind the hard earned degrees after our names).
“Will I harm my patients?” (Do athletes fall and hurt themselves and each other in practice? Does it stop them? As one client said to me “It is the repair that matters.”)
“Do I have to abandon all that I already know and start over?” (Absolutely not! Please, integrate new skills slowly as they make sense, and continue to value your hard earned knowledge in other approaches).
“I’ll never be able to do it like _______(fill in the blank). (Shouldn’t we rejoice over our individuality? Do we really want clone therapists? And if I’m trying to be someone else, where is the authenticity?)
“There is one right way to do this.” (Then we’re all doomed).
“My heart is racing and my palms are sweating as I open to the unknown.” (Then let us beat back all that would prevent us from our birthright…to keep growing!)
“My dad abused me too. Can I myself handle the pain of revisiting such painful emotions?” (Yes, you can. It’s the price of freedom and we’re in this together!)
I felt sadness imagining a communal burial ground because that which lay beneath the dirt, while needing to be left behind, included destructive remnants of precious loved ones (who may have meant well or just been sadly limited and emotionally damaged) as well as some very old, familiar and seemingly self-protective parts of myself and others. Pruning is bittersweet. After all, those dead branches and parasitical vines that now sucked our life force were once a living part of our families and us. Yet, if the healthy tree (i.e. healthy self) is to produce new fruit, that which is anti-relationship, anti-growth and anti-joy simply has to be separated from the tree and discarded. In Gretchen Rubin’s delightful bestseller, The Happiness Project, (a book that I picked up in the Atlanta airport on the return to L.A. that is based on her personal application of happiness research), she reminds us that we have a responsibility to nurture happiness within ourselves… even when the going gets rough. Not surprisingly, strong personal bonds, mastery and an atmosphere of growth bring the most personal happiness to people (supplemented with an occasional fashion magazine, listening to drummer Danny Seraphine of Chicago fame as he jams with other local greats, and writing this blog…if you happen to be me).
Jon and I both placed a high priority on self-reflection, self-care and, as Jon put it, a “culture of compassion.” At the sunset gatherings arranged by Jon after the workshop, sitting on rocking chairs or leaning against old pillars on our porches, sipping wine and sometimes swatting bugs and watching our makeup melt in the humid air, I found myself just loving this community of deep sea divers of the unconscious. So much passion to learn and bravery too! There was lots of laughter, giggling, morning yoga and long walks about the hills and woods too… to work off the bowls of steaming Southern dishes that greeted us at each family style meal. But what made the experience especially extraordinary were the intimacy and our collective commitment to kindness to self and other. We could express anger in our group process but devaluing was off limits. We could acknowledge what we didn’t know and wanted to learn but putting ourselves down would be met with clear resistance. We could challenge each other’s ideas but only in an atmosphere of respect. This didn’t mean we might not have superego reenactment, being human after all, but this was a culture that would support each of us in our personal struggles to practice what we preached.
