Philosophy
Through practice-based, phenomenological research, continuing training in coaching, counselling, and facilitation, and global interdisciplinary studies, I developed a holistic philosophy. I choose the term holistic (i.e., 'whole-istic') because I believe that every person is an individual, inseparable microcosm of the whole macrocosm of the universe. That is to say, that each person contains many vast terrains spanning the unique world within them, which is populated with instincts and conditioning from the human and more-than-human ancestors in the eco-system around us. I believe that our identities are constantly being shaped and re-shaped in response to life, and that we all belong to a broader multi-species stream of inter-dependent evolution on our planet. We are all a part of living networks, biological communities and generative systems, contributing to and benefiting from the shared biosphere.
The artistic and spiritual core of my practice is the quality of compassionate, warm and genuine presence that I offer. My interventions are informed by the following basic principles, which are constantly in a state of being tested and refined, like all good science. You'll notice that I write these principles from the collective perspective of "we" as so far they've proven to be universally applicable for all human beings from all kinds of experiences, cultures and walks of life. I remain alongside you, and my intention is to stay open to learning how to support you best.
21 Principles of my Theoretical Model:
We are relational beings. Human beings are multidimensional beings, existing as organisms in mutual relationships with all of life, and we are all diverse manifestations of energy.
We all share innate, personal needs and a capacity for collective evolution. We each have a natural, energetic curiosity toward exploring the world in order to meet our innate needs, and thereby fulfil our personal, optimal capacities for: individual and collective evolution, self-growth, self-expression, connection, belonging, safety, shelter, warmth, nutrition, survival, thriving, reciprocity and continuation of life-giving energy.
We are all in a natural flow of giving and receiving. The way that we relate with the world arises from our inner nature, which is creative and life-sustaining and seeks fulfilment of our innate needs and different capacities. We each have the potential to appropriately share inherent gifts and different strengths, to benefit the web of life.
We shape reality, and reality shapes us. Places, people, events, and indeed the whole cosmos, coalesces to form conditions whereby we each learn to adapt, grow and share in order to fulfil some of our personal needs and the needs of others in the human and more-than-human world i.e. the planetary ecosystem as a whole. In this way our identities, and our relationships and realities, are constantly being shaped and re-shaped from inside and outside ourselves.
Nothing is fixed, however love holds strong. Contact with people as infants, particularly our main caregivers may help to fulfil our sense of belonging in the world, and create a secure attachment as a relationship template for our relationship with all life. This security provides freedom to be our authentic selves with the expectation that our needs will be fulfilled. Such faith based in direct experience of needs-fulfilment, gives rise to pleasant feelings, regenerative emotions, and psychological strength and fortitude.
Trust is necessary, especially in early life. Insufficiently attuned connection with our caregivers as young infants creates an insecure attachment pattern. This happens when a caregiver shows a lack of presence, empathy, care or understanding, which breaks our trust in them. Such experiences may profoundly impact our ability to be our authentic, energised selves, and may create a lasting state of distress and compromised trust, based on fear that our needs may not be understood and therefore met. This can create a baseline of depleting emotions and unpleasant feelings, or even numbness as we learn to cope by pushing away our feelings. This may lead to trust and relationship difficulties with ourselves, other people, and life as a whole. Healing is possible through recovering a secure attachment with ourselves (i.e. self-trust) and also others.
Feelings contain information about our needs. Our feelings are a map to our needs, but they are not reality itself. We can track the feelings in our bodies and look deeply into them in order to fulfil our capacity to be our most growthful, wisest selves, and find ways to securely meet our needs.
How we respond to our feelings matters. It is possible that we may be used to responding to feelings in familiar ways, which may not meet our needs most wisely and effectively. Looking deeply within, as well as learning from others, can help us to find the best possible ways to care for our feelings and meet our needs; this is how personal growth happens. Looking deeply into our hearts, minds and feelings helps us to truly know ourselves, and connect to our resources and insights.
Changing our habits is sometimes necessary to restore wellbeing. We may suffer with emotional and mental wellbeing problems if we avoid meeting our needs, or meet them in ways that jeopardise our other needs. This can have critical consequences for personality development and relationships, and even survival. Such complications may create complex habit patterns that keep us stuck in suffering, unless we change how we respond to our feelings, and meet our needs in different ways. Changing habit formation is possible through intentional living; when we stay aware of our intentions, and divert our energy to take action following those intentions, we change our lives. It may be hard, but it is possible.
Psychological trauma happens in the absence of safety and connection. When the basic needs for safety and connection are not met from inside or outside of us, then on some level our survival may be perceived to be seriously threatened, and trauma, which is an energetic, embodied survival response, is made likely. Often this happens in childhood, and adults who experienced psychological trauma in childhood are more vulnerable to experiencing it in adulthood. Trauma responses include the 5 f's: fight, flight, freeze, flop, and fawn, and dissociation, which are all psycho-biological and nervous system states designed to keep us alive under experiences of acute or prolonged threat.
We can grow after trauma, however long ago it happened. Our bodies may recover from trauma if we relax and reconnect safely with ourselves and others after the situation where we felt so unsafe. From the experience of reconnecting, we may discover strength within ourselves, and wisdom about life and our relationships. This is called post-traumatic growth. It means that we can learn to adapt positively after the traumatic experience (resilience) and grow our resources to prevent future harm (anti-fragility). Ultimately recovery from trauma is an experience of coming home to ourselves again i.e. reconnecting after being torn and disconnected from our innate sense of safety in our core.
Post-traumatic stress may disrupt health and wellbeing if not resolved. If our experiences of safety and connection are not restored enough so that we can fully recover and relax, then our bodies may remain in the state of psychological and neuro-muscular tension known as post-traumatic stress. The main symptom of post-traumatic stress is hypervigilance, which means perceiving potential threat where there isn’t any. Sometimes the post-traumatic stress pattern can be identified in the form of chronic pain, intrusive thoughts and images in our minds, overwhelming feelings, or distorted views of reality. Post-traumatic stress is a loss of resilience, where our minds make templates for understanding reality that are informed by a loss of safety and connection to the world around us. Triggers that unconsciously remind us of the trauma that we originally experienced, may cause severe reactivity or dissociation. Post-traumatic stress may cause both physical and mental health problems. It is not uncommon for post-traumatic stress, to come from unresolved personal traumas, but from collective and trans-generational traumas. Post-traumatic stress is often passed onto others through compromised relationships, social practices and institutions, and in the case of family, through our genetics.
Relaxation is key. The way to heal post-traumatic stress is to connect safely with another human being, re-learn how to relax the muscles in the body, release pent-up energy, and safely process thoughts and feelings. This is often enough to repair mental perceptions and restore self-trust and trust in people, and in life. Because trauma causes the nervous system to send distress signals to our muscles, relaxing our muscles is a way of self-regulating and feeding back to the brain and the body, re-experiencing what safety feels like again. Slowing and lengthening the breath may also help. As we learn to relax, we may need to safely release the energy of trauma stored in the body, and possibly process memories, and this will change our perceptions of reality. Restoring relaxation and safety in the body is what trauma healing feels like. This changes how we experience ourselves and the world, so we are less anxious and depressed, and our overall health may also improve.
Creativity is a core, inner resource for living our lives with optimal health and wellness. If the need for free, creative self-expression is unmet, then we may not find solutions to our problems, and we could lose our ability to respond wisely to our needs. This may cause personal low mood, boredom, stagnation and destructive behaviour. Our minds thrive by staying open, relaxed and creative, but when they're closed, distracted or constricted, then depleting emotions build up that require self-reflection, imagination and creative experimentation, in order to be healed.
Some anxiety is natural and necessary to function as a human being. Anxiety is the natural human phenomenon of being in a creative process of moving towards one's needs. For example, in regards to the need to live in a more peaceful and evolved society, anxiety is sometimes known as existential angst or divine discontent. Anxiety can be reduced when we reconnect with our inner resources to work toward our needs, and share support with others to find ways to meet our needs together.
Overwhelming anxiety may be a result of unresolved trauma. Anxiety can be particularly intense when our needs have not been met often enough in the past, such as during early childhood when our caregivers didn't meet our needs sufficiently, which we may experience as being traumatic. This may create post-traumatic stress leading us to expect life to be just as difficult to survive, or worse, in the present and future. Treatment for post-traumatic stress may be required to help to restructure our thinking and expectations and increase our awareness of resources available.
Psychosis is the extreme self-regulating function of the mind in response to strain. If we are extremely strained because our basic needs are not fulfilled (such as for safety, nutrition, belonging, self-expression and collective evolution) then our personal mental structures, formed through habit and behaviour, may break-down as our minds expand and we try new ways to reach our needs. This is also called psychosis or spiritual emergency, which may happen due to a critical overload of stress. Through a process of separation and re-integration, the mind may reset to create a new personality structure, integrating what has been learnt, in time and with good support.
Healthy people still experience changing emotions and feelings. In day-to-day life, we may experience a changing mixture of pleasant and unpleasant feelings; this is because some of our needs will be met and others will not be met at different times. Listening coherently to our feelings and taking care of our needs can help us to suffer less, but it will not eradicate ever experiencing uncomfortable feelings and emotions again, because we need them in order to learn how to adapt, survive, thrive and ultimately evolve.
Unpleasant feelings are worthy of self-compassion. If we experience prolonged unpleasant feelings and unmet needs, then we may feel overwhelmed or numb, and think that life is not worth living. Sometimes we may even wish to end our lives unless we can experience freedom. At such times a safety plan is crucial. If we find out what our needs are, and practise compassionate, practical steps to work towards them, then we can act in meaningful ways that preserve our lives and allow us to thrive.
We are not just our suffering, we each have a core Self, and many different parts of us with resources. There are many parts of our personalities with different needs. These parts are autonomous and complex personality structures. We can relate with these psychological parts to create intelligent, self-aware behaviours that meet our multiple and often conflicting needs, and thereby establish internal harmony and coherence.
Life is meaningful, and the truth matters. Human beings share oral traditions of wisdom, all around the world. Understanding our personal life stories and how we relate with the land, people, culture and the universe helps us to live a meaningful life existence. An important purpose of our lives may be to restore our own sense of truth and find meaning as a part of the collective story of life; this may make our lives feel worthwhile, help us to transcend some suffering, enrich our life experiences and call us all to a greater way of being in the world.
