Your stomach does a flip. Your face gets hot. Your body tightens. Your breath gets more shallow. You start to sweat a bit. The feeling of guilt washes over you. But why? When you stop to think a moment, what did you do? You’re sat at lunch with your family. You mum looks over at you. Says nothing. […]
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Something flips inside you. It’s like a switch going. The system is going down. You start to numb out. It’s difficult to think clearly. Maybe your hearing goes a bit fuzzy. You feel like you’re here, but also not. The trigger? Maybe a moment of conflict with a parent, colleague or partner. Maybe someone’s behaviour […]
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Part of you knows this relationship hurts. The little (or not so little) put downs, the never quite meeting expectations, the feeling guilty for the ‘shoulds’ that you didn’t do. And yet the bonds feel unbreakable. The emotional cost of cutting free feels too high: rejection, isolation, shame. Perhaps a part of you feels powerless […]
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As the shadows grow longer, you exhale deeply. Night is coming, and it feels both a shelter and an interminable hole. Wherever you turn in your life, the exits seem blocked, the options for freedom or choice dwindling or limited. The drum beat and drone of a persistent hopelessness play out their mournful rhythm. Life […]
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Does this ring a bell? You love your mum or dad, but it’s also tough being their child. Somehow, what you do never seems good enough. If you disagree or stand up to them, there’s an almighty row so you end up keeping quiet or just avoiding them for a peaceful life. Or maybe, they […]
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As the world around continues its unstable lurching from one crisis to another, with acts of violence, despair and splitting, I’ve been thinking about the role of the shame in all this. Anyone watching the Brexit debates in the UK and the fall out from the vote, or the 2016 US Presidential contest will have […]
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