| Change - it's pretty central to our lives, yes? You may want to be able to change - but feel it's not possible, want to avoid change while your life, job or partner is requiring or else challenging you to do so (and you know you're in trouble if you ignore that...) Then there's a whole range of ways we can be in pain. You may know - or feel - that you're in distress and be hoping to change that. Given the above, as you arrive on this site, you may be wondering: "How do I change in a way that I want - and does a therapist really help with this?" A psychotherapist is really an "aid to your reflection, leading to shifts in consciousness/feeling and consequent changes in action that you choose" - which can certainly be done without the therapist - they just assist. Like hiring any consultant you need to be in charge. From the emotional/psychological process that I defined in that phrase I put in italics above, you Can feel better. That being said, I want to explain that what (and how) I write about therapy here on this site is not necessarily the way I explain things in person. I'm giving a set of behind the scenes options and opinions on how to facilitate those steps within oneself. I would only ordinarily speak of spiritual or say sub-personality or Autopilot aspects of how we are if it seemed merited or someone asked. So this site's explanations are like generic therapy on the web - it's not the same as the person to person version... So... To me this site will be a success if it's of use to you on this or other questions without you even contacting me. I've gained so much from what I do as a psychotherapist that I'd like to give back this way. Please feel free to contact me if you want - you can certainly contact me by email with questions. Otherwise, please take what resonates for you here and leave whatever does not fit... Any of this information is set in such a way that it can be approached from a number of different angles. Start wherever you'd like - hopefully there'll be some worthwhile food for thought and feeling :>) Some starting places: For 40 years now I've been a psychotherapist for individuals and couples, a group, workshop and seminar leader as well as public speaker. My primary belief is in our health and our capacity to find out how to change. I hope the energy of what I offer here transcends these pixels (!) and comes to be of use to you. This is an overview of my orientation, so please note that if you were to see me in person for therapy some of the terms I give here might never be relevant. I do tend to try and bend written language with contextual marks... My (adult) daughters also tell me I can sometimes be too obscure - my apologies in advance if you find that to be the case. For contact information and what types of services I offer, you can click here or use the "Contact & Rates Info" link on the left. I'm physically located in London, Ontario, Canada, but have an office in Richmond Hill near Toronto where I see clients on most Wednesdays. I also offer some online services and/or telephone counselling paid through PayPal through the link on the top left of this page where it says make a donation. If you'd like I'd be happy to a give you a free 10 minute phone consultation if you want to find out if the fit feels right. You can also see and hear my quick self introduction on You Tube speaking about the concept of Autopilot. Whether you are here for help or just curious, I hope you find words, images, concepts or at least an intent that assists you. Please freely explore and/or comment. Freedom is up front in my business name because that's where I feel it should be... My type of work as a psychotherapist fulfills me. The pages here (or at www.OffAutopilot.com) have, I think, means to help you understand what has been going on in you or others around you that creates the absence of peace you may experience. I believe any instant of our day an inner door in consciousness can open to a more expanded world and sense of ourselves. My aim is that you'll find instances of that through these pages. Neither my viewpoint nor my therapy style are at all easy to explain in a few quick words. When I started putting this site together I looked to see whether I could find another therapist's site which might explain some of this using a different set of words than mine. So, although his orientation is not as including of a spiritual perspective as you will find here, I like Dr. Bennett Pologe's overview of psychotherapy here... He says therapy is all about finding workable help for getting past "feeling stuck or lost." I heartily agree. After obtaining degrees in counselling psychology, I can say that Taoism, metaphysics, shamanism, Psychosynthesis, Milton Erickson's work as well as the human potential movement have all added to my present style. I know that honouring the enigmas of self and spirit works for me - I hope it can for you too. For more of my personal story click here or see "About me" on the above left <<< The Images page gives a more symbolic overview of how I view us able to move to health: click here or the "Images..." link <<< Just when I thought I was getting near having this site ready for launching I started creating the Dreaming page. It now has far more images than the images page! But it has also helped me realize that this will never be perfect. As a friend pointed out, this site will evolve with me - and that is the point of continuing to help oneself in Our Way Off Autopilot, Waking Up within this Life-Dream >:) That page has amazed me, frankly, with what I ended up being able to convey in image and counterpointed words... The sub-personalities page here (or through the link on the left above) gives a helpful perspective on how aspects, roles or scripts we have within ourselves can profoundly affect the way we feel as well as a fair bit of what to do about them! I'm an incorrigible poet, so there are some of my attempts to portray our potentials for expansion at the bottom of the Resources page that you can get to here. On the same page you can also take a look at a way of conceiving Who You Are from a spiritual perspective. Below on the present page you'll find more of an overview explanation on my style, philosophy, orientation and what way I believe I can possibly be of help to you. May you have happy meandering! Last Preliminary Note: "Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own common sense." - Buddha |
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| Although you can fear Nature - She/He/We/It is actually quite neutral. Click the picture above for a better look. Also, if you can figure out what the other image is on that page, drop me a note! |
| Within our "Autopiloted lives" and in a similar vein to how important it is for us to be Bridging across our sense of being alienated from self to other, our Dreaming of who we are is also crucial to our health - both the nighttime as well as daytime varieties. Click the sun above to go to the Dreaming page... |
| Anxiety, Depression, Couple, Marital or Family Conflict, Abuse Issues, Stress, Work Dilemmas, Career Development, Lack of Personal Freedom, Trouble finding Meaning in Life, Spiritual or Energetic Disharmonies... I have worked extensively with these and many more issues with people: work stress; single incident and complex, family of origin post traumatic stress disorder; physical, emotional, sexual and spiritual abuse survivors. After 40 years as a therapist I have to say there is not much that I have not assisted people with... Ultimately all of it is how we (or other people in our lives) have been minimizing the complex way our personal myths can control who we are. Our most harmful myth is that we each have one personality. We have many: like sub-personalities. They can be grouped into four types of Personas. Some of those are caught by Pushily seeking dominance or by Negating it. Others are caught by a mythology of seeking possession, avoiding possession or believing they can superficially rescue those they love. To paraphrase the Buddha: The cause of all suffering is our unawareness. Whatever the emotional, situational, relationship or psychological problem: overt or subtle, seemingly simple, long term or seemingly unsolvable dilemmas, issues or situations - I believe that something can be done through our having one or another version of a certain type of personal stance: a looking to re-discover balance for ourselves on a daily, moment to moment basis. The Dalai Lama calls this happiness. Others have called it many other names: Flow, Wui Wei, Mindfulness... It feels like being caring towards oneself as also towards others, yet living in the moment. You're not following a script for that, however, as we sometimes need to challenge ourselves (or others!) This is even possible when there seems to be no workable (external) solution... I believe this because I have seen this work over the years: that our perspective or stance towards ourselves and others as well as towards both the overall situation and it's possibilities makes all the difference. For instance, one day you can easily survive talking to a particularly annoying person and another day it just does not feel possible - that's the difference I'm referring to. It is not a difference in the content of one's thoughts, it's an availability of internal resources: firm where it needs to be and flexible when that's needed. This is complex to convey. Attitude - as taught in most of our societies - has often actually been Judgement, Defensiveness, Bigotry or any of a myriad of other out of balance perspectives, thus entrenching interpersonal and systemic abuse. Our societies sanction this dominance and our submitting to it. The forcing/conditioning of Attitudes of indulgence, violence, dissociation or victimization towards oneself and others is probably one of The Biggest Problems underlying both our world's and our individual pain... It has been the Parent's, Boss's or Corporation's attitude of "Just Do It"! or "Suck it Up" or "Take that Smirk off your face" and alllllll the other variations of these scripts that have created havoc in our lives. (I was even told in school that I was NEVERRR to Repeat Letters or Capitalize Unnecessarily!) We were not supposed to carry the Assertive, Rebellious part of self into Adult Life (or perhaps we carried it Too Much - so much so that the rebelling predominated in our lives...) In other ways at times we end up therefore with a Reactive Autopilot stance of Conforming - or a reactive Autopilot stance of Non-Conforming: either way we are not in a balanced, conscious relationship with ourselves or our world. So how could some kind of change to how we approach our lives or ourselves help all this? For an Extreme Example: Let's imagine I am standing cemented knee deep into a hard flat concrete roadway with no person in sight... A robotic mechanical steamroller with no-one at the controls is headed towards me and will inescapably crush me to death in the next minute. I propose to you that I still will have Choices - choices in whether I access my internal resources - how I decide to handle myself in the moment. In this case it means whether I choose to die screaming and desperate or die with as much dignity composure and a connecting with my sense of Spirit as I am able to muster in the circumstances... :>) I use this grisly example to make a point: it is the choice of what kind of personal stance we take - how to Be With Ourselves. Your relationship with anything or anyone else is first filtered through your relationship with yourself. It makes a primary difference in how we will experience life. Consider: I could have used the complete reverse type of situation. For example let's say you're sitting in your Here and Now (wherever that might be...) in a perfectly arranged situation - arranged by your higher self/your intuition for you to understand yourself and your world more... Yet you can't pay attention and get that next piece of self understanding because you're preoccupied with what some aspect - i.e. a sub-personality of yours - is focused on, say the next external source of consumption, dominance, work, play or addiction... This Crucial Filter, then, for All our interactions with the world is our relationship with self. Often we are being controlled by a script or sub-personality that has an attitude... but it is Not the Whole of Us! In most cases that attitude to self has been Conditioned by previous experience. There are certainly also impacting genetic differences, as well as present metabolic/body chemistry state differences: if you have had a lot of coffee or sleeping pills your attitude is at least partially then driven by those influences. However the biological/genetic aspect of who we are is not yet controllable and whether you have coffee or tranquilizers, your experience will still be largely influenced by your habits of how you relate to yourself... So for workable change, these scripts of ours are indeed crucial. We developed these attitudinal scripts, then, as a defense (or offense) in early life conflicts. These were attempts to Try and stay Okay in a a variety of easy, loving, complex and/or difficult situations. Trouble is, 10, 20 or 30 years later we are still using these scripts - now they are sub-personalities - enacted on an Autopilot (conditioned) basis. These subtly automated style responses and attitudes will then impact what way others will respond to us... It is these out of balance sub-personalities, then, these worries, needs, addictions and depressions which are impeding our connection with Flow, Balance, Mindfulness - with true happiness. Balanced Attitude is the blessing you give yourself and the world. This is Not a further Imposing of anything on yourself. The balanced attitude is about you Caring for You - as well as All Others. That mindful stance is really like a place in ourselves. It's a particular position you take in your energy body, a location of coherence towards oneself and the world. It's been called lots of different terms. Here we can call it the Balanced Observer, which leads up, within oneself, to what I whimsically call the Detached Enthusiastically Initiating & Observing Self - the DEIOS place in self. I also call this balancing area in self our access to the Inner Tao, Higher Self or Middle - particularly in my book Our Way Off Autopilot. It's what can make All That Difference ... (See the Dreaming, Resources or Reflecting page for more.) Each of us has some access to it - but the point is - we can get more. The flexibility to do all this is available through what some writers and psychologists have termed emotional intelligence: the capacity to be flexible and balanced in our emotional reactions. Buddhists, Taoists and similarly spiritually oriented practitioners would call it a meditative approach to life. It's the balanced attitude of taking all the parts of one's life with equanimity. The times when you have felt a curious mix of balanced happiness are instances of this. In Christian terms it might be termed a sense of Grace. In practice it's the height of balanced self assertion. When you have access to this balanced place in yourself you know that other people's realities are supported by your quiet assertiveness: they also feel better through knowing 'where you're at'. They will know that it is not a problem for them to be putting their needs on the table because they also know you're able to take care of yourself. As you also feel okay with putting your needs out clearly as well, then the two of you (or however many are involved!) can work out what to do next. All this leads towards win - win situations happening. A lot of people first coming for therapy or attending a workshop on increasing their personal life balance may be expecting something whiz bang, something that the therapist or leader is going to do to them. In contrast, in my opinion, anyone looking for help needs to find their own Authorship for their lives. This happens as you Take &/or Find the reality of something like this assertive/proactive stance I'm outlining (in your own terms and ways) For You. This then gives you a tool for shifting your life and your relationships yourself - not becoming dependent on some external authority/therapist/guru who is going to be telling you what to do! Too many forms of life work, coaching, spiritual work or therapy are forms that take advantage of this vulnerability of telling the new client or acolyte what to do. They then have a New Boss or New Parent who may indeed mean well - but who does not put the client or acolyte's freedom first. It's like neglecting the Prime Directive in Star Trek... So. I'm attempting to show - here on this website or if you were to see me in person - that it is your Expansive Self that can become more in charge of your life. Not through Dominating you, though! To explain that a bit more - I do not mean that this being more in charge is being more controlling of other people or yourself. I mean being more in charge of looking to find that Balanced Observer, that Middle place in you... because it Feels Better, calmer, more assertive - more happy. This does require personal work: a caring for yourself and others, because you and anyone you're in contact with will be better off. And that's what you want, isn't it? |
| Freedom Associates Therapy Barry Johnston-Spooner, M. Ed. |
| My larger concern - that I am writing a book about - is for us to find Our Way Off Autopilot Click here to go to my site www.OffAutopilot.com which provides some details on Autopilot and how it has been controlling all our lives. |
