DavidUK Journal

[DavidUK]

** Trigger Warning **
I am describing below some techniques prescribed for me by my DBT ( Dialectic Behavioural Therapy) therapist. Please do not read them if you think you may be triggered by doing so. Also do not try to use any of the techniques yourself outside of a therapeutic setting.


I went to see a T on Friday last week...

One of the practical DBT exercises which my T gave me to help me cope with a stress response was this:

Notice...
5 things I can see..
4 things I can hear..
3 things I can touch..
2 things I can taste/smell..

And... 1 Take a slow, deep breath right now...

I didn't need to use it over the following few days exactly as it was intended, because I didn't have a strong stress response to anything, and so it wasn't necessary.

However, it did start me asking some questions about how I am choosing to spend my time...
First.. I asked myself, "what am I looking at on a daily basis and how is that helping me?"
I realised that I could benefit from spending more time looking at nature, so I went into the hostel (my home for now) garden for the first time and discovered some beautiful flowers. I took a load of pictures of them using my phone and then posted them online for others to see..
I also love to see Kingfishers which I am blessed to have living in my local area so I went for a walk by a local country stream. I didn't see any Kingfishers but the search took me outside on a lovely sunny day, among flowers and butterflies, and a slow flowing stream.

Second.. I realised recently that other residents in the hostel who are dealing with their own issues can be triggers for me unknowingly. For example if I am in the kitchen area making a drink and someone else is in a bad mood they might bang down a coffee cup or loudly drop cutlery in the sink. This 'jars' my nerves and increases my stress levels. Similarly I can sit in a quiet cafe, but once it gets busy I usually have to leave. So I have decided to wear headphones more often in the communal areas of the hostel and listen to music. The music boosts my mood and it acts as a buffer between me and other intrusive sounds.

Third... I started to pay more attention to my physical body, massaging my feet and spending time in Qigong standing postures. This definitely helped me to feel more balanced and resilient.

Fourth.. As I also mentioned previously, I bought a reed diffuser to give my room an uplifting fragrance. I haven't had a nightmare for the last few nights since I bought it and slept a lot better.

Having done all of the above for a couple of days now, I am definitely moving at a slower and more steady pace as well as breathing lower in my abdomen than higher up in my chest as I had been before.

So instead of waiting for the stress response and treating it with the technique given to me by my T, I used the same ideas to prevent me experiencing the stress response in the first place... prevention being better than cure as far as I am concerned... 😊

[Hope67]

Hi David,
I just wanted to say that I think those things you did are great.    It's also really good to hear that the reed diffuser you bought has given your room an uplifting fragrance, it sounds lovely.  Glad you haven't had a nightmare for the last few nights.
So many positive things in what you wrote.
Hope 

[DavidUK]

Hi Hope,  over the last few months I have been trying to access as many different resources as I can to help with my recovery, and also build a strong support network of people.
I won't list them all here! Suffice to say I now have a mix of literature, therapists, support workers and mentors from various organisations that I can draw upon. It's been slow progress to begin with but in this last week I have felt like I'm making good steps.
I am going to try and maintain this momentum!
Good luck with your journey too and thanks for your kind support.

[DavidUK]

**Multiple Trigger Warning**
In this journal entry I talk about suicide ideation, EF triggering event from observing a car crash and EF triggering event from violent confrontation. EF trigger from discussing what I would term 'radical personality types'.
Phobia Trigger.. In this entry I talk about phobias. If you have any phobias I suggest you don't read this.
EF Trigger.. Drug use is mentioned.
EF Trigger.. Accidental death mentioned.
And others...

Please do not proceed with reading this if you think you may be affected by what I have written. It's useful for me to catalogue my past in order to make sense of it so I can prepare for my future.
I'm keeping details to a minimum, this is not intended to be gratuitous in any way. Writing helps me, but I don't want to hurt anyone else in the process. If in doubt... please don't...

I call this: My internal associate / dissociate 'on-off' switch and how it has served to protect me...

My former Shaolin Kung fu instructor years ago said to me, "the difference between you and me is that when I fight,  I don't care if I live or die... You do. When we fight each other I am watching the fight from the third person perspective, completely detached from my body and the feelings within it, whereas you are still concerned about the outcome."

How can it be possible to not care if you live or die I thought to myself at the time?

And of course later, ironically,  I understood more than I wanted to about how that feels... be careful what you wish for I suppose...

So how was my instructor able to do this and was he taught? Is it even useful, healthy to be able to take this stance/point of view?
My response to that is yes possibly, but like so many things it depends largely on the context of the situation and the intention(s) of the person or people involved.

When talking about the possibility of becoming totally dissociated from emotions we are entering the realms, in my opinion, of some psychologically fairly 'strong stuff'.

I copied this definition of dissociation from the Washington Education dept. online...

"Dissociation is being disconnected from the here and now. Everyone occasionally has times of daydreaming or mind wandering, which is normal. Sometimes dissociation is a way of coping by avoiding negative thoughts or feelings related to memories of traumatic events. When people are dissociating they disconnect from their surroundings, which can stop the trauma memories and lower fear, anxiety and shame. Dissociation can happen during the trauma or later on when thinking about or being reminded of the trauma. When dissociation is connected to trauma memories or reminders, it is considered an avoidance coping strategy. The difference from active avoidance (on purpose avoiding thinking about or doing something) is that dissociation tends to happen without planning or even awareness. Many times, people who are dissociating are not even aware that it is happening, other people notice it. Just like other types of avoidance, dissociation can interfere with facing up and getting over a trauma or an unrealistic fear. It can also interfere with school or doing other activities that require paying attention and being in the here and now. "

So we are basically talking about a situation where a person 'switches off' their feelings and usually not intentionally.
So is it possible to 'switch off' feelings intentionally?
This seems to be what my former martial arts instructor was describing. And what would need to happen or have happened to facilitate that?

I also Googled this online...
The Difference Between a Psychopath and Sociopath
...while a sociopath would feel no guilt about hurting a stranger, they may feel guilt and remorse over hurting someone with which they share a bond. ... The psychopath is keenly aware that what he or she is doing is wrong, but does not care.

So the idea that my Kung fu instructor was potentially a sociopath scares me a little because of the wording and the weight that we give to such semantic definitions. But thinking back to an earlier Karate instructor, he certainly was in my opinion a sociopath. And while working for years in the security industry in the UK I met I believe any number of sociopaths and a few psychopaths.

So is it learned, acquired, trained or useful?

All I know from listening to the stories about training at the Shaolin temple was that it was tough. Lots of things are tough. Ultra marathons are tough. Are all ultra marathon runners sociopaths? I don't think so! but I don't think I've met any either!

Is the necessary 'ingredient' trauma?
Why is asking these questions interesting for me? Because years ago when I studied NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) we did a lot of work around reducing phobic responses.
One of the questions we used to try and elicit the phobic response was, "can you do it now?"
Also " can you make it happen now? "
The premiss was that if you can cause it to happen... you own it... and therefore you can cause it to stop.
If you can't make it happen (trigger it) in a therapeutic setting then what are the chances of reducing it with therapy?
Today by coincidence I went to see my GP. He had asked me to visit him because following a stress event a couple of weeks ago I ended up in A&E. He prescribed me some anti anxiety medication to be used if or when a similar situation arises in the future. But he said, "there's no point waiting for the next event to test the medication because if it doesn't work you will be no better off. Try one dose before bed when it's convenient and monitor what happens. If it works great, if not we'll try something else." Common sense in my opinion...test it, see what happens...

So in what situations, if any,  might it be useful to be able to switch off your feelings intentionally?
When you need to protect yourself or others in an emergency situation?

So when I was about 21yrs old I lived out in the countryside approx 40 mins drive from the nearest town. Driving home one evening as it was just getting dark and raining, I was following a car in front as we headed downhill on a straight country road. There appeared to be some flashing lights ahead but it was something of an optical illusion as the lights appeared to be floating above the road. Anyway long story short, the lights were from a lorry unloading caterpillar tracked vehicles and the car in front of me didn't brake in time and crashed into the low loader lorry. Sadly the guy unloading the vehicles was now trapped at knee height between car and lorry.
The lady driver of the car had a young child passenger in her back seat. Driver was hysterical in shock not surprisingly. She reversed the car which freed the guy. I stopped got out, checked on the guy and agreed at same time she should walk up nearest driveway to a house and seek help taking her child with her.
This left me to help the injured guy.
It was dark and raining and basically I just held his hands, checked out what I could etc etc etc  and told him he'd be ok... for approx the next hour until an ambulance arrived. So it was traumatic for all involved..
But when this happened I had gone from thinking about stuff like what's for dinner when I get home etc to emergency auto pilot. It was like flicking a switch inside my head. I can only describe it like going from cruise to sport mode in a car kind of feeling.
I was able to function quite happily in a sense, despite the guys excruciating pain. None of it transferred to me, he could easily have died and I would have been calm about it. Years later a good friend of mine died in my arms while I administered CPR, it was the same feeling. The action of performing the CPR felt so natural, it was a similar feeling to what my Kung fu instructor had described.. It's like the wheels are going round but who's driving the bus?

As a door supervisor working in bars and clubs around the UK we often had to deal with medical emergencies. People having accidentally overdosed, epileptic seizures and many others. A very small but significant amount of time was taken up dealing with violent confrontation of various types.
On one occasion I was working as part of a team of about 6 security in a busy bar. The other team members were assigned static positions like, front door, back door etc. I was floating about keeping an eye on things mostly inside and I was also the self proclaimed 'tea boy' as I liked drinking green tea at the time, especially in winter to keep warm. And as I was the only one not 'stuck' in one place and therefore could make myself tea whenever I wanted, I took it upon myself to serve it up to the others as well.
One evening I was taking my tea and one colleague's tea to give to him as he stood by the back door. A potential customer was arguing with my colleague because he told them to go to the front entrance for admission where they would be counted in (fire regulations) etc etc.. the customer wanted to take the short cut and was becoming increasingly angry. I was just observing as I had my hands full with two cups of hot tea. (Hindsight = put down tea!)
Eventually the frustrated customer smashed his hands down on my forearms causing the cups to fall to the floor and shatter and soaked my lower legs with boiling tea. Calmness descended over me as the almost audible (to me) click of the switch flicked over in my mind. Up until that point I guess ( I can't fully remember) my stress response would have been gradually increasing as I anticipated where this stand off was heading.

(When I did the NLP training we often separated for purposes of therapy the conscious and unconscious minds. Conscious taking care of logic, reasoning, planning etc and the unconscious all the automatic stuff like breathing, heart rate and temperature regulation. For the purposes of therapeutic hypnotherapy we would sometimes 'speak directly' to the unconscious mind using pacing statements like "I know you are in charge of protection, so that's why I need to speak to you directly at this point" etc stuff like that... )

And so up until the moment that the tea was spilt, I guess it could be described as though my conscious mind was in charge of dealing with the situation,  and was becoming increasingly stressed at the prospect of where this was going and trying to formulate an effective plan..
Meanwhile the unconscious was saying nothing and just upping the temperature and sweat response etc..
At the point of tea spillage it was like a shift change.. Conscious mind you are forthwith relieved of responsibility, and unconscious mind you are now driving the bus...
The trigger for the changeover seemed to me when the customer crossed an imaginary line... They could no longer rationally defend their position so my rational conscious mind stepped back saying "ok my work is done here now, it's over to you."
Weird I know but that's the best way I can describe it..
Similarly I was once working with a security dog outside a large club in a converted factory. A colleague and I had been standing outside in the same positions in the pouring rain for about 7 hours. Our job was simple, don't let people pass guns into the club via the fire exits.
I was soaked and feeling miserable but I kept the dog who I loved more than me tucked between my legs, sheltered from the rain and certainly warmer than me! Then a guy appeared, walked straight up to my colleague without a word and punched him hard in the face.. The guy walked to his car, opened the boot and retrieved a long tyre iron bar. He started shouting at me, " send the dog, send the dog!
Of course I had no intention of sending the dog anywhere I loved him! (Even though he was a very well trained Rottweiler.) So I started to walk towards this guy, keeping the dog closely by my side. As the man became increasingly agitated and it seemed violent confrontation was inevitable, once again, the feeling of a soft click inside my head and a very calming soothing feeling descended over me. So much so that it caught me by surprise and I was so distracted by it that I began to laugh!
This was really a very strange sight! 4am in a large city, a very angry man with a weapon shouting threats at me, my dog barking like mad, and me laughing in a kind of relaxed manical way. Anyway I guess he thought I was totally nuts so he turned, got in his car and drove off..

At this point I think I had arrived at a similar position to that which my Kung fu instructor had previously described. Viewing violent confrontation from such a third person dissociative viewpoint that it became almost funny to watch and almost completely indifferent to the outcome.

In total I would say I've probably had 6 very near death experiences and that incident certainly wasn't one of them. Near accidental drowning, two very serious car crashes,  and several others I don't need to describe here. Each having a similar dissociative pattern to them. As time moved on and my quality of life diminished I suppose the almost inevitable suicide ideation began. " To be or not to be... " and given how relaxed I have become to life threatening situations, it still surprises me to this day that when I talk about the possibility of my own death, for lots of people who haven't had my experiences it's very disturbing and shocking. Whereas I can chat comfortably about it over a coffee and a biscuit.. Familiarity breeds contempt I suppose.

However I describe these events in what limited language I can use, it seems to me that dissociation is protection. So the idea of getting rid of it completely to me is foolish. The ability to gain some understanding and thereby control over the process is perhaps a better goal. For me this is helped by looking at my personal history and seeing how it might differ from other people's.

So what have I learned so far?

The dissociative 'protection' comes into play at peak fight or flight moments.
It's not activated for me at least by moderate stress.
The principal seems that linked to the stress response it's part of an increasing urgency response as the stakes are raised.
The dissociative state can be used for reducing or causing suffering depending on the context of the situation.


One of the techniques given to me recently by my DBT therapist was... "do the opposite" of whatever 'negative' actions you are feeling compelled to do.
So if you feel real anger aimed at a particular person, sitting down, having a cup of tea and hoping the feelings go away simply doesn't work in my experience.
I've spent years previously volunteering at a centre for blind people. I'd mentioned sitting with blind old ladies helping them to weave baskets etc to the therapist.
So he said, "what would happen in that stress moment if instead of venting your anger you chose to go and act out the opposite and did something truly compassionate? I bet it's pretty difficult to get angry doing something totally altruistic like that?"
I haven't tested it yet but I'm pretty sure he's right.

Just like in the NLP phobia sessions when we would elicit a peak state of 'confidence, strength etc' in the client by first referencing positive memories and 'anchor' this state by using a cue, usually physical (like the client gently squeezes their ear lobe between thumb and forefinger).
We would then trigger the phobic response by saying, "can you do it now, or has it gone?" or depending on the phobia we might use a small house spider for example.
Then firing the 'anchored' good memory trigger creates a neutral situation and the phobic response is reduced.


That's as far as I've got with it, but to me, dissociation is definitely not part of an illness or unwell mind.
Conversely it's a very powerful and useful protection response which I have yet to understand, but it's possible that in the future it may work for me in helping to keep order and stability in my life, more than being deemed a problem to be recovered from....

[DavidUK]

I don't have the correct software or computer to edit this correctly therefore it won't make sense to the reader. Apologies for anyone reading.



**Trigger Warnings***

Food eating disorders
Hospitals
Traumatic emotional events
Lack of self worth
Religious discussion


Please note that in this journal entry I cover all of the above potential Triggers.
Please do not read this if you think you may be affected by any or all of them.
And if in doubt.. Please don't..
I don't want my healing process from writing this to become anyone else's burden from reading it! 🙏


Hierarchy of Intention.

(Some of this journal entry I have copied and pasted directly from Wik)

For many people, myself included, it has been necessary at some point in our lives to try and (in the absence of any other effective mainstream alternative) 'heal ourselves'.
There are a seemingly endless variety of so called 'alternative' therapies, many of which I have read about and/or tried on myself. These range vastly from self medication drugs to monastic chanting and everything in between, and that diversity of choice can in itself be bewildering!
I find it interesting to explore my own 'set of values' around why and how I want to heal myself, in order to do it more skillfully or perhaps better said, 'more beautifully'.

What internal 'value' am I trying to satisfy when I begin the search for treatment? Am I being selfish, greedy, altruistic, righteous?
In order to understand this I need to try and understand what 'outcome' or 'goal' I am trying to achieve by 'being healthy' again.

So a good example for helping me to understand this is from my days of being street homeless. There is a guy who I have known for several years now who seems endlessly trapped in a revolving door of alcohol addiction, alcohol induced seizures, hospital stays, sanctioning ( Government non payment of) of benefits, petty crime, drug use, rough sleeping etc etc....
Taking out the how, why, where, what causes of his situation (everyone starts somewhere, and everyone's story is different if we take time out to listen) I think for me it is interesting to uncover his overall 'intention' for his life.
When I was learning NLP this was called 'values elicitation' and was a useful tool for setting achieveable therapy goals. I suppose it's really just getting to the bottom of what makes people 'tick'.
When I asked this guy, " if in a perfect scenario we take away all of your illness and you are free again to do what you please, what would you spend your time doing?"
He said, " I love watching films, I've got a large video collection of action movies and if I get my own place I'm going to start watching them again."
So for him his 'intention' was to watch films at home, alone and maybe have a couple of beers at the same time.

Now around 10yrs ago I had a flair up of a long term lower back injury. The pain, discomfort and resulting loss of mobility caused me to stop working for a time and seek treatment...
I was 'trapped' a bit like the homeless guy above, in a body that wouldn't allow me to do the things I wanted to do...




As I began to learn about Chi, the body's life force of electricity, and techniques for moving it around with 'intention' I had a kind of 'spiritual epiphany'. Not only did my physical condition improve but I was so grateful to my 'higher power' for 'showing me the way' that I made a promise to 'pay back' what I felt like I 'owed'.
I suppose it felt like I had taken out a large 'loan', using my body and health as collateral.
Once I was able to function physically again I set about reading as many spiritual and religious texts that I could find, in order to try and 'make sense' of what was going on in my life. This started me down the path which I am on now and have been ever since that time.. A spiritual journey of self discovery.
I began to question everything in the Bible, the Koran, Vedic texts etc. regarding human energy, energy usage, energy storage, healing with energy, killing with energy.. (Why really does Daath Vader breathe like that? 😂 )
I visited libraries, esoteric bookshops like Watkins Books in London, dug up lost texts from the Gnostic Gospels, Jewish mysticism, Kaballah, Tarot, Sufism, Mary Poppins,  the Pilgrimage by Paulo Coelho, you name it I read it, and consumed it all like I had been starving for the previous 40yrs!
I took myself off into the mountains of Scotland for weeks at a time to conduct 'real life' experiments on myself regarding energy. How much do I need, how much should I eat, drink, what if I run out? How do I stay warm when it's cold? How long can I survive without food etc etc etc...
From time to time I had to be 'rescued' by friends or family who totally couldn't get what I was doing! They didn't understand that like Luke Skywalker entering the Tree of Life at the base with Yoda, there was no escaping it for me until nature had run it's training course! And Funnily enough although I thought to myself I wasn't scared at the time, the words "you will be" have an all too familiar ring to them!

I became a bit of an 'energy nut' or mildly obsessive because for me, the answers to these questions around energy held the keys which could help me unlock all the meaning to my life. Who I am? why I'm here? where did I come from? and where am I going? were all tied for me very tightly to discovering more about 'energy work' (Qigong)

So my Yoga at least initially was like training with Special Forces. Walking between 20 and 30 miles a day, everyday, in deliberately the most remote parts of the Highlands of Scotland, in usually extremely wet and often freezing conditions.
I used a tent for shelter, I had either a tiny amount of money, having bought a return coach ticket in advance for a return date via Glasgow coach station - a rendezvous I literally could not afford to miss! Or no money whatsoever.
No phone signal, no local population, no rescue of any kind available if things went wrong, just self reliance. This really helped me to concentrate my mind not surprisingly! 😂 
Looking back now I guess if Yin is female and Yang is male, it's probably fair to say it was pretty much Yang! 😂 Maybe I would have been better off sitting under a palm tree in Bali!!

(Yoga - word meaning the work we do for God. Literally 'to be yoked to God' like an Ox in a harness)

I got a lot of the answers I was 'seeking' (can't write that word without hearing The Seeker by The who playing in my head!) to my life's big questions.
I made my counsellor laugh the other day when we talked briefly about this period of my life when I said, " I think it's possible for humans to live without food for extended periods, even maybe indefinitely. But it is tough...so why would you?"
She laughed because I was so 'matter of fact' about it like if you go wandering through a field full of sheep for long enough, eventually you're gonna step in some crap!
I've read the book 'Into the Wild' and watched the film. I totally 'get' what he was doing. I suppose I could say, " there but for the Grace of God go I" but in those moments where things had become dangerous in the mountains I would say to myself, " this is an experiment that you are conducting for your own benefit, don't die over it" and then I would take some positive action to ' get me out of here' rather than 'toughing it out'. I guess that might explain why I am still here and he isn't.
I shed a tears for him though...

[DavidUK]

Please read Part 1 first.. ** Trigger Warnings** See Part 1 before continuing...

Once I'd discovered that life for me was a balance between survive and thrive, I stopped going on such drastic journeys. I was still like a wandering mendicant and walked back and forth across the UK, France, Spain for months or a year at a time,  all the way until I could see the lights of Africa on the opposite sides of the straights of Gibraltar.
I was poor and there were moments when drinking water neat from an ornamental duck pond while the ducks eyed me with what appeared to me to be humorous curiosity, I would ask myself like I was being interviewed on the tv, "David, would you say that you consider doing this (sucking up water filled with duck poo) a low point in your life?" And that would make me laugh out loud to break the silence of the surrounding countryside and the monotonous monotone of the ducks quacking!
I covered large sections of the Camino de Santiago but never actually made it to that Cathedral to see the huge swinging incense diffuser, wafting away the smell of dirty socks and muddy boots. That to me in itself was symbolic and should have served as a warning that my journey wasn't over yet and there was much more to come!
I also understood the mystical experiences which Paulo Coelho had described in the book about his Pilgrimage, both good and bad..

So returning to the UK I needed to understand what my intention was now regarding my Yoga in it's broadest sense?
This would at least for the time being reduce the risk of foreclosure on the 'debt that all men pay - death'.




When I had begun this ' healing'  journey, I had the opportunity to ask myself the same question as the homeless guy I mentioned at the start of this journal entry,
"if you get your health back, what are you going to do with that gift of additional time? What use will you put it to?"
I decided at that point that I would 'pay back' the gift by doing work for free to help others.
There was no blinding flash of light, no booming voice telling me that I had discovered my life's 'true purpose'!! 😂 conversely I happened to see a small advert for Tai Chi classes at a local College for Integrated Chinese Medicine.
Instead of signing up for the group classes once a week, as I considered myself an 'emergency' case, I contacted the instructor and asked if I could have 1 to 1 coaching because I needed to get well enough to start doing security work again.
I had plenty of time on my hands because I couldn't work and I was highly motivated because I wasn't earning any money!!
I think it's fair to say I took to it like a duck in a bath tub! I totally immersed myself in the healing benefits and began having weekly lessons but at the same time training between four to six hours a day at home in the cramped space of my flat!
And sure enough I quickly became a lot better, more calm, more resilient, etc etc... Soon I was well enough to begin working again and I regaled my work colleagues with tales of eastern mysticism from books I had read and the Tao Te Ching. I started bringing my own green tea bags to work much to the amusement of some and admiration from others... I couldn't please everyone...

True to myself I kept my promise to 'pay back my gift' and visited the local volunteering office. I found an advert for volunteers required at the local hospital. They needed people to push a trolley around the different wards in the hospital selling newspapers, sweets, toiletries etc to patients and to a certain extent help the lonely ones to keep in contact with the outside world. It was a wonderful job (anyone who has seen the film Bed of Roses with Christian Slater will understand the healing power of delivering a surprise bouquet of flowers to someone who is struggling on their life journey) everyone was always happy to see me!!
There were also challenging aspects to it, on the geriatric ward one day there was a guy who looked like the face from the painting 'The Scream'. He was shouting over and over "help me, help me" and everyone was ignoring him. I'm sure in hindsight he was in the latter stages of dementia and would probably keep this up all day and night regardless of whether anyone 'helped him' him or not. But to me as a visitor walking through the ward briefly I was traumatised by it. I wasn't a healthcare professional and I certainly couldn't start interfering with this man's clinical care, and if I did I felt sure that I would very quickly be dismissed from the position I loved.
I went home after finishing my shift of 'rounds'. Now by this time I was convinced that there was some kind of higher power directing my direction of flow in life...  I also felt the time had come for the two of us to have an honest heart to heart chat!

Tears and tears and tears.... were streaming down my face as they are now as I am writing this.. I was on my hands and knees as I said something like, " I guess it's inevitable that at some point in the future, you and I are going to have a 'face to face' talk... and when that happens are you going to say to me, ' why David when you were faced with that man's suffering did you decide to turn your back on him? Did I turn my back on you when you said you needed help?'
I have never felt so wretched and unworthy at any time in my life before or since..
"Why was I such a hypocrite?"
All taking and no giving said my 'internal critic'... It was a pretty big wake up call for me I don't mind admitting!!

So eventually once I calmed down I told myself, "you need to raise the bar my friend. You are on the path to lower back pain because you are becoming too comfortable again, slipping back into old patterns of behaviour and this has been a message to get your stuff together and work harder. "
I was renting a room in a flat above a shop at the time, big enough for a single bed, not much else. I earned about £300 per week from doing the security work at night and by the time I paid for the room and paid off my grocery tab from the shop downstairs I cleared about £150.
I used to get paid at the end of every week after the Saturday night shift.
So every Monday morning I started walking to the hospital and going to the charity office and handing over my spare £150. I imagined in the beginning that there would be 1 hospital charity. In fact there were hundreds! They had a thick book like a telephone directory filled with the names of all the different charities who sponsored stuff at the hospital. The staff would always make me specify a charity I wanted to donate to. I tried to avoid this and just said, "you choose" but they said they weren't allowed so I used to flick open the book to any page, plant my finger somewhere on the page and whatever it landed on, that would be my charity of the week.

Time moved on and things were going well, the 'buzz' I got from helping others encouraged me to do more and more.. I started to volunteer as a minibus driver taking mainly elderly, but some younger, blind people to their community hall. Most drivers would drop off, go home, and return in the afternoon to do the home run. Most of the other drivers were retired themselves, I was one of the few I think working, but as I worked at night, I was free all day.
I'd finish my shift at 2am and whereas before I would have sat down with the other staff for a couple of beers, and at the weekends be crawling out into the daylight sometimes at 9am, eyes being scolded by the sun, now I headed straight home.
I was awake again at 7.30am and picking people up in the minibus by 9.30am.


This was a special time for me... Talk about learning not to 'take things for granted!'
If you ever feel like you need a 'reality check', spend some time talking to a blind person! You never truly know someone until you have walked a day in their shoes!!!
I got on great with pretty much everyone and soon I was volunteering nearly everyday. Not just taking members to and from the hall but also on a fortnightly ramble, some taking their guide dogs with them where we would walk in the countryside ( I as a volunteer would drive the minibus but also guide people by the arm and described the scenery to help them paint a mental picture of their surroundings before going to a pub for lunch), also we went on day trips to historic places, music recital evenings, and I also took lists of shopping and bought groceries for members while they were in the hall.
I did a sponsored walk 66 miles around the Isle Of Wight to raise money for the blind charity. ( I was also doing other sponsored walks like the Three Peaks Challenge to raise funds for the local cancer hospice using my new found energy and giving all proceeds of my 'gift' to charity)
By this time my volunteering activities were clashing so I decided regretfully to stop doing the hospital work as they had plenty of volunteers and concentrate mainly on the blind charity who always needed drivers.
I formed a very special friendship with a lady (let's call Rose for the purposes of this journal) who was elderly, retired, totally blind but mentally very alert. She hadn't always been blind unlike some members so she had the concept of colours and many other things stored in her memories.
Rose was fiercely independent, lived on her own and cooked all her own meals. Furthermore she insisted on cooking a hot meal for herself everyday, and refused point blank to 'cut corners' buy buying pre prepped veg, she peeled every single bean, potato, whatever by hand herself with no help. And to to top things off she wouldn't use a microwave, she would cook joints of meat in the oven or grill steaks under the grill!
Rose loved to weave wicker baskets which is how we became such close friends. I would sit with her for hours at a time, running a guide ruler through a pre determined pattern so that she could then do the weaving herself by following the guide with her fingers and threading the strands. Her sensory acuity was amazing and she was one of the few members who could read Braille because people preferred talking books these days.
One day as we were sitting together weaving, I became curious about something so I said, "Rose you've told me that you cook joints of meat in the oven or use your grill. I hope you don't mind me asking this but, how do you know when things are cooked? I know you can taste them but isn't that a little dangerous, tasting potentially uncooked meat?"
" oh " she laughed,  "that's pretty easy, I just ask God when it's ready, never failed me yet!"

Now absolutely no pun intended here but if that wasn't a demonstration of 'blind faith' to me then I don't know what is..


So time passed and despite doing all the charity work which I loved, not everything was well. I had nagging feelings of kind of unfinished lessons I needed still to learn. I felt guilty around buying and eating food.
Also I felt huge guilt around owning or possessing any kind of wealth or anything which could be construed as a 'material' possession.
I took this to the extreme in order to test it, so I would buy for example a toothbrush in order to test whether I felt guilty or not around its potential 'beautification' use.
Looking back now it feels very much like I was on the first rung of a monastic ladder following an epiphany. I lived in a 'cell' not unlike that of a monk and spent all day everyday trying to help others.


Again now looking in hindsight I can see the cause of my growing internal conflict...
For every action (karma means action) there is a consequence. Are we always fully aware of the short, medium and long term consequences of our actions?
I don't think so!!

So while it might appear to the casual observer and indeed myself at the time that aim was not only 'doing no harm' but quite a lot of 'good' into the bargain... I was still running up an invisible 'karmic tab' that I was slowly beginning to become aware of and although I didn't know what it was, it was beginning to make me feel uncomfortable.

At this point in my life I was vegan, intentionally poor etc etc 😇
But for example were all my actions totally vegan? I didn't buy meat or dairy products so at that level I'm ticking the boxes.
But at the same time I'm giving approx. £150 per week to charity. Obviously with the best will in the world not every penny of that charity money is going to be given directly to the intended recipients. Some has to be spent on wages. Some employees of those charities when they get paid at the end of each month are going to potentially buy a month's worth of steak, eggs, chicken whatever and put it in their freezer.
And of course because this keeps up demand, supermarkets will pass this demand onto suppliers, and suppliers pass this demand onto nature.
Even leaving food aside for a minute.. Even if I sit cross legged on the floor all day, eyes shut, chanting 'ohmm' ... I may not be very hungry afterwards and therefore I may not rush out to McDonald's or Burger King etc but I'm still going to need new clothes from time to time, heating for my house, fuel for my car.
So me disappearing into the mountains for weeks at a time to learn how to starve myself and ' be at one ' with nature wasn't significantly enough reducing what inward taking from nature and stockpiling my karmic debt.
Maybe I wasn't eating omelettes anymore but as far as nature was concerned I was ' still breaking eggs'.
Back to the clothing charity shops for just one second, buying a second hand jumper from Oxfam or Salvation Army is never going to add to the global demand for jumpers or wool. Nobody at those type of organisations is ever going to quantify that demand for jumpers and roll it up into a big fat order of sheep from a farmer.
It's a different system... I think some people innately 'feel that difference'.
My cousin's son for example is on the autistic spectrum and he for me is such a pure soul... and sees life with sometimes such a purity of vision... He loves charity shops way more than conventional ones..


So going back to the hierarchy of intention.. In order for me to 'do no harm' I need to begin to understand the wider, long term and more profound consequences of my actions..

This description of Maimonides and his hierarchy of 'charitable giving' really resonated with me at the time when I was doing all of the charity work... I just saw it the first time and it totally made sense to me...

Moses ben Maimon, also known as Maimonides, was a Medieval Jewish Philosopher who lived in Spain between 1135 - 1204 AD.
In Judaism, it's common to follow Maimonides' Eight Levels of Tzedakah (the Hebrew word for charity, justice or righteousness). The aim is to give charitably as close as possible to level 1. It's considered a ladder that you climb gradually over time as you mature and have the means to do better...


Here is the hierarchy;

1. Giving an interest-free loan to a person in need; forming a partnership with a person in need; giving a grant to a person in need; finding a job for a person in need, so long as that loan, grant, partnership, or job results in the person no longer living by relying upon others.
2. Giving tzedakah anonymously to an unknown recipient via a person (or public fund) which is trustworthy, wise, and can perform acts of tzedakah with your money in a most impeccable fashion.
3. Giving tzedakah anonymously to a known recipient.
4. Giving tzedakah publicly to an unknown recipient.
5. Giving tzedakah before being asked.
6. Giving adequately after being asked.
7. Giving willingly, but inadequately.
8. Giving "in sadness" (giving out of pity): It is thought that Maimonides was referring to giving because of the sad feelings one might have in seeing people in need (as opposed to giving because it is a religious obligation). Other translations say "Giving unwillingly."

So when I feel like I am ill, or off balance or whatever and I start thinking about 'healing myself' I often stop and ask...
"What is a 'higher intention' than to 'heal thyself' ?
For me contributing to paying off a proportion of the global mountain of 'karmic debt' is a higher intention.

'Karmic debt' is my own phrase for the build up of debt which as a species we owe to nature. It's just my own concept that helps me facilitate understanding of how my model of 'reality' works.




Around 10yrs ago I had a flair up of a long term lower back injury. The pain, discomfort and resulting loss of mobility caused me to stop working for a time and seek treatment. I tried lots of sports massage, osteopathy, chiropractors and later began to try Tai Chi, Chi Kung (Qigong), Yoga and meditation.
As I began to learn about Chi, the body's life force of electricity, and techniques for moving it around with 'intention' I had a kind of 'spiritual epiphany'. Not only did my physical condition improve but I was so grateful to my 'higher power' for 'showing me the way' that I made a promise to 'pay back' what I felt like I 'owed'.
I suppose it felt like I had taken out a large 'loan', using my body and health as collateral.
Once I was able to function physically again I set about reading as many spiritual and religious texts that I could find, in order to try and 'make sense' of what was going on in my life. This started me down the path which I am on now and have been ever since that time.. A spiritual journey of self discovery.
I began to question everything in the Bible, the Koran, Vedic texts etc. regarding human energy, energy usage, energy storage, healing with energy, killing with energy.. (Why really does Daath Vader breathe like that? 😂 )
I visited libraries, esoteric bookshops like Watkins Books in London, dug up lost texts from the Gnostic Gospels, Jewish mysticism, Kaballah, Tarot, Sufism, Mary Poppins,  the Pilgrimage by Paulo Coelho, you name it I read it, and consumed it all like I had been starving for the previous 40yrs!
I took myself off into the mountains of Scotland for weeks at a time to conduct 'real life' experiments on myself regarding energy. How much do I need, how much should I eat, drink, what if I run out? How do I stay warm when it's cold? How long can I survive without food etc etc etc...
From time to time I had to be 'rescued' by friends or family who totally couldn't get what I was doing! They didn't understand that like Luke Skywalker entering the Tree of Life at the base with Yoda, there was no escaping it for me until nature had run it's training course! And Funnily enough although I thought to myself I wasn't scared at the time, the words "you will be" have an all too familiar ring to them!

I became a bit of an 'energy nut' or mildly obsessive because for me, the answers to these questions around energy held the keys which could help me unlock all the meaning to my life. Who I am? why I'm here? where did I come from? and where am I going? were all tied for me very tightly to discovering more about 'energy work' (Qigong)

So my Yoga at least initially was like training with Special Forces. Walking between 20 and 30 miles a day, everyday, in deliberately the most remote parts of the Highlands of Scotland, in usually extremely wet and often freezing conditions.
I used a tent for shelter, I had either a tiny amount of money, having bought a return coach ticket in advance for a return date via Glasgow coach station - a rendezvous I literally could not afford to miss! Or no money whatsoever.
No phone signal, no local population, no rescue of any kind available if things went wrong, just self reliance. This really helped me to concentrate my mind not surprisingly! 😂 
Looking back now I guess if Yin is female and Yang is male, it's probably fair to say it was pretty much Yang! 😂 Maybe I would have been better off sitting under a palm tree in Bali!!

(Yoga - word meaning the work we do for God. Literally 'to be yoked to God' like an Ox in a harness)

I got a lot of the answers I was 'seeking' (can't write that word without hearing The Seeker by The who playing in my head!) to my life's big questions.
I made my counsellor laugh the other day when we talked briefly about this period of my life when I said, " I think it's possible for humans to live without food for extended periods, even maybe indefinitely. But it is tough...so why would you?"
She laughed because I was so 'matter of fact' about it like if you go wandering through a field full of sheep for long enough, eventually you're gonna step in some crap!
I've read the book 'Into the Wild' and watched the film. I totally 'get' what he was doing. I suppose I could say, " there but for the Grace of God go I" but in those moments where things had become dangerous in the mountains I would say to myself, " this is an experiment that you are conducting for your own benefit, don't die over it" and then I would take some positive action to ' get me out of here' rather than 'toughing it out'. I guess that might explain why I am still here and he isn't.
I shed a tears for him though...

Once I'd discovered that life for me was a balance between survive and thrive, I stopped going on such drastic journeys. I was still like a wandering mendicant and walked back and forth across the UK, France, Spain for months or a year at a time,  all the way until I could see the lights of Africa on the opposite sides of the straights of Gibraltar.
I was poor and there were moments when drinking water neat from an ornamental duck pond while the ducks eyed me with what appeared to me to be humorous curiosity, I would ask myself like I was being interviewed on the tv, "David, would you say that you consider doing this (sucking up water filled with duck poo) a low point in your life?" And that would make me laugh out loud to break the silence of the surrounding countryside and the monotonous monotone of the ducks quacking!
I covered large sections of the Camino de Santiago but never actually made it to that Cathedral to see the huge swinging incense diffuser, wafting away the smell of dirty socks and muddy boots. That to me in itself was symbolic and should have served as a warning that my journey wasn't over yet and there was much more to come!
I also understood the mystical experiences which Paulo Coelho had described in the book about his Pilgrimage, both good and bad..

So returning to the UK I needed to understand what my intention was now regarding my Yoga in it's broadest sense?

[DavidUK]

Third and final instalment of this part of my journal.
** Trigger Warnings** Please see parts 1 and 2 before continuing with Part 3.

I do not have the software or hardware to properly edit these journal entries into linear entries so they have become ramblings instead!


Everything starts with intention.

At one point I had a Shaolin Qigong teacher who was English and had trained initially in Karate to Black belt level. Then seeking higher level instruction he went to live in Japan where he won the Karate open heavyweight world championships two years running.
From there he went to the Shaolin temple and lived and studied with the monks for a year, eventually being ordained as a monk and given the name, "Great Honorable Respect". He left the temple and went south throughout China learning the southern fighting styles of Kung Fu from Grandmasters etc etc..
Going back to the reason he left the Shaolin temple, it was because he was seriously injured. It was a hamstring or groin muscle tear that seriously inhibited his training. The high energy, high kicking style of Shaolin Kung Fu is very demanding on the body whereas the southern styles of Chinese Boxing tend to focus on the hands and lower level kicks ( correct me if I'm wrong, I'm only just qualified to order Chinese takeaway so I can't speak from any knowledgeable standpoint! 😂 )
It crossed my mind at the time when he first told me this story, I wonder what he was doing differently to the other monks which may have caused / explained his suffering?
He told me that at the Temple the monks trained Kung fu for 8hrs per day nearly everyday of the year. The monks are all Buddhists and vegans and live on a diet exclusively of rice and vegetables. Their guiding intention or principle is to 'do no harm'
My mum won't mind me saying that years ago she was diagnosed with a medical condition requiring her to have two replacement hip operations. Between the first and second op she had to wait for a year and because she couldn't therefore do the physio to rehabilitate the new hip joint, she was mainly confined to a wheelchair for getting around.
This loss of freedom certainly concentrated her mind on what she valued in her life, and she was highly motivated to get back up and out and about. I remember I asked her at the time, "what is your intention, once you get your mobility back? Do you remember all the charity work you used to do when we were kids growing up?"
She said she certainly intended to make a positive contribution to society once she was fit and able again. She had the second hip op in the morning and was up and walking around the ward in the same afternoon. The nurses said it was the quickest recovery they had ever seen... My mum quickly returned to charity work as a volunteer helping people suffering from dementia and she hasn't looked back since..

The Shaolin monks give up all their worldly goods in order to purify themselves prior  to entering the temple. Once they are able to 'grasp the pebble' from the master's hand (ref to the 1970's tv series Kung Fu starring David Carrodine as the student named 'Grasshopper' 😆)and it is time for them to leave the Temple and find their way in the outside world, it's extremely difficult for them not to be transformed by the change in 'intention' towards amassing enough wealth to survive. And they might soon find themselves ordering a burger and fries instead of sticky rice.

[DavidUK]

Where the mind leads the body will follow

I was reminded recently of the time when I was receiving lessons in how to ride a motorcycle and more specifically how to turn around 180 degrees in a narrow road without putting a foot down which was a requirement for the test. I remember the instructor telling me, "just look over your shoulder at the place where you want to end up and you will find that the bike will almost 'turn itself' to point in the right direction without much attention needed to turning the handlebars. Conversely trying to turn the bike around at very slow idling speed and looking in the direction of the front of the bike at the same time made this exercise nearly impossible (for me anyway!).
So I could understand in a very practical sense, 'where the mind goes, the body will follow'.
I have additional theories on why, how this technique may or may not work but they are just my ideas so don't count as evidence of any sort.

[DavidUK]

**Trigger Warning**
This journal entry is about my Triggers and EF's as they materialise and effect me today.
Therefore, they include:
Suicide Ideation
Drug taking / Overdose
Alcohol / Alcohol Abuse
Self Medication
Hospitals
Lack of Self Worth
Authority Figures
Confrontational Situations
Feeling Patronised Judged
Abusive Language / Swearing


Please DO NOT read this if you are Triggered by any of the above. I am only writing this to help me understand my own Triggers and how over the years they have become layered, and some of my Triggers activate other Triggers.
This self analysis helps me to formulate my own coping mechanisms and coping strategies both on my own and with healthcare professionals.
If you think that my experiences will be helpful in understanding your own or other's situations by all means go ahead and read on.. If in doubt.. Please don't.. 🙏

NHS response to a stress event.

So to summarise .. Last week I reached out to my support worker (I live in a hostel for homeless people where we are each assigned a support worker) and asked for help (feelings of helplessness like a small child, vulnerable and anxious)

I admit to her that due to various triggers (loud continuous door slamming, raised voices, kitchen items like cutlery being thrown into a sink making a loud crash over a period of several hours, lack of sleep etc )and through frustration and anxiety I have broken the rules (took 6 anti depressant tablets over a 12 hour period instead of 1, and this had zero effects, harmful or otherwise)

Am told I will now be referred to authorities for taking an OD... (Feeling anxiety, fear, which gradually increased over a several hour period because I received no information on what will happen next. Meanwhile my support worker is on phone to various mental health professionals who can't decide how to offload me onto another department to deal with )

I have outlined to key worker at this stage that I have had intrusive suicidal ideation.

Transcript from my most recent telephone conversation with an NHS Clinician from Crisis Team:

Clinician " so tell me how you feel at the moment?"

Me "   " ( sentence filled with more words beginning with the letters f and c than she'd probably ever heard before )

Clinician " well there's no need to speak to me like that "

Me " you need to raise your f**king game, you're a professional now, you're not in the girl guides anymore  "

Support worker takes back phone before it melts..

Me " well that went as well as could be expected "


Eventually several hours later I am taken by strangers (ambulance crew) to a public place (A&E) where I experience guilt for not being 'sick enough' to jump the queue of 'really' sick people.

Told I would be waiting an indefinite period of time on my own, on a trolley. (isolation, in an unfamiliar environment causes me anxiety, feeling patronised and judged on the trolley because I am not sick!)

I am informed by ambulance crew I will be meeting with an authority figure who is likely to be sceptical, confrontational, dismissive, patronising because they have lots of people every week trying to 'play the system'.... (Loads of triggers!)

I think to myself ... If that happens and I then react with anger and frustration I will be 'judged' by other strangers around me, and if I am totally passive and compliant I will be dismissed potentially as a fraud with feelings of guilt, shame, unworthiness...etc

Because I am not feeling strong enough to face this, I leave without anyone's consent,  resulting in me being placed on a list of 'naughty' people. (Technically I have now absconded)

I return to the hostel after stopping at a bar to have a few drinks to try and calm my nerves which is what I was seeking help to do in the beginning! ...and later receive a visit from two more authority figures (police) who tell me that in future if I feel the same way I must contact them so that they are in charge and can manage my outcomes...




I related the experience to my therapist  who said, "oh my God..."

[DavidUK]

** Trigger Warning**

This journal entry contains references to:
Verbal abuse
Intimidation
Bullying
Domestic Abuse
Coercive behaviour
Manipulation
Authority figure abuse

If any of the above are Triggers for you please do not read this. This journal entry is about my positive friendship with my hairdresser but in order to explain how and why that came to be, I describe some of my behavioural Triggers. Overall this journal entry relates a positive message I believe but it probably breaks a couple of eggs in order to make the omelette.
If you are in any doubt about these being Triggers for you please be safer rather than sorry and skip this entry. 🙏



Why I hug my hairdresser...

Yesterday I had a haircut.. I guess it's not usually an emotionally charged event for many people.
In my case my hairdresser, (let's call her Sharon) has been cutting my hair or rather shaving completely my hair and beard, roughly once every 6 months for the last 18 mths.
I first met Sharon when she offered to cut the hair of any homeless person in my town for free, in order to give them back some of their dignity and self worth.

When you have been told by your local authority that, "you have deliberately made yourself homeless, you are not a vulnerable adult, you have no local connection to this area, we have no responsibility to help you, you may become eligible for assistance in 10 years from now." it can give your sense of self worth a 'bit of a knock'.
I replied to them, " no problem, I'll see you in 10."


Deliberately making myself homeless consisted of me leaving my accommodation in a building of multiple occupancy (1 room in a shared flat) because one of the other tenants hated the fact that she was being forced by her housing association landlord to share a communal living area with "Tramps" as she liked to refer to us.
In the absence of any hope of redress on her part, she took it upon herself to use the front door to the flat (immediately adjacent to my room) as a weapon. She slammed it as often and as hard as she could to try and make my life so unbearable that I would be forced to leave. I already had CPTSD but undiagnosed, so this in addition to accusing me of stealing her stuff and other things eventually, after 18 months did the trick.... I left and slept on the pavement for the next two and a half years.

So when Sharon offered to cut my hair for free, and show that some people in the community really did care about people like me, I gratefully accepted.
It must have been a strange sight though! Me sitting in a camping chair in the market place with a hairdressers gown wrapped over my shoulders having a very 'short back and sides'! After all I didn't know when the next opportunity for such a luxury would present itself so I  figured I must make the most of it!!

It turned out that Sharon and I had some mutual friends in the town and we chatted  about that 'something in common' for ages which acted as the 'ice breaker.
People were walking past what must have looked to them like a charity fundraiser for Comic Relief!

Sharon and I kept in touch and she refuses to accept a penny in payment to this day even though I always offer it, every time she cuts my hair.

After two years the local authority staff approached me and said, "we'd like to help you, we're worried about you sleeping out every night in the snow."

"I replied, oh wow! That's amazing!"

I don't think they understood that what I was amazed at was not their offer, but the idea that they actually believed that I thought they were telling the truth!

Six months later I decided to give them the benefit of the enormous doubt in my mind. I moved into the hostel.


Yesterday Sharon said to me, " it's amazing to see how far you have come! When I first met you, you were so withdrawn, you were totally wrapped up in your own world!
Now you are opening up and chatting so much more, it's lovely to see your progress."


And that is why I hug my hairdresser.. The people who helped me when they knew I had no way to repay them, they are very special to me...

[DavidUK]

The Consequences of Mindfulness... Part 1

I recently started Dialectic Behavioural Therapy, DBT, which I guess could be called a synergy of Traditional Eastern Philosophy (Yin - The female energy, Observing and going with the 'flow') and Congnitive Behavioural Therapy CBT ( Yang - The male energy, Prescriptive, problem solving, solution conscious, without need of emotion).

Funnily enough I studied quite a lot of CBT in the form of Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) 25 or so years ago and found it to be very effective for certain things.
More recently in the last 10 years I have spent a good deal of time learning Chi Kung, Tai Chi, various styles of Kung Fu, Yoga and meditation.  (mostly self taught through necessity, i.e how to keep warm at night when sleeping outside)
I was drawn also to the Thai Forest Tradition of Buddhism, because I discovered it's training was very tough, and had it's roots in 'going into the forest to meditate, and not coming back until you can survive by doing that and only that', which suited my circumstances of avoiding society at the time.

So when I came across this DBT kind of fusion of the two a couple of weeks ago,I guess it shouldn't have come as any great surprise that I had a significant feeling of recognition, 'coming home', being on the 'right track' or 'path' again.

I wrote about in my last journal entries a Hierarchy of Intentions. Due to my lack of desktop publishing software or a reasonable sized computer screen, the copying and pasting of large sections of text meant the posts became a huge download of jumbled experiences, pretty much confusing to any reader other than myself, but can I guess be summarised in a few words..... "decide what's important."

Now that I've managed to churn out and offload from my brain, that bunch of confused thoughts and ideas, the question for me is what is next?

DBT is about Mindfulness...
So what is mindfulness? I don't actually subscribe to the popular definition these days that it's 'paying attention to what's going on in the here and now', but that doesn't matter as long as the semantics are commonly understood by everyone.
DBT is also about being able to analyse 'what works and what doesn't work' for ourselves in a more scientific type analysis.
So why should I pay attention to my actions and analyse them?

For me the answer to that question is.... "So that I more accurately understand the consequences of what I am doing'.... 'How is my presence here, and the things I am doing, impacting on the environment around me?'

Actions and the consequences thereof are a subject that has, in recent times at least, been conveniently wrapped up here in the West in one word, 'karma'.
My understanding of the word 'karma' is that it can be translated to mean 'action' and, therefore, there than can be 'good actions' or 'bad actions' of karma depending on the outcome.
So when I talk about 'good' or 'bad' karma, what it is that I am really describing is, 'the consequences of my actions'.

So the bottom line for me is, "if I pay closer attention to both my actions and the consequences of my actions, then I can train myself to be more skilful in the actions I choose to perform, and start to take control of their outcomes."

"Great! How do I do that?" 😂

So in order to work out what to do in the future, it's probably going to be useful to make a brief summary of the past.

So for the first 40 years of my life I was a 'consumer'. I sought out ( my intention ) activities that would bring me enjoyment or happiness to make my time here on earth more pleasant. I fuelled these activities by taking resources from nature such as food, clothing, equipment.
What were the results?
Often I was unable to complete my 'intended' activities,  and became 'side tracked' into helping other people who I came across and found struggling along the way.
I was disappointed at my 'own' lack of success or progress, but I learned quite a lot of 'unintentional' skills along the way, and took a fair bit of satisfaction in seeing others achieve success or overcome their obstacles.

At the age of 40 I began (in hindsight) a decade of self analysis in trying to define for myself, why am I here, what's my 'true purpose' (if as it seems I'm not here to just have fun and satisfy my own curiosities and cravings), what are my values, motivations etc?

Now age 50 I have reached a few conclusions.

My intentions are these days to....

Do as little harm as I reasonably can to people and nature. (If I'm ahead of you in the queue at Tescos yes that means you will have to wait a few minutes longer.. Sorry about that! ... and sorry nature that I bought a sandwich but at least I turned down the offer of a plastic bag to carry it in! 🙏)
Explore ways in which I can live a sustainable life that is interesting, enjoyable but not too hedonistic or exploitive of resources.
Try to help others who are suffering, by sharing what I have learned along my journey so far... And in so doing hopefully help people to be more compassionate towards themselves, other people and nature...

So how am I going to ensure that my future actions are in line with these goals/intentions?
By training myself to ask questions of myself like,

" Is what I am doing now/today in line with my highest intentions?"

"What are the consequences of the actions I am doing right now?"

"Is what I am doing today, taking me closer to or further from my goal of living a sustainable life?" And if further from...
"What am I going to do to change that for the better?"

"Is what I am doing right now harmful to anyone or anything? ...If yes
"Is there anything more I could be doing to minimise that harm?"

"How am I splitting up my time between, doing things that bring me happiness, helping others, protecting the environment?" Etc.



So that's as far as I have come for now...My next DBT is on Friday this week and I'm looking forward to giving some feedback to my therapist on the things that have helped so far.. Like writing these thoughts down in this journal...

🙏







 

[DavidUK]

Medication and the 'Lost Tears of My Inner Child'

For the last 6 months I've been having counselling at the hostel where I am staying.
My counsellor is very client based and the work is centred around getting in touch with my 'lost child'.
I think my resistance to this approach can best be summed up when I said, "my lost child is dead and, therefore, won't be coming back anytime soon."

My counsellor had, it's fair to say, a lot more faith than I did!

I suppose my early life answers to questions, struggles, problems etc were a lot more 'prescriptive' such as "do this, do that" both for myself and others than the idea that, "things will work themselves out eventually."
So it amuses me now to think back to the early sessions and my thinking that, 'she's just sitting there doing nothing, and while I appreciate her time, I don't see how this is going to help.'
Now in tandem with my DBT therapy I am beginning to understand the cumulative  value of these sessions.
Having taken part in several Vipassana silent meditation retreats over 3, 10 and 14 days in the last few years at my local monastery, one of the things I had noticed was that during the course of the retreat the senior monk leading the practise would have at least two more junior monks or novices 'supporting' him or her and up to a max of 4 at any one time.
I didn't really understand their purpose at the time. They would sit bolt upright, eyes closed, in lotus position, meditating for up to 8 hours a day at the front of the room and just to the side of the senior monk.
I suppose a bit like the pillars of Boaz and Yoachim their contribution was as much spiritual as it was physical and their intentions for being there just as important than their physical presence in the room.
So for the last 6 months I sat in a small room venting, anger and frustration and blame, while my counsellor reflected back to me compassion, empathy and unconditional love.

During this time I have been taking medication to try and control my emotional disregulation. These medicines have been, Citalopram, Sertraline and Venlofaxine.
I wasn't convinced at any point that the medication was making the slightest positive difference for me.
I knew it was doing something, making me tired, lethargic and probably balancing my mood a little in the long run etc just nothing that I felt was useful for my anxiety and frequent stress responses.
Several of my friends are taking these types of anti depressants or similar and one of them had told me that since starting taking them a few years ago she hadn't shed any tears. While this emotional buffering is undoubtedly helpful in potentially shielding us from harmful emotions or uncontrollable outbursts, in my case I definitely noticed that my tears were 'locked away'.
Recently I agreed with my GP that a daily dosage of mood stabilising medication was probably less likely to suit my situation than an anti anxiety medication that I could take as and when required over a short period until I was able to calm my mood. This to be used in conjunction with my new DBT techniques.
So I stopped all of the Venlafaxine and instead now take Promethazine Hydrochloride tablets when I need them. These are not addictive and have for me a mild sedative action as well as a calming effect.
There was a lot of resistance from the medical community to prescribing me a sedative such as Diazepam in case I became addicted.

The result seems to be that (everything working in tandem, taking all other environment factors into account) I seem to be getting my emotional 'mojo' back!
I took me 'crying my eyes' out with a friend in cafe Nero the other day to be a very good sign, when I felt I was strong enough to say I was 'sorry for not being there for him' recently, when I knew he was in need of my emotional support but I had nothing left in my 'own tank' to give.
This public outpouring of tears from both of us was simultaneously, amusing, cathartic and ironic. Any concerns of shaming myself in public were resigned to the past many years ago once I started regularly performing my pre sleep beauty routine and unrolling my bedding in the High St in front of any passers by in the neighbourhood.
I'm pleased to say that I have had several occasions recently to shed a few tears of joy and felt better for it.

So my counsellor's patience has paid off in her quest to find my inner child...My willingness to try 'anything that might help' like medication and equally to stop it if it isn't working seems to be a useful method... And the progress I'm making was reflected this morning when I went to the local supermarket and bought myself a small, cheap bouquet of flowers to brighten up my room, because unusually for me I felt like , 'I'm worth it!'...

[DavidUK]

As part of my journey to wellness I am using all available tools at my disposal.
I just came across this music and I find it very relaxing/soothing...

https://youtu.be/TWdSi0Xw4u0

[DavidUK]

DBT Therapy Goal Setting.

Today I had my second session of DBT (Dialectic Behavioural Therapy).
This therapy is in addition to my ongoing client based Counselling which I have been having every week for the last 6 months. The Counselling is now beginning to 'bear fruit' in my feelings of self worth, self love, self validation etc.

The DBT, running in parallel, is hopefully going to give me the strategies I need to function reasonably in modern society both at home and work.
These are strategies I failed to fully learn at a young age and as a consequence, left me with coping skills far too simplistic for modern living i.e 'fight or flight'.

In addition to Counselling and DBT, I am also using anti anxiety medication as and when I require it to, 'back myself up' until I have improved my resiliency sufficiently to no longer need it.

So in my first DBT session I gave my therapist (T) a brief personal history with examples of what my difficulties are today, and how I believed they were caused.
I came away from that session with some very simple, common sense strategies for coping at home (I'm not currently working) with situations that trigger my stress response.
Between my first session and today, as well as 'treating' my stress response I began to put in place 'prevention' techniques to avert a build up of anxiety, allowing me to take back some 'ownership' of my environment and the stimuli around me...
For example, I started using headphones and listening to music more frequently to block out intrusive noises.
I bought a scent diffuser to give a nice fragrance to my room, hoping to alleviate my frequent violent nightmares.
I bought and began using a sweet scented hand moisturiser to make me feel better about myself.
I bought a bouquet of fresh flowers to brighten up my room and make me feel cheerful every time I open my door when returning home.
I started taking more frequent walks in nature and the countryside, looking for Kingfisher birds and taking pictures of wild flowers, sharing the pictures online later...

I was very happy today to be able to return to my T today and inform him that these measures have been working to great effect.
My nightmares have reduced significantly, I have had one in the last week.
My need for medication has been low, I've taken an anti anxiety tablet on three different occasions in the last fortnight, as opposed to taking anti depressants everyday for the last 6 months.

So trusting that I can continue to manage my home situation 'mindfully' in the future, today my T and I began exploring the next goals of my DBT therapy.

The next goals are those I have listed below.


1 Inter Personal Skills in the workplace
Coping with conflict at work.

2 Emotional Regulation at home. (For when I move into my own accommodation)
Managing everyday stress such as letters, bills, neighbours etc.

3 Distress Tolerance in the Community.
Controlling stress response to triggers such as noise, delays, over crowding, confinement.


My parents are currently funding my private DBT treatment as my previous GP was frankly obstructive.
Having recently changed to a new GP in a different practise, I am now receiving 'common sense' help from my new GP in the form of my anti anxiety medication which works well in tandem with the DBT.
I have also agreed to review my progress at the end of these initial 5 therapy sessions  with my GP and to discuss the possibility of an NHS referral for more therapy in the future should it be necessary.

So as far as my 'home study' is concerned with regard to the above therapy goals, my parents have bought me the DBT Skills Training Manual Second Edition by Marsha M Lineham.
As my T pointed out today, this book is more for the use of the T than the client, however, the worksheets for home study which are available to buy as a separate volume, come FOC with this book and can be downloaded and printed as required. So it just seemed like a cheaper option to buy the 'teaching manual' and get the 'client' worksheets with it for free.

I have had the book for a couple of weeks and I have been delving into different sections without any real focus so far.
Now, however, I am going to start working more methodically through the Inter Personal Skills section to help me make progress in the area of dealing with 'conflict at work'.
Having been out of paid work for the most part of the last 8yrs or so, managing how I return to the workplace is going to be a critical part of my journey.
I have had several 'false starts' where I have felt ready to go back to either voluntary or paid employment and have been overwhelmed by the pressures or found physically that I was too exhausted.
Interestingly for me, over the last few years, by trying to avoid 'work related stress' I have opted to apply for the lowest paid jobs available.
This I believed at the time would mean that I could somehow hide away in the background, more or less unnoticed, and thereby avoid any confrontations.
As well as not taking much off the company 'bottom line' I thought this would allow me some kind of 'free pass' when it came to workplace responsibility...(WRONG!! 😂)
As I said to my T today, this approach/strategy failed totally!
Instead of being valued for not 'taking too much' I was treated poorly for the very reason that I hadn't given myself enough value in the first place!
In hindsight, rather than choose the easiest, lowest paid type work, I would have served myself better by working on my self esteem and self worth prior to seeking employment, so that when I actually felt ready to do a job, I would be looking for something reasonably satisfying, challenging and commanding the 'market rate' of pay!
This way I could have maintained my self esteem in the workplace and challenged any behaviour from others which tried to invalidate or belittle me.
That, therefore, is the work I am undertaking now in order to more successfully return to the workplace with a goal to finding and keeping long term sustainable employment.
Luckily the support network which I have in place around me now, including a key worker, mentor, counsellor, therapist, job coach, GP and my family and friends are all supporting me in looking for a long term solution rather than a quick fix to the problem of my employment.
I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say this has not always been the case, and it's been a struggle to get to the position I am in now..
But I am looking forward, while being mindful, rather than resentful of my past.


So that's where I am at in terms of my DBT therapy goals.
In tandem I am also working on maintaining my physical energy by doing self taught yoga, walking etc.


I'm looking forward to seeing how I progress over the next two weeks...

[DavidUK]

Survivor of Trauma.. Not a Victim...

For myself, metaphorically speaking,  I 'fell off my life skills bike' at a certain age, let's say for sake of discussion aged 13yrs.
I was pretty badly shaken up and my leg was broken.. Consequently I missed a significant portion of my 'school of life' education while I was trying to recover.

Rather than seek out the 'careless driver or drivers' who caused me to swerve, hit the lamp post, fall off and injure myself.. And blame them, take them to court for millions in compensation etc. I have decided to adopt what some DBT therapists call 'radical acceptance'...
I call this "stuff happens, get over it!"
Because I believe that solving things for me in the future is going to benefit me more, right now, than looking for who to blame in the past.
This wasn't always the case for me, and I have spent time coming to terms with my past, but right now that's where I'm at...

Now many years have passed and  I find myself in certain situations where my brain says, "for this episode in your life you need to refer to the notes which you made during years 13 to 16 at the 'school of life'.
My response is that, "I was injured and I skipped those years so I have no notes to refer back to..?"
My brain replies, "well you're not going anywhere until you learn those lessons, and you're going to be continually 'back classed' until you've accomplished this part of your 'life training'.

So now, as a mature student, I am back at the 'school of life' taking all the classes I missed.
Ironically to me, my teacher is quite a lot younger than me, and undoubtedly doesn't have the depth of life experience which I have accumulated.
But rather like a young medical doctor, he does have in his bag, a far better 'toolkit for life' than I do.
So I am quite willing to take his classes and learn his techniques, which in addition to my life experience I hope will prove to be a formidable combination in the future.

It's all a question of how I perceive myself, my environment, and how I currently fit into it... And at the moment I feel more like a survivor than a victim...