Saturday 30 April 2011

Table Set For Two ... a dagger right in the heart of the soul …

The current focus on the Royal Wedding and the love between two newly married people has made me think of the opposite experience … that of loneliness and being alone in life.

Not everyone is lucky enough in life to meet their prince or princess; to get their fairy-tale ending, or even beginning. And a life filled with loneliness and yearning can be one of the most painful, empty and isolating ways to be.

Research shows the importance of human-to-human touch like that only experienced in intimate relationships. Both the physical and emotional development of babies who aren’t held and touched enough is stunted. Adults, deprived of physical touch can develop depression … without intimate or affectionate touch and connection, the world can be a very lonely place. We all need affection and loving touch.

I’ve counselled a number of people over the years struggling with loneliness and the heartache of a life lived alone. Some people I’ve worked with have maybe had brief relationships which haven’t developed, others have maybe yearned for men / women who didn’t want them, and others have simply never experienced a relationship in any form. I’ve counselled women in their late forties, fifties and sixties, who, have not only missed out on the experience of love, but as a result have also lost the opportunity to become a mother. And to sit with someone in the full depth of their regret, questioning and heartache can be particularly moving and challenging.

Why? … Clients question what was / is it about me that’s prevented love coming into my life? What did I do wrong? Why has no one wanted to love me? What’s so wrong with me that no one’s wanted to love me? … And these are questions which simply can’t be answered. But these are also questions which leave the individual questioning their own self worth and value. They’ve watched everyone else around them fall in love, watched other people have successions of relationships maybe, and yet they’re still on their own … and it seems that they can’t help but think that it must be something they’re doing wrong. There must be something wrong with them that no one wants to love them.

Watching other people happy in relationships, sharing loving gestures, looks & touches can be painful for those people on their own. Some people prefer a life alone, and that’s fine, but for those who yearn for deep connection with another human being watching the intimate happiness of others can cut to the core. A kind of envy; not jealous of the couple in love, but a yearning to have their own special someone in their life. Watching other people is a reminder of everything they don’t have; a mirror of their loneliness and empty heartache.

The lonely person will often appear to be busy, filling their life doing things an attempt to fill the void inside. But no matter how much ‘stuff’ people are engaging in, filling their life with, none of that can take away the yearning inside. At times, the busyness, just emphasises the emptiness when the individual pauses and realises that they’re still on their own. No matter how significant the achievement in the external world, it can’t compensate for the empty hole at the core of their internal world.

Love is at the heart of human life, and to feel that no one has ever wanted to love you, or that the person you love no longer loves you is a dagger right in the heart of the soul …

As I was writing this, a song of mine, which I wrote many, many years ago came to mind … its lyrics describe the loneliness experienced after a love affair ends…


Table Set For Two
(© Sharon Cox, Nov 1992)


I can hear my beating heart,
Cutting through the silence.
What can I do to ease the pain that comes
From the tears that fall in defiance.
If somebody new knocked upon my door,
Would I be free to let them inside?
Why does it feel that I’m trapped within a grave;
Tell me, how can I be saved?

Now the time is getting late,
I sit abandoned at the table.
I long for someone to hold me in his arms,
Like an infant in a cradle.
I stare at the table; still set for two,
And watch the candle flame grow dim.
Just like the fire, my dreams went up in smoke;
Now, they haunt me like a ghost.

This world was made for partners in crime,
Everywhere’s a table set for two.
I don’t know how I will survive;
I’m lonely at this table set for two.

See the plates; they’re empty now.
Just like the vacant hole that fills me.
I don’t know if I’ll ever love again,
Or even if I’ll want to.
All my life, love’s brought only pain,
Tell me why it’s been so cruel.
Maybe it’s me, but I don’t understand,
Perhaps, I’ve just been a fool.

Wednesday 27 April 2011

... to embrace the feminine

Immersing myself in the concept of my new website, ‘Embodying Change’, I’ve been reflecting on when the holistic, embodied experience first caught my interest. I’ve been aware for many years of the limitations of talking therapy … as someone who is naturally intellectual, I’ve always had a tendency to intellectualise things and try to understand everything via words with my rational, conscious mind. I realised though that this wasn’t always effective in understanding myself or trying to bring about personal change. I then discovered the importance of bypassing the intellectual level (the ego) and accessing the unconscious via creative ways of exploring and working … which has proved hugely beneficial for me.


And what this reflection has brought to mind for me is a workshop I participated in a number of years ago … it was a weekend workshop facilitate by Natalie Rogers (daughter of Carl Rogers, the ‘founder’ of Person Centred Therapy) based on her ‘Creative Connection’ process of therapy.

Across the weekend, we engaged in a variety of creative ways of connecting with our Selves, our bodies, and thoughts, feelings, emotions and memories, and our unconscious. Natalie facilitated us in using dance, drama, our voices, guided visualisations, story-telling, metaphor and the use of various art methods (drawing, painting, collage, sculpture) to explore the issues arising for us across those 3 days.


For me again, it was the power, or knowing insistence of my unconscious which amazed me. Someone I loved dearly had very recently died and consciously I’d expected to find myself accessing and illustrating those very present and raw feelings … however, my unconscious had other plans …

As each exercise led into the next one, I realised that the things I was creating in art form and accessing via my bodily expression were all about my sense of self as a woman … and more specifically, my sense of self as a women within my own female body. Prior to this weekend, and as a woman with a history of eating distress, this was something I hadn’t fully appreciated; to begin to access this acceptance and appreciation was hugely significant and symbolic for me.

Many people living with eating disorders live at a distance from their bodies. They become disconnected and aren’t able to easily access their embodied experience. The body becomes a separate thing, an object, to hate or to change or sculpt into a more acceptable (for the individual) shape or size.

Towards the end of the weekend, Natalie facilitated a sculpture creating exercise with clay. Using guided visualisation, we were invited to work with a piece of clay, moulding and sculpting it into whatever shape or form was right for us. This was all done with our eyes closed, so we could engage fully with the clay in our hands, fully experience it and allow our unconscious to guide us in our creation.

As we paused in the exercise and were invited to open our eyes, I was surprised to recognise the distinct shape of a womb, fallopian tubes and ovaries. With my eyes close, I’d had no conscious idea as to what I was creating. And of course, the sculpture fitted completely with the rest of the things I’d produced earlier in the weekend.

We were then invited to re-engage with our sculpture. I’m not sure now, but I think this part of the exercise was done with music playing in the background. As I worked in a trance-like state, I was amazed to watch my hands re-sculpt my creation slightly and work it into more of a heart shape with outstretched arms.


The final sculpture was, for me, very emotive. Not only did it seem an inevitable conclusion to the weekend’s exploration, but it also symbolised a significant state of self-acceptance for me, and of my body as a female body with all the privilege and magnificence that affords me. The (my) heart reaching out with arms open wide to embrace the feminine …

It was also yet another confirmation of my continued movement away from my earlier eating disorder. For many years (both before and during my eating disorder), a lot of my self-hatred and un-ease had been directed at my stomach, which, in my mind, was never flat enough. For many women, a rounded stomach is natural … a female stomach has to house the feminine reproductive system, the start of life. A female stomach naturally has a covering of body fat.

And I find it now so sad that many women fail to recognise this, especially those with eating disorders or body image concerns. For many women, their stomach remains a source of self-hatred … when really is should be a focus of self-love and a celebration of all that is feminine.

So not only was that weekend filled with huge personal significance for me and the privilege of working with Natalie Rogers, it also reinforced for me, the power of working in ways other than the verbal. Taking away words, bypassing my intellectual / conscious mind allowed me to access learnings I wasn’t aware were ready to be offered and integrated. And because those learnings came from my unconscious and were experienced and processed in non-verbal ways, through the engagement of my whole body in the exercises … those learnings were experienced in a very profound and embodied manner … in ways too profound and deep for me to express fully in words here …

Monday 25 April 2011

Worlds colliding; worlds merging

I had an interesting dream a couple of nights ago when three distinct eras of my life all merged into one scenario. This dream has stayed with me and made me think about how different elements of our lives can all come together and lay the foundations for a new way of living or being …

Over the last few months, my life has felt like it was made up of three separate and distinct parts … my employed work within the NHS, my PhD and the current studying I’m doing around NLP. Recently, I’ve become aware as to how at least two of those parts are merging together and forming something new …

The learnings I’m taking away from NLP are feeding into my private practice and the work that I do with clients presenting with eating disorders and related issues. I’m seeing lots of possibilities for working with clients around weight loss and eating or body image issues incorporating various NLP techniques and approaches into my current understandings and ways of working. This, in turn, is feeding into my ideas for my new website, ‘Embodying Change,’ which will be live very soon...

And surprisingly, the world of NLP has collided and merged with my PhD world … Researching the topic of eating disorders and sharing my research with others, is ensuring that I’m increasingly becoming known (at least locally) as ‘an eating disorders specialist’. For a while, some time back, I decided I didn’t want to be known simply as an eating disorders specialist; I worried it might limit me. However, I’m increasingly recognising that my personal experience and understanding, combined with the vast amounts of literature I’m reading for my PhD, and the therapists I’m interviewing, are filling me with a unique & privileged mix of knowledge. And I want to share this with others …

Through people I’ve met connected with NLP, I’ve been invited to present at a conference next month in Newcastle where I’ll be talking about ‘effective change work with clients presenting with eating disorders.’ This is the inaugural conference of NCCCTC (Northern Changeworkers, Counsellors, Coaches & Therapists Conference; www.nccctc.co.uk) and it’s so exciting and feels like a huge privilege to have been asked to present at this conference.

It also feels like this is where, for me, the worlds of eating disorders, PhD and NLP all come together as one … it feels like this is where the separate parts of myself collide and merge. I have the opportunity to share my passion with others; to talk about eating disorders, embodied experience and how I work with clients. It’s a chance to share my knowledge and understanding which is continuously developing as I integrate counselling theories, NLP and hypnotherapy approaches, the experience of specialists I’m interviewing, books & articles I’m reading and my own personal interpretations. It’s also for me, where ‘Embodying Change’ takes its first breath in the world…

The coming month feels like a hugely exciting one for me … I’m presenting my academic research as a poster presentation at BACP’s Research Conference in Liverpool on 6th & 7th May, and then the following weekend (14th &15th May), I’m presenting at NCCCTC.

Saturday 23 April 2011

The importance of pets


I’ve been thinking today about how important pets can be for us. Earlier today I learned that a friend of mine had to have their dog put to sleep yesterday, and it’s reminded me of a time eighteen months ago when I had to take my cat, Scrumpy, to the vets and have her put to sleep …

It was one of the saddest things I’ve ever had to do. I was determined I was going to be the one to take her, and it was also important for me to make sure that I was in her line of vision as she died; I wanted to be the last thing she saw. As the vet and nurse held her and injected her, I crouched down next to the table and just looked into her eyes. Having those final seconds of eye contact just between the two of us ensured the rest of the world around me disappeared and I got to say my final goodbye to the little animal that had been there for me, and with me, for thirteen years. Seeing the light, and life, disappear from her eyes was so sad, so final.

For anyone who’s loved, and shared their life with an animal, their death can be heartbreaking. People often belittle the importance of pets and the significance of their death. It’s important to allow ourselves to grieve over our animals in the same way we would a person we loved. We do get attached to our animals and they do become like friends or part of our families, and consequently, it is okay to be sad, to hurt when they die. It is okay to miss them and mourn for them.

For people living on their own, pets can be vital company. Just to know there’s someone (in the shape of a furry little friend) depending on you, waiting for you to come home, can be hugely comforting. Just having another living creature in a house, can make that house feel more lived in. A house which has had a pet living in it, can suddenly feel very empty and cold when they’re no longer there.

It amazes me just what deep connections we can form with animals, if we spend the time nurturing them. In my experience of living with two gorgeous cats, first Scrumpy, and now Elsie, the relationship has definitely been a two way thing … I’m happy to provide all the food, comfort and safety they need (and probably a little bit more!), and in exchange, I’ve had the pleasure of their unconditional love. The pleasure of watching the antics which cats get up to, the pleasure of having a cat snuggle up with me on the sofa or in bed, the privilege of knowing that a little furry animal trusts me …

My life has definitely been enriched by the cats I’ve shared (and am still sharing) it with …


Tuesday 19 April 2011

Embodying Change

Embodying Change is the name of my new website … it’s not yet up and running, although it is in its early stages of development. And this is my new logo …

This feels like such an exciting time for me. I’ve been involved with counselling and personal development for 12 years now, so it’s taken up a large chunk of my life, but it feels like only now that it’s all finally coming together in a unique way for me.

My PhD has led me down avenues I didn’t anticipate or expect, and not only has it informed my academic practice, it’s also had a hugely positive impact on both my therapeutic practice and my own understandings of my Self. I’ve also met some hugely influential people over the last few months, who, in various ways, have fed into these exciting new developments in my therapeutic work and myself.

I’ve become increasingly aware of the embodied nature of human beings. We all inhabit a body, and our bodies are how we present our-Selves to the world. Our bodies are also how we experience the world around us through our five senses, and also how, & where, we experience our internal feelings and sense of our Selves.

Both my therapeutic practice and my personal understanding of how people develop, change and grow, is becoming increasingly focused on the embodied experiencing of Self.

As therapists, we present ourselves to our clients through our physical bodies and they present themselves to us in, and through their bodies. My experience and research are increasingly highlighting the need to pay more attention to the bodies in the therapy room and to what, and how, those bodies are communicating to each other. In the world of talking therapy, it’s easy to focus on making sense of words and to forget about our bodies, and embodied sense of being.

For an individual to feel secure within themselves, I believe it’s vital that they feel comfortable within their own body; that they are able to allow feelings to emerge within their body and pay attention to those feelings. Our bodies have so much to tell us … if only we knew how to listen to them, and work with them.

My new website will have a focus on the embodied experience of everyone …
clients, therapists and individuals in general, and how that embodied sensing of self can lead to more effective therapeutic connection, personal understanding and change.

I look forward with such enthusiasm and excitement as to where the coming months take me and Embodying Change … this is only the start!

Sunday 3 April 2011

The Metaphorical Cake in the Oven


Metaphors can be hugely powerful when working with clients. Metaphors paint a visual image of how a client is feeling or experiencing themselves. And metaphors are unique to the individual who creates them.

I love working with the metaphors that clients describe. They can be very graphic and can help clients to explore their situations and feelings in a much more powerful way than simply with words. It’s good to assist clients in fully exploring their metaphors, helping them to describe them using all 5 senses … what do they see, taste, touch, smell and feel in relation to their metaphor. Whereabouts in space, or in their bodies do they ‘see’ their metaphor. Does their image change as you explore different aspects of it.

I’ve worked with some clients who find it difficult to put their thoughts and feelings into words; indeed words sometimes distract from someone’s true experience. I’ve had sessions in which I’ve had no idea what the client was metaphorically talking about, as all we’ve explored and played with was their metaphor.

I think we all think in metaphorical language, but aren’t always aware of it. And for me, it’s important to take the time to stop and explore our metaphors ... they hold such vital information for us.

This is particularly relevant for me today … I was sitting earlier and a thought came to me that I felt like I was a cake baking in the oven. I’ve been doing a lot of work this weekend around my PhD and preparation for conferences I’m presenting at in the near future around eating disorders, so the food related metaphor didn’t particularly surprise me. But when the image came to mind, I stopped and just allowed myself to fully experience it. I questioned what it meant, and was it a positive metaphor for me? And the conclusion I came to was that yes, it was … I’m especially busy right now, doing lots of things, bringing a lot of new ideas to fruition; and I realised that for a cake to be in the oven that meant that all of the ingredients were in there. They’d all been mixed together & had been put in the tin to bake. That was hugely reassuring for me, as it made me realise that I have all of the resources and skills I need; they’re all there inside of me, mixed together like the cake mix. And right now, just like that cake in the oven, I’m simply processing everything, allowing everything to germinate and cook. And soon, when the oven timer rings, the cake will be cooked and I’ll be a changed person. Like the cake, the ingredients will all be there, but cooking and processing changes the raw cake mix into an edible, much more useful and effective final product.


This metaphor also fits in with an experience I had a few weeks back when I had a real yearning to bake a New York style cheesecake. I gave in to that yearning, baked the cheesecake and felt the satisfaction of having created something so tasty from a selection of raw ingredients. Seems like my unconscious has been working on this cake / baking metaphor for a while!

It also brings to mind for me the metaphor commonly associated with pregnancy … the ‘bun in the oven.’ Maybe for me too, my current growth and change process is a bit like a pregnancy, growing the ideas inside of me until they’re ready to be born and introduced to the world.

We all have the raw ingredients inside of us to succeed … it’s learning how to mix them together most effectively and allowing them to cook, to be processed, which leads to effective and ongoing personal growth and change...