Seasons of the Soul |
''Imbolc Light
The Imbolc light is upon us.This morning, whilst walking Jake, I saw the first purple Crocus of the year.
Now, as I write there is strong brilliant sunshine pouring through my window.Imbolc is the next Pagan festival after the Winter Solstice.It means "in the belly of the Goddess".It is about the Earth being pregnant with the gifts of another year.We as humans are part earth, part Spirit, so it is also that we are pregnant and full of potential for the year ahead.
What is emerging for us next on this journey through life?
What mysteries, joys and losses is existence(God,Tao,Sacred Mystery etc)going to gift us with this year?
It may have been a difficult winter and not even any snow and not enough ice to cool those internal fires we call the winter blues.There is something about a snowless winter that makes the inner challenges of contraction, even harder to bear.Maybe our earth bodies are being given mixed messages.Go out and connect/stay in and retreat...So who am I when I am neither here nor there?I am the winter spirit of nothing, nowhere and nobody.Yesterday,I met with a wise old friend and we were talking about the Seasons of the Soul.She reminded me of how the sap in the trees goes down into the earth in the winter to replenish the roots ready for the Spring.
This is a wonderful symbol for us as Human earths.We necessarily retreat during the cold winter months, a time of contraction and reflection.At this time maybe our souls are being replenished for the year ahead.Rather like a heart felt grief.Difficult to be with and ride through but once we have made this Sacred Journey there are gifts awaiting….''
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The Therapist is not, therefore the Therapist is and is not..” |
''The following is a letter of response to Jeff Foster in "Undivided"The online journal of Non Duality and Psychology.2011
I welcome Jeff’s article “Therapy without a Therapist:Non Duality,Healing and a search for wholeness”.
I note that what Jeff has done is to set the cat amongst the pigeons of our cosy therapeutic conceptualizations and rigidly erected illusory ego-mind constructs.Steering us once again to stare in the blank open space of this mysterious existence.
As a Psychotherapist practicing in the vastness realms of Non Duality, I think it can only be a good thing to question who we are and what we do.
Psychotherapy often assumes too much personal responsibility and relies too much on the concept of the apparent sense of self.
Non Duality or I should say many modern day Non Duality teachers often speak too much about the also apparent and illusory selfless character.
Surely in the Spirit of Non Duality both self and not self need to be respected.As Wei Wu Wei so succinctly states in “Fingers pointing to the moon”.”I am not, therefore I am”.
I note also in a subsequent response to his article Jeff supports this view “Non Duality is a total embrace of our embodied humanness”.
The problem we always have with words and structures is they are never the absolute truth.In the Spirit of Wei Wu Wei , the moment we say a thing is , it is also therefore not.
So for Jeff to imply that which Therapy and Therapists do, will never be the whole picture.Many of us Therapists including those apparently unaware of Non Duality will often sit with”not knowing” and hold what Fritz Perls called “creative indifference” or the “fertile void”.Similarly, Beisser states in the “Paradoxical Theory of change”that the moment we stay aware of that which “is” the change will happen.Change happens anyway.Sometimes patterns we learnt in childhood or elsewhere do block us and cause suffering.Casting the light of awareness on the process can and does evoke a shift , a more energized release of movement and ease.This is as likely in a therapy session as in a satsang, a Non Duality meeting , a traffic jam or by simply washing the dishes.
It may happen thus in the sacred space of a therapeutic encounter that we shine a light on the patterns and processes “contained” in the limited self through which we may then glimpse our eternal self, the healed whole which we all are.
This is happening anyway.The therapists presence is but a part of a sacred mystery which is ever present and as always moving in us and through these bodies we call “our self”.
Some call this “moving through” God, Tao, Love or Grace.And yet its all of these and none simultaneously.For it is as the “Tao Te Ching” says ” the (Tao) which can be named is not the eternal (Tao)”.
Names and not names, words and wordless expressions, all are sacred, all Non Dual, all everything and nothing.All that is and is not.
The Therapist is not, therefore the Therapist is and is not…
Tim Carrette 2011
References:
A.Beisser -”The Paradoxical Theory of Change” in Gestalt Therapy Now by Fagan and Sheperd.1970.
Lao Tzu -”Tao Te Ching” from a translation by S.Mitchel 1995.
Fritz Perls – quoted in “A Gestatlt Transpersonal perspective”.L.Williams.2006
Wei Wu Wei – “Fingers pointing to the moon”1958
''
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New book of poetry..Free download |
''To Download my book of poetry in pdf format completely free, please go to the poems section which is in the "Resources/Book Excerpts" section.''
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Relational Psychotherapy Group Starting Autumn 2011 |
'' Relational Psychotherapy Group
Seeks new members for Autumn intake.
Fortnightly Thursday evenings and Group days.
6.15 – 8.15pm in Belper
Cost £35
Facilitators:
Tim Carrette and
Miriam Granthier
UKCP Registered Psychotherapists
With extensive groupwork experience
The group is open to both men and women and a balance of members is our preference.
Some expererience of therapy/counselling is desirable. Please call to discuss.
If you are interested in a supportive, challenging experience and in finding out more about how you relate to others and how to be more accepting of yourself and others, please contact:
Miriam on 01332 559668
Tim on 0115 9692987
Email: Miriam: info@blue-skies.org.uk
Tim:timcarrette@ntlworld.com
You can find out more details about Tim and Miriam’s training, qualifications, background, experience and interests in the applications details and through the contact details above.
“Being 'as one is'.
Can we not do it now?
Indeed can we not-do-it?
It is not even a 'doing'
: it is beyond doing and not-doing.
It is being as-we-are.
'This is the only 'practice
All Else is Bondage' –
~Wei Wu Wei
''
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The self is a story we tell ourselves.. |
''A meeting with Non Duality Leicester, Hosted by Nic Higham and Tim CarretteJan 15th 2pm
Quaker Meeting House, Leicester.
The self is a story we tell ourselves; whether it’s the apparently independent self or the equally apparent eternal selfless self. They are all word stories, dancing energies of beingness. When all there really is, is this, this moment being as it is.
All conditions and sufferings are seemingly born of the non-acceptance of what is, the mind stories of an imagined life. When all there “really” is is this and this…
An open meeting for all those interested.To book a place please contact: Nic Higham at Non Duality Leicester.''
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A moonlit walk in the woods |
''Its mid October about 7pm in the evening, Wednesday night is woods night. There is stillness and moonlight streaming through the trees.
Everywhere is luminous and translucent.
.
There are pools of light and glistening ferns and brackens tinged with autumnal bronze, all bathed in this majestic light.
In the distance I can hear the buzz of traffic and nearer still the internal silence voids of white noise and utter thoughtlessness. So quiet I can hear the breath of this body which walks amidst this magical presence of being.
In this moment I-is trees, space, dark, moonlight, ferns, magic, white noise and traffic and immensely much much more than this stillness, this everything in clear transition unfolding, unfurling, unknown and yet knowing this I to be everything and nothing simultaneously.
And its all constantly changing, energy in motion.
The moon gets steadily brighter and the natural forms before me are death and birth entwined, is and is not , here and yet nowhere.
Back from the walk, after the battle of getting the dog in the car. God knows he loves the wild. Though I notice in this strength of hand, he is not staying out in the woods tonight.
Safe in the womb of car, a new silence penetrates, lights dazzle and home beckons.
Now I collect these thought memories in front of a fire of dying embers. My dog eats his bone, I assume he is happy to be home.
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Everything falls away |
''Today the traffic was heavy.Haircut imminent.Barbers empty.Now is always the only time there is.Today it wasn't holidays we discussed it was council cuts and bypasses which were not being built.Beautiful locks fall to the floor.Everything falls away.The beautiful and the painful.Everything falls away only when it falls away.Never a moment before, never a moment later.Just this beautiful moment orchestrating everything.''
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Autumn Leaves |
''The autumn leaves fall all around and the nights are getting darker. I can hardly see the stick as I throw it across the park for my relentlessly playful dog. My daughter, recently mastering the art of riding her bike zooms past. In this moment I am at peace there is only this moment of stick finding, the wetness of fresh earth from stick on cold hands and the shouts of Dad, watch me! Then a thought, what time is it?, should we be going back now? An interruption. An awareness of the greater roles and responsibilities of a life constructed of time and expectation. Another thought did I send that email, have I printed of that invoice…Meanwhile the stick is lost as it is dark now and my daughter is avoiding my recognition that when we get home it will be time for bed.''
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