Saturday, September 11, 2010

New Person-Centred Forum

We'd like to invite you to join the new online community/forum:

PERSON-CENTRED http://personcentred.999.org



A non-geographical & non-organisationally-aligned online community –
based on the principles of the Person-Centred Approach.

A place to give & receive support…
…discuss the Approach…
…share resources…
…and encounter one another in peace.

You need to register in order to view or post (or do anything, really).

Go to: http://personcentred.999.org

If you have any problems or queries, email us -
we'll do our best to help.

At the time of writing there are over 80 members - not bad going for only 3 weeks!

Friday, September 10, 2010

The Empathic Civilisation

Brilliant animation of an equally brilliant talk on empathy by Jeremy Rifkin. Thanks to Elizabeth Sarfaty for the link.

Sunday, September 05, 2010

The Trajectory Of The Non-Directive Paradigm

To all,

“We” in community at ADPCA in Rochester had a fight and I feel sad in the wake of it. I guess I was already sad and not up to the argument in the first place because I found in the course of it that I had no words with which to argue my point in the battle within what I believe has been a thirty, forty or fifty year war within the approach.

I haven’t really had my words for this ongoing fight since Barbara Brodley died. I more completely lost my words and my energy when my own mother died. I was trying to pick up my pieces when Nat died — he died about a month after I wrote an email about death to the ADPCA listserv — an email that had words but was incomprehensible.

I woke up this morning, the last day of a much needed vacation for me and Bert. We spent our vacation walking in forests (but sleeping in motels). So as I write (still to a far degree without my words) I see forest shadows with little sprinkles of sunshine, green moss, and mud, vermillion, yellow and white mushrooms, green leaves, pine needles, dying growth, stricken and dead trees, friendly chipmunks and endless mosquitoes.

So I woke up thinking about the ADPCA fight and about Carl Rogers.

To me Rogers’ theory has a trajectory that soars into the netherworlds of philosophy and post-modernism.

The 1959 theory statement is a crystalline work of art.


Embedded as it is in the Koch book with the Koch mission, the theory seems grounded in science (social science). But, within that chapter, Rogers states that we do not know what the far philosophical reaches of the statement will come to mean. The theory, in 1959, is crystalline, embedded as if in rock, with a symmetrical diagram no less. But the crystal is like coral reef — it is alive and moving, delicate and ephemeral like a snowflake, lost but not gone, but the moment has died, or is it dead? Is it particle or wave?

Is it a bird, a plane? It is certainly not Superman. It is as flickering as each of our capacity to experience the attitudinal conditions from moment to moment. But it is also in the cracks of our fatigue and prejudices — in our incongruence as well as our congruence.

So back to our war within the approach. How do we survive? Are we incapable of compromise and resolution? I say, yes, I am incapable even though I don’t want to fight. I think to myself thoughts like, “They” don’t understand Rogers, “they” don’t get the theory, “they” don’t register the trajectory of the theory. Particle and wave? With all of the space in the universe, doesn’t “it” have to be more wave than particle — or is it really all emptiness and death?

There’s a good bit of the rub. It’s with this death stuff. That’s what I’ve been learning these last three years since my deaths began. It’s a lot in all the stuff, the left-over papers and artifacts. The wonderful inheritances and solid treasures I can touch and feel strengthened by, filled within into a sense of my own landedness in my own power. But really all I’m left with is my own attachments and my own moods and fears.

So I woke up thinking about Rogers and that “they” don’t get the man the way I do (even though some of them actually knew and rubbed shoulders with him and I never did). But it’s not really about the man. It’s about the trajectory of a theory, of words, of an idea, of an example of how to be in constructive rather than destructive relationship with another. The idea did not start with Rogers, but he, with his words and ways and personal growth brought it to psychology (and to groups, and to all the helping professions, and the predatory professions, and to peace conferences) in a unique way. He brought us the glimmers and flickers of sunlight and photosynthesis within the darkness of entropy and the hope within relatedness. But entropy does not have to be dark, and relationship can be deadly.

My next thought was that Rogers’ did not have the energy to protect the wave trajectory of his theory. He didn’t feel he owned the theory, and the theory is about not controlling others, so it would be a theoretical lie to fight to protect the public clarity of the trajectory. And, after all, the essential ideas of the trajectory are older than Rogerian theory.

There are those who get the paradigm and want to preserve it within the mainstream. Those who want to band together for greater effectiveness and political/economic survival. This mission is real to them and who am I to badger and hinder them. Again, the rub. Rogers did not say before his death, as I might wish he had, — “Shut up, you over-active crusaders and self-serving revisionists. Don’t you see that you are on a slippery slope of snowflakes. If you do this and take that and use it, then our dreams are back to mud on the particles of old physics and you’ve obfuscated the trajectory of the life’s breath of the Person.” Maybe Rogers didn’t say it because it is all true. The life is in the mud, in the dust when the water is evaporated, or is it still in the air within the water?

At any rate he didn’t say something to arrest the march of the good soldiers who want to take the banner to the mountain and stake out some economic territory for the person-centered approach.

But the good soldiers are my mosquitoes. The flag of the person-centered approach does not, because it cannot, declare all the stars in my universe. It’s presence, like a billboard on the horizon where others see it, where some apparently hope it is maybe going to finally force the “mainstream” to recognize our entitlement to the territory we’ve claimed, and some apparently think the banner can represent the philosophy of person-centeredness. This rag of a flag that does not belong on my horizon, is blocking the trajectory of my personal truth and is an inaccurate representation of the trajectory of Rogerian theory. But that’s not true. I’m no more lasting than a mosquito and my personal truth just is, except when it isn’t.

Rogers is dead. My lament is for myself. For my own mosquito life and my wish to enjoy and bask in my flicker of sunshine and relationship to my world. How long is the shelf life of the packaging of an idea? Longer than my own capacity to experience its way of being within a single therapy session. Not true. The being is in the incongruence as well as in the congruence.

Both the base and the top of many columns in ancient Greece were decorated with the eternal circle of the egg and the sword. 0I0I0I0I0I0I0I

The moss and the chipmunks and Bert’s and my escape into greenness have helped me find some of my words.

The mosquitoes in Michigan’s upper peninsula were unrelenting but the chipmunks were more playfully “in relationship” with us.

Kathy (Moon)



Editor's Note: Thanks to Kathy Moon for her kind permission to reproduce this item (and for sharing the photographs too).

It first appeared as a post to the international listservs (email lists), which remain perhaps the best sources of discussion about the Person-Centred Approach.

There are three lists - PCINTL, NDSU-CCT-C-PCA and ADPCA - although membership and posting is to a great extent interchangeable.

They are not advertised publicly, but if anyone reading this is inspired to join these lists, please email for further details.

Tuesday, July 06, 2010

BAPCA leads call for BACP to consult on regulation

The Future Of Counselling And Psychotherapy In The UK:

An open letter to the British Association for Counselling & Psychotherapy (BACP) calling for open consultation with the membership of BACP

Since our original post, this initiative has been modified somewhat, and now aims to reach out to all BACP members.

The letter requests that BACP consult with its membership regarding:

* Increasing BACP involvement in developing an alternative form of regulation to that offered by the Health Professions Council (HPC).

* Providing an Alternative Practitioner Accountability (APA) system for BACP practitioners who do not want/intend to register with HPC should the current process continue.

Open consultation with the membership on these issues will reveal the level of BACP membership support for and against regulation by HPC.

As over 80% of its membership voted against regulation by HPC, BAPCA initiated this request. However, it has been signed by practitioners of many modalities and so is from ‘Concerned Practitioners of Counselling & Psychotherapy’.

To add your signature, feedback, comments, or to contact the coordinators of the campaign, please send an email to cppcoordinator@gmail.com. If possible, please include your membership status with BACP.

[Post edited: 25 July 2010]

CPD Round-up

Apologies to recent visitors for the tumbleweed effect here at PCAyorks. I won't bore you with the reasons for the neglect over the last couple of months.

I have a few things I want to let you all know about, so without further ado here's a round-up of some events that are coming up which may be of interest:

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NORTHERN PRACTITIONERS NETWORK MEETING
A one day event at Hinsley Hall, Headingley, Leeds LS6 2BX
www.hinsley-hall.co.uk
on Saturday 17th July 2010, 9am - 5pm

Network Meeting for practitioners involved in working with domestic violence/abuse, either with programmes for ‘perpetrators’ or with support services for victims, but can be a ‘taster’, or an opportunity for those who find the national events too far, too big or too expensive.

It will be a day of: networking, sharing ideas, small-scale workshops (led by us all), giving and receiving support, and generally helping to recharge batteries. Most of the workshop ideas will be decided at the opening session, but if you have requests, ideas or offers of workshops, we’d like to hear them in advance. All this for the cost of £35 per person for the day, which includes teas and coffees and a delicious lunch.

For more information, contact:
Pete Dominey, M: 07906 203063, E: petedominey@hotmail.com
OR Simon Roe, M: 07986 783460, E:
simon.roe93@btinternet.com

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RELATIONAL DEPTH WORKSHOP & CONFERENCE:
Perspectives and Understanding
Keynote Address - Gill Wyatt
7th & 8th September 2010 at Nottingham University

The Centre for Trauma, Resilience and Growth invite you to attend this one day conference and a pre conference workshop. The conference features an open debate facilitated by Stephen Joseph with a panel consisting of Mick Cooper, Gill Wyatt, Pete Sanders, Rosanne Knox and will include audience participation. The event opens with a full day (7th) workshop focusing on practice experiences of relational depth and will be facilitated by Mick Cooper.

Our understanding of relational depth continues to grow with exciting developments and new questions emerging at every step. This conference provides an opportunity to become involved in the progress of a new field of enquiry as it unfolds. In addition to the keynote speech and open debate, the conference will feature a range of papers on theory and research presented by a variety of practitioners and researchers.

Feedback from delegates of last year’s conference was the atmosphere was friendly and inclusive, with the programme being both enjoyable and informative. The cost provides excellent value at £50 for the conference day and £30 for the workshop. Bookings can be made for either or both days although places are limited.

For further details, visit:
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/Sociology/Events/relational-depth.aspx

Telephone enquiries: 0115 951 5197.

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LA JOLLA PROGRAM UK
A Project of the Center for Studies of the Person, La Jolla, California, USA
Person-Centred Self Discovery and Personal Growth.
26th September to 3rd October 2010
The Assembly House, Theatre Street, Norwich, Norfolk.

The La Jolla Program was developed and established in the United States by Carl Rogers and his colleagues in the 1970s. The Program provides an opportunity to explore personal and professional relationships in a Person-Centred community. It is an interactive experience, where participants may develop new levels of communication. Rogers believed that the intensive group experience could lead to deep and significant changes in persons, institutions, racial and international tensions and in the values and philosophies of mankind.

The Center for Studies of the Person is bringing the Program back to the UK for the second time this year at the request of previous participants, who have benefited from the opportunity that the Program provides.

The facilitator will be Will Stillwell, who was a colleague of Carl Rogers. He works in organisations as coach to individuals, facilitator to groups and mediator in conflict situations.

THE ASSEMBLY HOUSE is a Historic Grade 1 listed Georgian building in the centre of the medieval city of Norwich. Resident participants will be booked into B&B at a comfortable hotel nearby. Full details of accommodation will be will be sent nearer the time. Numbers are limited to 20, so early booking is advisable.

COST: Resident - £525 or £475 if paid in full by 19th July 2010. Includes B&B, lunch, dinner and coffees; Non-Resident - £300 includes lunch, dinner and coffees. A £50 deposit will secure a place.

For further details, please contact:
Kay Laurie, 30 Chestnut Court, Norwich, Norfolk NR2 1HB.
T: 01603 614766 E: lajollaprogram@hotmail.co.uk

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FACILITATE Certificate in Therapeutic Group Work,
Leadership and Facilitation.
October 2010 – March 2011 (Weekends)

The course is for people who have an understanding and experience of therapeutic (fundamental: person-centred) principles, and wish to extend into working with groups. You should have at least a Certificate in Counselling Skills or equivalent, and are likely to have a Diploma or be working towards it.

The course will help to train you to host and run groups in a variety of settings, including counselling skills /personal development courses, voluntary organisations, community groups, and groupwork involved in professional settings.

It will include academic /theoretical input (e.g. psychodynamic, transactional, the constituents of group dynamics etc) and one reflective assignment. It is, however, primarily an experiential course, with opportunities for each person to facilitate group sessions: doing it, as well as talking about doing it.

A FACILITATE Certificate in Therapeutic Group Work will be awarded on completion of the course, enabling 60 hours to be counted towards Continuing Professional Development (CPD) for those seeking accreditation, and for maintaining BACP/UKCP membership.

Tutors: Leslie Davidoff and Jean Clements
Venue: East Lancs Voluntary Resource Centre, 62/64 Yorkshire Street, Burnley BB11 3BT.
Dates: 5 weekends, one weekend a month October 2010 – March 2011
Times: 10.00am – 5.00pm (Saturdays and Sundays, 6 hours each day with lunchbreak - exact start and end times to be negotiated with the group)
Cost: On entry to course £270 / Or initial deposit of £140 and 4 monthly payments of £40 (total £300).

To enrol or for further information, contact:
T: 01282 690741, E: facilitate@live.com.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Psy-Praxis - The Changing Context

I know this blog has been banging on about the regulation of counselling and psychotherapy issue a lot in recent times and this is not an apology for that.

Although the person-centred approach has influence and application in many fields, the majority of our current membership - and of BAPCA, the main membership body in the UK for the PCA - is training and/or working in the field of the talking therapies. And the proposed regulation of the counselling and psychotherapy professions by the Health Professions Council has the potential to influence the future of those professions and all practitioners within them.

For those wanting to keep on top of HPC/regulation-related issues, you should probably be making regular visits to the websites of the Alliance for Counselling & Psychotherapy and the HPC Watchdog blog -

and I would also recommend that you subscribe to receive 'Psy-Praxis – The Changing Context' reports by Janet Low.

If you are already on the mailing list of the Alliance, you might already be receiving messages from Janet Low PhD, whose main contribution to informing the debate consists in keeping a close eye on the functioning of the HPC and related bodies.

It always makes for fascinating reading.

For those unfamiliar with Psy-Praxis, I've uploaded the last 6 months' worth of her reports - here they are, most recent first:

PP50 - The Generic Standards
PP49 - The Mystery Of FTP
PP48 - Review Of First Quarter 2010
PP47 - Power
PP46 - Politics
PP45
PP44 - Education & Training Committee
PP43 - Post Confer Conference
PP42 - Prepping The Confer Conference
PP41 - Interview With Mind
PP40 - National Audit Of Psychological Therapies
PP39
PP38
PP37 - HPC Fudge Consultation Results
PP36 - Collapse of GSCC
PP35 - State Machinery: IAPT, NICE etc
PP34 - UKCP Election Results
PP33 - Anne Milton Meeting.

If you just want to grab them as a job lot, here's the zipped bundle.

Janet's email is on each of them - just drop her a line and ask to be added to the mailing list. Let her know you read about it here.

She would welcome contributions - most helpfully in the form of monitoring the HPC website, FTP (Fitness To Practise) hearings and other relevant developments.

Financial support for the 'project' would also be welcome - she attends a lot of meetings when she could be earning a living (she is registered as a practising analyst with the New Lacanian School (NLS) – but we won’t hold that against her). Here’s her website.

Hope you dip in - always worth reading.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Confused about regulation?



Many counsellors and psychotherapists are. Confused, that is, when it comes to this whole statutory regulation business. Don't be ashamed if you are too. Why exactly are we all banging on about it? And why are we opposed to it - or opposed to the Health Professions Council (HPC) imposing it upon us? What's the problem with the HPC?

I'm glad you asked. Here's a great piece by that Darian Leader bloke, which answers pretty much all of those questions. A couple of points he makes jar a little for us PCA folk (he is a psychoanalyst, after all), but he does hit the nail repeatedly on the head when it comes to all this stuff. Read on...

Problems with HPC
Since the 2007 White Paper, Trust, Assurance and Safety, the Department of Health has given the Health Professions Council the task of assessing the regulatory needs of the talking therapies and its own suitability to regulate them. This brief, however, was understood as an imperative to regulate, with a resultant neglect of representations from the field and no questioning of the suitability of its own regulatory framework.

The Health Professions Order states that any profession to be regulated by HPC “must cover a discrete area of activity displaying some homogeneity”. Counselling and psychotherapy constitute a diverse field and display little homogeneity. Many therapies do not consider themselves or advertise themselves as health professions. They focus on human relationships and not medical-style interventions with set outcomes or promises of cure. Unlike health professions, many therapies do not aim at removal of symptoms, but at an exploration of human life, understood in a variety of ways.

HPC has claimed recently that it is able to encompass relationship-based work, pointing to its apparently successful regulation of psychologists and arts therapists, yet there are very significant differences between these fields and our own, and there are many psychologists and arts therapists who feel that their work has already been compromised by HPC. Crucial to our work is the way in which elements from early life may be re-enacted in the therapy, and the long process of exploring this is generally not shared by these other fields.

The consultation process initiated by the Department of Health was intended to assess the feasibility and suitability of state regulation through dialogue with all of the professional field. However, the consultation process became monopolised by a small number of people with a narrow view of talking therapy. This reliance on a small number of people with a set agenda has created the illusion that counselling and psychotherapy are a homogenous field. It has also meant the wholesale exclusion of professional groups and user groups, despite initial inclusion in draft documents.

The key issue in the regulation debate has been protection of the public. Therapists accept that their clients need the highest possible form of protection from inadequate and unethical practitioners. No therapy organization or individual has argued against this principle. Indeed, therapists have consistently been open and active to strengthen the effectiveness of their current systems by all reasonable means. However, there is no research based evidence suggesting that the client-group here is in the degree of danger that would justify being forced into a type of regulation that, in many respects, is unsuitable and unworkable for current professional practices.

HPC complaints procedures are formal and adversarial. Most complaints in the field of the talking therapies are resolved by informal process and mediation. HPC gives no place to these processes, and thereby risks alienating potential complainants who do not wish to enter into such formal procedures, held in public with none of the confidentiality that a hearing may require. It also lacks the expertise to deal with the complexity of complaints in this field. Note that HPC reject more than 70% of complaints from the public as 'no case to answer' compared to around 10% in the main therapy organisations. As HPC states on its website, if they don't think a complaint will have a clear outcome, they won't hear the case, in contrast to the acceptance of complex complaints by therapy organisations.

HPC focus on two central issues regarding protection of the public: that any unscrupulous individual may set up a brass plate advertising their services as a therapist, and that, once struck off by a professional body, a therapist can simply continue to practise independently. Yet neither of these concerns is addressed by HPC regulation. HPC regulate professional titles not functions, so as long as the individual does not use a title protected by HPC, they can set up shop through use of any unprotected title: life coach, mentor, therapist, lifestyle consultant etc. Other models of regulation used abroad are much more effective, yet to date HPC have refused to examine them.

The HPC brings with it mechanisms that may be suitable for professions allied to medicine, but which threaten the survival of the very essence of psychotherapy. Therapy is forced into a one-size-fits-all model of healthcare intervention, with its focus on outcomes and protocol-based procedures. By marginalizing and even making illegal those forms of therapy which follow a different model, HPC regulation would deprive the public of their free choice of which therapists to consult.

The Regulation Debate
The field of counseling and psychotherapy in the UK is rich and diverse, with several hundred different schools and orientations. Approaches to therapy differ enormously: some therapies focus on symptom-relief, some specifically avoid this; some aim at insight into unconscious phantasies, some reject the very notion of an unconscious; some try to bolster a patient’s belief-system, some to undermine it; some encourage physical warmth, some proscribe this; some aim to get patients back to work, some do not. The range of practices is extraordinarily wide, and the public benefits from a choice as to this range of different approaches.

Since the early 1970s, the field has organized itself into a small number of umbrella organizations - UKCP, BACP, BPC - which have worked progressively on codes of ethics, practice and complaints procedures. There have been various attempts over the years to add a statutory framework to the field’s own set of procedures, yet these have been consistently ignored or rejected by government. Nearly every practitioner currently working in the UK belongs to a professional association with codes of ethics, practice and complaints procedures, which is inspected periodically by its umbrella organization. These codes were found by the UKCP-BACP mapping project, funded by the Department of Health, to fulfill or exceed HPC requirements.

This situation has not been especially controversial, yet calls for statutory regulation have been made by some therapists and lay people for the following reasons: there is nothing to stop any untrained person setting up a brass plate calling themselves a therapist; if a therapist is expelled from their professional organisation, there is nothing to stop them continuing to practice elsewhere; there are a small number of therapists who do not belong to any organisation and so are not subject to any agreed codes of ethics, practice and complaints procedures. These three factors are deemed to represent a significant risk to the public, which is the main reason given for statutory regulation.

The scare stories circulated to the media by HPC and by Witness, an advocacy group that the HPC has worked closely with and that is largely funded by the DoH, serve to inflate the risks involved and confuse the relevant issues. No therapy organization in the UK to date has shown any opposition to regulation. The question for them is whether HPC regulation is the best way to deal with these issues of protection of the public. HPC regulates professional titles, so if it regulated the title ‘psychotherapist’, it would be illegal for anyone to use this title without being HPC-registered. Likewise, being struck off the HPC register would make it illegal for someone to continue to offer their services as a psychotherapist. This seems to solve the issue of public protection, yet HPC regulation in fact fails to do so since the practitioner may simply set up shop using another title not regulated by HPC: life coach, therapist, life skills advisor, mentor etc. It thus fails to deal with the brass plate argument or the practicing after expulsion issue.

Even if it were to close these loopholes by regulating functions and not simply titles, HPC regulation poses a number of very serious problems to the field of the talking therapies. It subscribes to outcome-based notions of health and wellbeing which are rejected by many schools of therapy, as well as redefining the actual concept of therapy itself. Therapy is defined as the correction of developmental and psychological dysfunction via the application of a set of techniques to the patient. Yet many schools of therapy see their work as totally opposed to this model based on the health/illness framework. For them, therapy is a joint work, a collaborative effort to explore human life, with no manifest aims to ‘correct’ dysfunction or promote health.

The very notions of health, wellbeing, normality and dysfunction are rejected by many schools of therapy. These schools of therapy have a tradition of social critique, and distance themselves from the contemporary industry of ‘wellbeing’. Terms like ‘health’ and ‘wellbeing’, they argue, often carry a political agenda in any given society, and the work of therapy has to go beyond them. Psychoanalysis, for example, has always aimed to subvert received forms of knowledge, and hence the current objection from most of the UK’s psychoanalytic groups to subsume analysis into a framework which is based on received forms of knowledge and power.

Given that the notions of health, wellbeing and illness run through HPC regulations, and influence its requirements regarding education and training, conduct, performance and the hearing of complaints, they naturally see HPC as unsuited to regulate their work. To construe therapy as a set of techniques to be applied to a patient, rather than as a relationship, an ongoing work between two people which can have no predictable outcomes or set goals, is to misunderstand its basic principles and ethics. HPC has redefined therapy though a medical lens which is not appropriate to the relationship-based paradigm of analysis and many therapies.

HPC uses a model of health professions as service industries: a client pays an expert for a service, which they deliver. But for many schools of therapy, the service is actually provided by the patient. Like an artist’s studio, the therapist provides a space where the patient can create something, following their own rhythm and logic. Therapy is thus not about the performance of any procedure. No outcome can be predicted in advance and so, contrary to the service industries, it is not self-evident what product the patient is paying for. This inherently risky work is clearly not served by pretending that its results and procedures are clear, predictable and transparent.

So where medical interventions may involve set outcomes which the patient could complain about if not achieved, many therapies are about the open-ended work done not by the therapist but by the patient. One could visit a therapist’s office for years and not actually be doing a therapy, in the sense of being authentically engaged in an activity of self-exploration. Therapy, for many schools, is about what the patient manages to invent and construct in their encounters with the therapist, who does not apply the kind of protocol-based procedure envisaged by HPC.

Likewise, some schools of analysis and therapy hold that patterns of thought and behaviour that produce suffering in the patient derive from childhood responses to what is unknown and unpredictable in their caregivers. The compulsion to please others, for example, may have its roots in interactions with an erratic and unpredictable parent. Therapy will play out this situation, so that the therapist may behave in an erratic and unpredictable way, allowing an access to the process by which the patient’ patterns of response were established. HPC’s emphasis on clarity of communication and behaviour may fit a small group of therapies, but cannot subsume this latter model.

Many clinicians who do not subscribe to the healthcare model see their work as an exploration of the human condition, a journey in the same sense that becoming a Buddhist monk involves a long process of questioning one's life, ideals and expectations. Like a Buddhist training, this long process of psychotherapy cannot be identified with a set of techniques or procedures to be applied to a human being, but forms rather a strange kind of relationship which operates in unpredictable and unexpected ways. One cannot know what will happen in advance, and change often takes place through surprise, bafflement, shock and disappointment. HPC regulates professions within a framework which explicitly aims to remove these variables, and so it cannot accommodate those therapies which give a valued and central place to risk, shock and disappointment, seen as tools of growth and development. With HPC, will therapists really continue to challenge their patients or, fearing complaint, will they little by little change the way that they work?

A further and critical reason for the unsuitability of HPC as regulator lies in the field of ethics. Psychotherapy has, for the last 100 years, offered the patient a system of values freed from the moral judgments of social authorities. This has indisputably been the central characteristic of psychotherapy and what set it aside from the mental hygiene movement and from techniques of social engineering. Therapy provides a space for challenging received wisdom, social imperatives and norms of all kinds. Yet HPC regulation, for many schools of therapy, would involve the wholesale application of such norms to the therapeutic encounter. The therapist would have to become a ‘health professional’, whose practice must adhere to a moralistic and normative framework. Failing this, the practitioner would be struck off.

This tension between psychotherapeutic ethics and social morals is a crucial issue, yet it must not be misunderstood to suggest that therapists see their work as somehow beyond the law. All therapy organisations agree that rigorous codes of ethics and conduct must be in place, as well as complaints procedures. In the event of any instance of sexual assault or financial fraud, the criminal justice system should be appealed to. In line with international practice, in other cases, mediation and informal resolution of complaints are the first step, rather than automatic escalation of a complaint to the level of litigation.

For some critics of traditional models of regulation, mediation and informal resolution are a profession’s way of avoiding responsibility for mistakes and misconduct. Yet escalation to the level of litigation and formal complaint may constitute barriers to real resolution of issues for those working within a non-healthcare model. For those therapies that are relationship-based, the parallel is less with HPC-regulated disciplines such as radiology or physiotherapy than with the introduction, encouraged by government, of mediation procedures as a first step when the divorce of a married couple is considered. Although this might seem surprising, it reflects more accurately the kind of problems some patients may experience in therapy - which, for many schools, is about re-living problematic relationships from the past – than the model of a failed medical intervention.

Psycho Filler - qu'est ce que c'est?

Spotted some interesting stuff recently. Not person-centred, per se - but definitely blog-worthy.

1. Do Humans Have A Daily Requirement For Certain Kinds Of Emotions, Like The Body Does For Certain Nutrients?



A Web-based psychology experiment is investigating whether human beings have a daily requirement for certain kinds of emotions, in the same way that the body has a proven requirement for certain nutrients. Based on animal studies and human research, Dr. Imam Saqib of the National Institute of Psychology at Quaid-i-Azam University in Pakistan is interested in finding out if there is an optimum state of emotional health describable by regular experiencing of certain feeling states. Is it optimally healthy for a person to experience a certain amount of love every day? Of creativity? Of connection with others? Of competition, or even aggression?

We are all the products of long periods of evolutionary adaptation. Presumably, if the same emotions exist in most people, they must be there for a reason. Even the so-called negative feelings may have their place.

Researchers are studying whether hormones which are characteristically released in response to certain emotional states, like oxytocin, cortisol, and adrenaline, have an optimum level of release which makes the individual healthiest.

There is a discussion group which the public is welcome to join. The study is sponsored by the World Mind Network and is co-moderated by Irina Higgins of the Oxford Foundation for Theoretical Neuroscience and Artificial Intelligence and Melissa Mendoza of the University of La Verne.

The website is here.

[Source: World Mind Network, 3170 Bonita Rd., Bonita, California 91910]

2. Hoarding

Hoarding can cause many personal and social problems but psychologists are only just beginning to understand what causes it and how to help sufferers.

Here's an interesting item on the subject.

Resilience key to LMU flagship conference


Leeds Metropolitan University CONFERENCE 2010
Friday 18 June 2010

Resilience: Counselling and Coaching for Physical, Emotional and Spiritual Wellbeing

Resilience is often referred to as ‘the ability to bounce back’ from adverse life experiences. What does ‘Resilience’ means to you? How important is it to the way we live our lives? How might we find it for ourselves and what can we do to enable others to develop it?

Through lively and stimulating keynote presentations and by getting ‘up close and personal’ with the speakers in a workshop setting later in the day, this conference will give delegates a ringside seat with 3 of the leading experts in the field.

John Allen – “Physical Resiliance … From Surviving to Thriving”
John Allan is Senior Lecturer in Adventure Education and Psychology in the Carnegie Faculty of Leeds Metropolitan University. His published interests focus on adventure and personal growth with emphasis upon the development of psychological resilience through adventure programming. He has just joint authored two chapters in this area within a new Human Kinetics book on Mountaineering. As an outdoor educationalist and practitioner, he has been instrumental in developing arguably the world’s largest data base investigating the impact of adventure residential programmes on student inductees’ transition into Higher Education. Being a member of the sports science research team supporting Everest West Ridge 2006, he undertook two trips to the Himalayas. He was also Deputy Expedition Leader on a recent staff and student visit to Everest Base Camp.

Elie Godsi – “Emotional Resilience … Out of the Mists of Time”
Elie Godsi is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist, therapist, broadcaster and author. The son of Sudanese and Israeli parents, he was born in Nigeria where he spent the first few years of his life before coming to live in Britain as a young child. In the course of a career spanning over two decades he has worked extensively with violent men and women as well as their victims. He has also spent many years working in community based mental health and forensic services, in various hospital and prison settings and with young offenders in residential units. He currently works as a freelance expert witness for civil, criminal and family courts and also carries out assessments for social services child protection proceedings. His second book, Violence and Society – Making Sense of Madness and Badness was published in 2004 by PCCS books.

William West – “Spiritual Resilience … Getting By through What We Believe In”
William West PhD is a Reader in Counselling Studies at the University of Manchester in Britain where he is Director of the Counselling Studies Programme and where he delights in supervising doctoral students. William’s key areas interest include: counselling and spirituality, culture, traditional healing, supervision and qualitative research methods. William has written: two authored books – Psychotherapy and Spirituality (Sage 2000), Spiritual Issues in Therapy (Palgrave 2004), one edited book Exploring Counselling Spirituality and Healing (Palgrave 2010), one co-edited book with Roy Moodley, Integrating Traditional Healing Practices into Counseling and Psychotherapy (Sage 2005), 26 academic papers, 15 book chapters and 29 professional journal papers. William is a keen cyclist, amateur poet and beginner piano player.

£110 Organisation fee
£90 Community Groups/ Individuals

Booking deadline: Friday 28 May

All enquiries to Jenny Partington
T: 0113 812 5974
E: j.e.partington@leedsmet.ac.uk

For more details: click here

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Regulation Round-up - Judicial Review


Just arrived in the PCAyorks inbox is the following, from Darian Leader, updating us all on progress with the judicial review.

You know - the judicial review that is challenging the HPC's fitness to regulate those of us who use the title counsellor or psychotherapist.

Read on:

The judicial review of HPC is now in its first stage. Documents prepared by Dinah Rose QC and John Halford of Bindmans have been sent to the High Court which point to problems with the HPC's actions to date. It had been charged with assessing the regulatory needs of counselling and psychotherapy and whether its own system was capable of accommodating this field, yet proceeded as if this was a foregone conclusion. Despite stating several times unequivocally that it had not made any attempt to study these questions, HPC could then write to the Department of Health in December 2009 claiming that it had in fact done so. Attempts to query this contradiction proved fruitless.

The JR papers discuss and document this, as well as other major failures in the process, which indicate that the HPC did not approach its work in a rational or fair way. Alternative models of regulation were not given proper consideration despite being repeatedly brought to HPC's attention. Key questions about the nature of the talking therapies were ignored, and hardly any of the HPC's criteria for regulating professions, such as homogeneity of knowledge base or practice, are applicable to our highly diverse field.

The first set of documents will now be scrutinised by the courts. The instructing organisations are The Association for Group and Individual Psychotherapy, The Association of Independent Psychotherapists, The Centre for Freudian Analysis and Research, The College of Psychoanalysts-UK, The Guild of Psychotherapists and The Philadelphia Association. Funding of the review has been made possible by contributions from thousands of therapists and members of the public who feel strongly about the issue.

Significantly, the Department of Health has now said that it will await the outcome of the judicial review before acting on the HPC's recommendations and that it is exploring alternative models of regulation. This is an important decision, as until now the DoH has simply stated that it will regulate the talking therapies via HPC, and the HPC itself has refused to discuss alternative models of regulation. The fact that other models will now be studied is real progress, and we hope that the DoH will work with our organisations and examine the models used in other countries, where regulatory arrangements have been arrived at that are satisfactory to both government and the field itself.

Saturday, March 06, 2010

WAPCEPC, PCEP & all that



Taking advantage of the discounted rates for BAPCA members (see Why Join BAPCA?), I decided to take out a year's sub to WAPCEPC (the World Association for Person-Centered and Experiential Psychotherapy & Counseling).

Then - demonstrating conclusively that I need to get a life - I decided to have a go at producing my own desktop index to the full collection of PCEP Journals (2002-09).

What I've done is to save the link page for every paper in every issue of the journals as an html file, and then I've combined all those files into a single pdf - which is obviously searchable by keywords and handy in itself.

But I've also activated all the links in the document and, if you click on the title of any of the papers, it will take you to the actual download page for that paper. If you are logged in you can read or download the paper in question. If you don't have a membership / login, at least you can read the abstracts and remind yourself of where to find the paper in your hard copy (if you're a BAPCA member) - or simply drool at the collection and/or save up your pennies (if you're not).

You can download my index from:
PCEP Desktop Index Beta

Don't be put off by the truncated titles on the first couple of pages - that's something that WAPCEPC sorted out after the first (short) Volume - the rest of the index shows the full titles of all the papers.

Hope you find it useful!

If you desperately need sight of any of the papers, why not join PCAyorks and we’ll see what we can do to help?

Some (generous) comments on my little innovation:

Wow! Impressive.
[Janet Tolan / Liverpool John Moores University / BACP Fellow / author]

I feel this is potentially pretty useful, particularly when I am doing a lit review at the moment! Maybe you want to talk to the WA people and see about them offering it on their website [...] I feel this is a quick and easy way through for PCEP readers to find that lost article that they know is there somewhere. [Mark Harrison, MBACP / BAPCA trustee]

WOW Paul very impressive indeed, and so fast!
[Linda Heavon, Knowsley Council / BAPCA trustee / President-elect of Bootle Club of Soroptimist International / Therapist]

I've just visited your index, must have taken you ages! Thanks very much, I'm sure it will be a useful resource.
[Paula Newman, GQHP, UKRC, BACP (Accred) / Counsellor and Hypnotherapist]

Wow!
[Jackie Taylor MBACP, UKCP registered psychotherapist]

Oh, that's brill, many thanks! I'll need to study how to get to the info for a while, but look forward to getting there!
[Shirley Jolley / BACP / BAPCA / occasional author]

Thanks for sharing this - it's a fantastic quick resource. I'd like to share it with students on the course I work on.
[David Murphy Nottingham University]

Amazing!
[Ralph Wallin, BAPCA]

Wednesday, March 03, 2010

Carl Rogers & the CIA



Carl Rogers was a pioneer and leader in the humanistic psychology movement. Although his many professional activities and accomplishments are well known, the story of his association with the Society for the Investigation of Human Ecology - a front organisation for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) - is barely known and has never been explored in any depth...until this article by Stephen P. Demanchick and Howard Kirschenbaum, which attempts to tell that story in the context of America during the 1950s, Rogers' academic career, and the mission of the CIA.

Download: Carl Rogers & the CIA

Launde Abbey Encounter Weekend



PCAN - see Kendal Encounter post, below - are running another event at their regular haunt, Launde Abbey, from Friday 9-Sunday 11 April 2010. Some places remain. The cost will be £195 for the weekend.

For further details, contact Bernard Mooney, T: 020 8504 3675.

Launde Abbey is an Elizabethan manor house, set in a partly wooded valley among the rolling hills of Leicestershire. It has gardens of several acres, and is a place of tranquility. It is the site of an Augustinian priory founded in 1119.

PCAN (established over 30 years ago) has met here for more than 20 years.

See the website for more details of how to get there.

“In a group where control is shared by all… where every person is empowered, a new type of community becomes possible, an organic kind of flow… if we can find even one partial truth about the processes by which… people live together…. Without destroying one another… can live together with a caring concern for the full development for each person… can live together in the richness of diversity, instead of the sterility of conformity, then we may have found a truth with many, many implications”
[Carl Rogers, On Personal Power, 1978]

Tuesday, March 02, 2010

PCA Encounter Group in Kendal

Encounter Group in Kendal
Friday 9 April (7.30pm) to Sunday 11 April (4pm)
Facilitated by Will Stillwell from the La Jolla Program in California.

About the Encounter and the person centred approach
An Encounter Group provides an opportunity for people to experience a temporary Person-Centred Community. Such gatherings can be facilitated or have no formal structure except for conditions required by the venue. There is a commitment to creating an environment of the Core Conditions: where individuals are accepted and valued, where we each strive for empathy and authenticity. Since there is no-one "directing", each member of the group is able to take personal responsibility. It is an opportunity for self-exploration of, for example, your relationship with personal power. The gatherings can be challenging, exciting and deeply moving.

Reflecting on his experiences in both large and small community groups, Carl Rogers wrote: "I realise that of all the ventures in which I have ever been involved, this was the most thoroughly person-centred".

* Group numbers are between 10 and 25.
* The cost is £95 (there may be reduced fee places available, on request) for the facilitation and administration fee. Food and accommodation is not included.
* This group requires payment in advance for each booking.
* No food is provided except a limited variety of coffee, tea and biscuits. Please state special requirements. There are places to eat nearby.
* We include your contact details on a participant list, unless you ask us not to.
* Each gathering will determine its own confidentiality with regard to sharing of personal information, photographs from the event etc.
* Our meetings are unstructured, taking encounter form.
* The gatherings can be exciting, energising and risky. This offers a rare opportunity to experience an undirected temporary community. The facilitator has some responsibility for ensuring that arrangements go smoothly.
* We ask each for each person to be responsible for her/himself. We also ask each member of the community to contribute as far as they are able towards the 'duty of care'.

La Jolla Program
Will Stillwell is facilitating the 8 day Program in the south of England and has agreed to facilitate an Encounter Group in Kendal. He knew Carl Rogers. La Jolla Program uses a method of facilitating human potential and interpersonal effectiveness that grew out of client-centred therapy and known today as the person-centred approach. To help someone else “grow as a person” is no easier than to “grow oneself as a person.” But it can be done, and we have some hope – based on over 40 years of observation and practice – that it may be guided and encouraged by what one learns at the La Jolla Program. Take this weekend for yourself! You may decide to do the 8 day La Jolla Program at a later date (Phone 01539 720647 for more information).

Many, many people tell us this experience is still extremely useful, many years later. You can think of the Encounter Group as part of your journey of self discovery and professional advancement. You will learn methods for being effective in your associations with other people both personally and professionally. You will probably interact with people who bring different customs, thoughts, values and aspirations to the program. You may become a more effective listener. You may increase your acceptance of others and yourself. You will learn more about yourself at levels that are invigorating and may be surprising.

For more information on the British Person Centred Approach Network, go to: www.pcan.info

For more information on La Jolla Program go to:
www.lajollaprogram.com

For bookings and further information on the Kendal Encounter, contact:
Ian Fallows on (01539) 720647 or email ianfallows@hotmail.com

Sunday, February 28, 2010

Psychotherapy & Politics event

Psychotherapy and Politics: Contributing to a Sustainable Society
Saturday 8 and Sunday 9 May 2010
Weetwood Hall, Leeds

Co-sponsored by the Psycho-Social Academic Unit, School of Healthcare, University of Leeds; the Centre for Psychological Therapies, Leeds Metropolitan University; and Psychotherapists and Counsellors for Social Responsibility

What are the characteristics of a sustainable society, and what can counselling and psychotherapy contribute to its creation? Like 'freedom' or 'justice', 'sustainability' is a complex and flexible term, but its key meaning could be rendered as improving the quality of current human life without damaging either future generations or present ecosystems. It includes such concepts as emotional sustainability and economic sustainability. There are many ways in which and levels on which the idea of sustainability interacts with the theory and practice of counselling and psychotherapy.

Following on from the successful conferences in London in 2008 and Glasgow in 2009, a diverse group of counsellors and psychotherapists, with representatives from the humanistic and psychodynamic communities and from Psychotherapists and Counsellors for Social Responsibility, are organising a major conference hosted by Leeds University to explore the interface between psychological therapies and progressive social-political-environmental perspectives.

For more details: Download Conference Brochure

Click here for booking details and click on bookings

Monday, February 22, 2010

Carl Rogers' Transcripts

Transcripts of Carl Rogers' Therapy Sessions
Edited by Barbara T. Brodley and Germain Lietaer
[Completed in December, 2006]

To facilitate psychotherapy research and the education of students in client-centred therapy, the editors have compiled as complete a record as possible of transcripts of Carl R. Rogers' sessions with actual and demonstration clients.

A full description of this project is available in an article by Germain Lietaer and Barbara T. Brodley, "Carl Rogers in the Therapy Room: A Listing of Session Transcripts and a Survey of Publications Referring to Rogers’ Sessions," published 2004 in Person-Centered & Experiential Psychotherapies, 2(4), pp. 274-291.

A supplemental list of more recent publications referring to Rogers’ sessions is included with the collected transcripts.

To facilitate access to this collection, PCAyorks – the regional network for the Person-Centred Approach in Yorkshire & the Humber (UK) – has, since 2007, provided webhosting for this resource. Prior to that, the 17 documents were being emailed as separate attachments, in response to individual requests only.

From correspondence with the principal editorial assistant to the project, we were informed that: “…Barbara and Germain are not in favor of "posting" them publicly on the web. But if what you are doing is more a personal thing to be followed up upon only by word of mouth I think that is fine. Thank you for your kind offer [...] “That is really fantastic. It worked in seconds when I clicked on it directly from your email message. I am quite overwhelmed.”

Whilst she was still working on the transcripts, Barbara Brodley informed us that she fully supported the efforts we were making to promote the Person Centred Approach through the private distribution of such key papers: “… especially Rogers' transcripts which I think belong to the world” [5 July 2006].

If you would like to receive the download link to the full transcript collection, please contact us at pcayorks@yahoo.co.uk, stating that you understand and accept that they are being made freely available as Microsoft Word documents for purposes of research, study and teaching and may not be sold.

The Person Centred Approach / CCT has always been at the forefront of evidence based practice and the availability of this collection will enable students, teachers, practitioners and researchers to study in detail the work of Rogers with his own clients. We at PCAyorks are delighted to play a small, but significant part in promoting and facilitating the Approach in this way.

We look forward to hearing from you if you would like to take advantage of this offer.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

BAPCA AGM, Regulation, Links

A bit of a round-up, this post.

BAPCA AGM
This year's AGM will take place on 27 March 2010 at the Letchworth Settlement, 229 Nevells Road, Letchworth Garden City, Herts SG6 4UB.

It's an exciting time for BAPCA, and the Co-ordinating Group (trustees) have issued a recent statement in response to the Open Letter on Statutory Regulation that signals a potential shift towards a more robust - or at least multi-stranded - response to the unpopular HPC would-be regulator.

Their website is a bit wonky at times (who are we to throw stones?), but you can find out a bit more at:

BAPCA 2010 AGM

Coordinating Group's Response to the Open Letter:
The Future of the Person-Centred Approach in the UK and the Case against HPC and State Regulation


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REGULATION RESOURCES
Statutory Regulation and the Future of Professional Practice in Psychotherapy & Counselling: Evidence from the field

October 2009 / King’s College London – Department of Management
Dr Gerry McGivern, Dr Michael Fischer, Prof Ewan Ferlie, Dr Mark Exworthy

http://www.kcl.ac.uk/content/1/c6/06/35/90/StatutoryRegulation1.pdf

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LINKS
We've done a fairly major update of the links section - have a click around and see what you can find.

Remember, you can always leave a comment and let us know you are out there.

More CPD Stuff



FFYNNON PPD
PROGRAMME OF EVENTS
2010


Including Brian Thorne and Dave Mearns - October 30 2010

24 April - ‘No Person is an Island ’ - Race, ethnicity, culture and society: A ‘transcultural’ perspective to psychotherapy.
Workshop with Colin Lago

29 May - Working at Relational Depth in Counselling
Workshop with Mick Cooper

30 May - The Therapeutic Power of the Arts
Workshop with Helen Cruthers

19 June - ‘Potentiality’, Counselling young people in Schools from a Person Centred Perspective (full details of this workshop to be confirmed).
Workshop with Susan McGinnis

30 October - Brian Thorne and Dave Mearns
For many of you Brian Thorne and Dave Mearns will need no introduction. As inspirational pioneers of the person centred counselling approach in Britain, Europe and beyond and prolific authors and co-authors of the best seller ‘Person Centred Counselling in action’ (3rd edition 2007) their reputation as practitioners, teachers, trainers and writers is of the highest merit and regard in the field of counselling and psychotherapy.

At present the possible flavour for this day event at this developmental stage is ‘where are they now?’ an exploration and reflection on how very different paths and core experiences of faith and atheism can lead to a similar deep valuing of humanity and an inclination to be particularly 'present' in working with others. (Full details of the day to follow in due course.)

Events all take place at Glyndwr University, Wrexham (North Wales border)

For further details:
T: 0560 3199080 E: info@ffynnonppd.co.uk
http://www.ffynnonppd.co.uk/


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Introduction to Psychosexual Therapy
Workshop by Muriel O’Driscoll (counsellor, coach, psychosexual therapist, educator and author)

Sunday, 25 April 2010, 9:30 AM - 4:00 PM
Contemporary Urban Centre, 41-51 Greenland Street, Liverpool, L1 0BS
£75.00 (lunch included)

A discount of £10 will be given to diploma students and those working in the voluntary sector and a further £5 discount will be given to anyone paying in full before 1 April 2010.

Full details and booking information can be found at:
http://www.counselling-matters.org.uk/

Monday, January 25, 2010

Counselling & Psychotherapy Regulation - Event


Viewpoints on Counselling and Psychotherapy Regulation
13 March 2010, 10.30am–4.30pm
University House, University of Leeds
Cost: £65/£50

Jonathan Coe
Witness
Nick Totton
Alliance for Counselling and Psychotherapy

The essential issue that will be debated and discussed during the day is what form of accountability is most appropriate for the profession. Is regulation by the government-appointed HPC the best way? Or should we regulate ourselves and, if so, by what means? Is the situation of counselling and psychotherapy broken, and if so how should it be fixed? Stimulated by two speakers with very different approaches to the issues, participants will be invited to debate the issue themselves with the help of various small and large group structures, including Cafe Conversation.

Full details and booking:
http://www.healthcareconferences.leeds.ac.uk/conferences/details.php?id=4

Saturday, January 23, 2010

Statutory Regulation - Links

BAPCA Documents:

BAPCA Report: Meeting with Shadow Health Minister, November 2009 - Allan Turner and Teresa Cosgrove represent BAPCA at the meeting in the Grand Committee Room at Westminster Palace called by Anne Milton, MP and Shadow Health Minister.

BAPCA Members in Action:

Open Letter - The Future of the Person-Centred Approach in the UK and the Case against HPC and State Regulation: An open letter to BAPCA

Government body:

HPC - Regulation of Psychotherapists and Counsellors
'The HPC is a UK-wide regulatory body which keeps a register of health professionals meeting its standards for training, professional skills, behaviour and health. Currently, 13 professions are registered including arts therapists.'

HPC Watchdog - 'Watching the HPC to protect the public’s liberty.'

Professional bodies:

The Alliance for Counselling and Psychotherapy - Against State Regulation - A host of reports, articles and links can be found under ‘Resources’.

BACP on Statutory Regulation - 'BACP continued to favour statutory regulation in principle but believe the current proposals are not 'fit for purpose'.'

BPS on Statutory Regulation - Statutory regulation for psychologists was introduced on 1 July 2009 and the Health Professions Council (HPC) Register of practitioner psychologists opened.

IPN on Statutory Regulation - IPN is 'committed to defending freedom of practice, and to creating a culture of openness and challenge. The Network grows out of the belief that no centralised organisation has the right or the ability to decide who should practise therapy, facilitation or equivalent skills.'

UKCP on Statutory Regulation - 'UKCP has always advocated statutory regulation as a mechanism to protect the public interest and to give psychotherapy professional recognition and responsibility, as well as to unite the profession.'

Articles by person-centred practitioners on Regulation and related subjects:

‘Dare We Do Away With Professionalism?’ Why the person-centred approach is opposed to the state regulation of the psychological therapies by Andy Rogers - Article originally published in Therapy Today, May 2009

Notes on the Increasing Access to the Psychological Therapies Programme by Paul McGahey & David Murphy - Article published in PCQ, August 2008

Response to Proposals on Statutory Regulation by Paul McGahey - Article published in PCQ, August 2007

Ahead of His Time: Carl Rogers on 'Professionalism', 1973 by Richard House - Article published in Ipnosis, Summer 2002

CPD Opportunities for the solvent practitioner

We've been asked to give the following a plug. Quite a mouth-watering selection of opportunities coming up this year:

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La Jolla Program UK 2010
A Project of the Center for Studies of the Person, La Jolla, California, USA

PERSON-CENTRED SELF-DISCOVERY & PERSONAL GROWTH
Saturday 17 April – Sunday 25 April 2010
St Rita’s Centre, Honiton, Devon

THE LA JOLLA PROGRAM
Carl Rogers founded the Center for Studies of the Person in 1968 with colleagues who shared his belief in the person-centered approach. They developed an intensive residential workshop, known as the La Jolla Program. This has been attended over the years by thousands of people from many countries. Its continued success encouraged the Directors of the Center to bring the Program to the UK This will be the 7th year it has been brought to this country providing an opportunity to explore personal and professional relationships in a supportive environment. The pattern of each day will be negotiated with participants, placing high value on mutual respect, careful listening and the acceptance of differences.

The facilitators will be Will Stillwell and Keddie Burrows. Will was a colleague of Carl Rogers. He works in organisations as coach to individuals, facilitator to groups, and mediator in conflict situations. Keddie is director of the Center and specialises in working with developmentally disabled people for whom the regular health care system has not worked well.

Cost: £470-£555

Kay Laurie (UK Organiser), La Jolla Program UK, 30 Chestnut Court, Norwich NR2 1HB
T: 01603 614766 E: lajollaprogram@hotmail.co.uk

You can find out more about the La Jolla Program at:
http://www.lajollaprogram.com

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Being our ages
A residential weekend encounter for women at Northern College, Barnsley
Facilitated by Gillian Proctor and Linda Smith
Friday 6pm, 26 March 2010 to Sunday 4pm, 28 March 2010
Cost: £245.

An opportunity for women to spend time with other women talking about what age means for us. We are hoping this will be an experience not only for therapists, but for all women.

How do messages given to us affect us?
“You'll understand when you're older”
“You don't look your age”
“You can't wear that at your age”

Gillian Proctor: I have just celebrated my 40th birthday. This age felt like a watershed in terms of reproductive potential and no longer being able to delude myself that others see me as “young”.

Linda Smith: In the year 2010, I will be able to say, “Next year I will be 60.” I'm shocked in disbelief. I cannot relate to this age. Nothing in the world helps me to identify myself with being 60.

Temenos Person-Centred Education & Training, 289 Abbeydale Road Sheffield S7 1FJ
T: 0114 258 0058
http://www.temenos.ac.uk/

Understanding and Supporting Self-Injury
With Eleanor Longden
Thursday 28 and Friday 29 January 2010
Cost: Individuals £140, Funded places £170.

Self-injury is a purposeful act of coping and self-help in which emotional pain is externalised and dealt with in a more visible way. However, this very visibility means self-injury is often treated with mistrust and fear. This session will explore why people self-injure and how self-injury is related to life events, as well as how mental health workers can engage in an open, supportive and empathic relationship with someone who self-injures. Guidance will also be provided around the concept of harm minimisation and safer self-injury.

'Mistakes' in Psychotherapy
With Colin Lago and David Rose
Wednesday 17 February 2010
Cost: Individuals £70, Funded places £90.

This was a frequently used phrase within our profession in the 70’s and 80’s. It reflected a philosophic view, current at that time that mistakes were inevitable, were to be learned from and reflected upon, and proved oftentimes to be productive within therapy.

We contend that in this current climate, there is a much more rigid, fearful attitude within the profession towards ‘mistakes’ that we might make, as counsellors and psychotherapists. We may be more anxious now about telling our supervisors about them or fear official complaints being made against us by our clients.

A day of Dialogue: Person-Centred Therapies and Cognitive Behavioural Therapies
With Joe Curran and Linda Smith
Wednesday 24 February 2010
Cost: Individuals £70, Funded places £90.

This day is an opportunity to experience contemporary understanding and advances with both Person-Centred Therapy and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, through experiential engagement. We have a commitment to critical dialogue and subjective experiencing and the process is often lively and enjoyable. This may be a chance to discover, within the day, if the Postgraduate certificate course beginning in March 2010 is one you might find useful.

The Tyranny of Person-Centredness
With Leah Davidson, Suzanne Keys, Gillian Proctor, Clare Raido and Linda Smith
Friday 5 March 2010
Cost: £95.

‘That’s not person-centred’.

‘We’re all person-centred – I put the client first’.

‘You can’t be angry/judgemental/challenging/ask a question if you’re person-centred’.

Ever heard these in yourself or from others?

The Intimacy of Authenticity
With Gillian Proctor and Linda Smith
Friday 12 March 2010
Cost: Individuals £70, Funded places £90

Where is your power?
What about ethics?
Where is your sexuality?
What about risk of authenticity?

Where is self-care?
What about non-defensive practice?
What is real/authentic?

Also taking place on Saturday 20 March in Edinburgh (http://www.person-person.co.uk)
and Saturday 12 June in Brighton (http://www.brightonbapca.co.uk/Workshops.php)

Encounter
With Clare Raido and Linda Smith
Saturday 13 and Sunday 14 March 2010
Cost: Individuals £140, Funded places £170

Antony Gormley says: ‘our place is in the consciousness of another’.

Jacques Lacan identifies: ‘a bridge to self-experience, the change between one and the other – to encounter.’

Peter Schmid asks: ‘Who are you?’

Carl Rogers writes: ‘each of whom is endeavouring to the best of his ability, to be himself in the relationship.’

Person-Centred Expressive Therapy
Creative Expression and Connection through the Arts

With Tess Sturrock and Fiona Strodder
Saturday 17 and Sunday 18 April 2010
Cost: Individuals £140, Funded places £170

In a world of busyness, dis-ease and disconnection:

How can we feel good in our own bodies?
How can we nurture a sense of belonging?
How can we feel connected to our environment?
How can we experience a real sense of relationship?

Making Sense of Voices: Recovery and Discovery
With Eleanor Longden
Saturday 12 and Sunday 13 June 2010
Cost: Individuals £140, Funded places £170

Hearing voices is a deeply meaningful experience, even if these meanings are painful and difficult to face. However, while attempts to eradicate voices are considered a 'cure response' by conventional mental health services, understanding, accepting and integrating the emotional and personal significance of one's voices is the recovery response. This two-day session will explore how practitioners can support clients to make sense of their voices, recover their well-being and in doing so promote practical healing and emotional growth. Particular attention will be given to ways of working with powerful and controlling voices.

Power in Therapy and Supervision
With Colin Lago and Gillian Proctor
Friday 25 and Saturday 26 June 2010
Cost: Individuals £140, Funded places £170

‘When we enter into therapy we give enormous power to the therapist because we want to see that person as someone who can take our pain away. Such power can be abused’. (Dorothy Rowe, 2002).

FOR MORE DETAILS:
Temenos Person-Centred Education & Training, 289 Abbeydale Road Sheffield S7 1FJ
T: 0114 258 0058
http://www.temenos.ac.uk/