BACKGROUND
I studied theology at Westminster College, Oxford and then trained as a teacher at Hughes Hall College, Cambridge. I've taught pre-school and 5 to 18 year olds in mainstream and specialist education. I was also an SEN teacher and head of department for a brief time. I worked with young people permanently excluded from school; and separately children on the autistic spectrum. Working part-time as a teacher supported my training as an integrative psychotherapist at The Whittington Hospital (NHS Trust) in London. Part of this training involved working with out-patients with complex mental health issues.
'We are poor indeed if we are only sane'
Donald Winnicott
MY APPROACH
The integrative approach gave me training in Existential, Psychodynamic, Gestalt, Object Relations, Transactional Analysis and Transpersonal perspectives. My training took several years and provided a rigorous and in-depth grounding, it's intention was not for me to chose one or more school of thought, rather its aim was to facilitate an 'after-school' way of thinking. I benefit from not having collegial or theoretical affiliations and commitments, in other words I haven't already decided what I think, or how I will before I start working with someone. My training encouraged a critical stance toward theory; a self-reflexive stance toward my thinking, how I work, and how to offer genuine personal engagement in the therapeutic relationship.
I have an holistic approach to my own mental and physical health which in turn informs how I work. I've long had an interest in the philosopher and "psychologist" Friedrich Nietzsche as his writing has had a significant influence in my life and on my psychotherapeutic work. This has underpinned my long held value that the best way to approach psychotherapy is the same as I approach life. It is not a performance, it becomes the way I breathe, think and talk. So far this has been to the betterment of both.
I have an interest in the development of psychedelic assisted psychotherapy and am even more interested in psychedelic experience without the use of psychedelic medicine.
In recent years I have discovered the value, pleasure and difficulty of writing. Currently I have three writing projects, two books I am working on and a blog. The blog is on hold at present as I work to finish the first book. To find out more www.nietzscheanpsychotherapist.com
'... every great philosophy till now has consisted of - namely, the confession of its originator, and a species of involuntary and unconscious autobiography.'
Friedrich Nietzsche