I read something very helpful - here's a link

Hi alexdefoe,

Welcome to the forum. Thanks for drawing our attention to that article, it's a good read.

This made me smile:

The self-help industry is tantalising but fragmented and difficult to mine for its real gems. It’s a growth area but without any clear definition or leadership for the confused consumer. There’s always a therapist with a consulting room in some basement somewhere but no two of them sing from the same hymn sheet, and if there’s something close to your heart from one technique it’s bound to be contradicted by another.

.

Very interesting.

I liked this:

Now imagine that we can see the mundane sleight of hand behind the trick. Suddenly the intensity of our reaction is gone.

Kathleen

I wrote this piece and alexdefoe was kind enough to point me to your remarks. I appreciate them. Thank you.

I write a column every week in the Saturday Times' Body and Soul supplement. Here's a link to this week's http://business.timesonline.co.uk/artic ... 64,00.html

The rest are at my website in the magazine section.

I also have a forum at that website and although it gets alot of views it has been a bit slow to get going. It would be great to have some expereinced forum users like you make a contribution.

All the best,

Benjamin

Hi Benjamin,

Welcome to the forum. Good luck with your website and forum!

Now I know we've made it - we're being headhunted!

Seriously though, a nice article benjamin, and I hope you'll stick around to contribute here as well.

All the best

Roger

Hi all

What a great article - it struck such a chord - I've had a decent middele-class upbringing, have parents that are still together, have just finished a degree aged 36, am just about to marry the kindest man in the world and have recently moved into the house of my dreams. Life should be perfect but the panic attacks are coming thick and fast and having read the article, I would say that I too may have some soul-searching ahead of me.

Best wishes

Jo.M

Jo,

Here's an idea that might make sense to you. There was apparently a study done once about driving habits and safety. they found that the more safe a car was made the more risks we would take driving it. the overarching theory was that we had a constant threshold of danger that we liked to live at and if you make one thing safer, then another gets more dangerous to compensate.

my view (explained in more detail in my book) is that we have a similar pattern of behaviour with our emotional housekeeping. it stands to reason that there is only so much we can take. when life exceeds our threshold we store up emotions (which I think of as trauma). when life then later gets safer, there is the opportunity for these feelings to be reprocessed (hence the e-motion).

you have arrived at what sounds like a very safe place in your life. what better time than this to let out something that has remained hidden within for so long? the confusing thing is that you may have no idea where this is coming from. it could be from something beyond your recall such as birth trauma or troubles in infancy.

I went through something very similar after getting engaged and my wife becoming pregnant. my humble advise is simply to let it happen, and don't compound the suffering by judging yourself negatively. you are being given an opportunity to clear away some of the detritus of your soul and when you do so you will be able to better enjoy all the fruits of your life that you mention.

Treat yourself with kindness and be patient. Best of luck.

Benjamin

[note: I asked Admin for permission to copy your post to my forum because I thought others might like to know about it - let me know if you mind]

hi benjamin

thanks so much for your lovely reply, what you say makes so much sense. it seems that now i have nothing to worry about anymore, the emotional floodgates have opened and all the years of emotional trauma is starting to gush out.

your story is an inspiration and i hope that i can also learn to enjoy the path to self-discovery.

Best wishes

Jo