TSHP117: Should All Drugs be Legal?

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What’s Coming This Episode?

We’re all drug users of one kind or another, be it cocaine or caffeine, ecstasy or aspirin. There’s a big debate amongst scientists, politicians and other ‘thought leaders’ that thinks that it’s about time we experimented with legalising all drugs. Where do you stand?

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Should Drugs Be legal?

They already are!!!!

Alcohol, nicotine, tannin, caffeine, legal highs, all easily available on the high street. What about exercise, chocolate, carbs? They all create a chemical dependence in our brain chemistry. But would we think of religion, education, reading or knitting as addiction?

We all have an internal and individual chemical normal. Your internal chemistry is different to mine, but when yours is in balance you feel that all is as it should be. If you had my chemistry you would feel horrible, like wise if I had yours.

The nearest we get to normal is at the moment of birth, yet even then our individual internal chemistry is set by the genetics from our parents and from the things that we ingest like our mothers milk. As we grow and move on in life different experiences create different internal chemical states that, when repeated, we experience as normal. In the end we say, “that’s just the way I am”, no it is not, it’s the way we have taught our system to be. What it comes down to is that you normal chemical balance is your addiction and you will do things to maintain your normal. That is called ‘your addictive behaviour’. So what is yours? Remember the person who needs to go to mass everyday is as addicted as the cocaine user, it is us that see it as good or bad.

A class drugs are those substances that we, collectively as a society, have decided are so bad they should be made illegal and people, our population, should be (are) banned from using them. The popular image of a Class A addict is of a spotty no-good living in the gutter. Yet, functional addicts are everywhere.

Functional alcoholics famously run governments, functional cocaine addicts run the financial sectors and functional heroine addicts run businesses. I am not saying that we should all go around ‘off our cake’ and ‘out of our tree’ but being stoned is more common than we realise.

Does drug addiction damage people? Yes! Should we do something about it? Yes!

Human beings have used drugs throughout their evolution. The chances of this stopping are remote. Making drugs legal enables us to take control of them and it stops the negative associations such as people trafficking, violent crime, robbery, prostitution, and so on.

There is another issue of balance. The government creates income from the tax on cigarettes. There is also a cost in the health costs of the diseases caused by smoking. Is the income greater than the health costs? I do not know the answer. However, if all drugs were legal and subject to tax, we would create income to deal with rehab and recovery. At the same time we would reduce violent crime and maybe make the world a little safer.

Whatever your addiction is, be happy and live in the present.

Take care

Sean x

TSHP116: Social Networks – Good or Bad?

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What’s Coming This Episode?

What a time we live in. We can share our thoughts with the world at the click of a button. There are good sides and bad sides to this connectivity mind you. I mean, I love cats gifs as much as you do but you’ve got to draw the line somewhere…

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The Book of Face – Good or Bad?

I have just checked my facebook and twitter, I attempt to check it when I go to bed. What did I do before facebook? well, I went to sleep or, maybe, read a book.

I once heard a wonderful talk given by Stephen Fry. He read out a quote about a new invention that suggests it was, and would, ruin the world. It was destined to destroy society, break up families and relationships, turn children against their parents and people against their governments it would be the end of society as we know it. The invention he was talking about was, the book.

The book, at that time, was a creation that followed on from the invention of the printing press. The book was not seen as a good thing. Thinkers and philosophers of that time thought that if someone was sat alone, or in a corner of the family room, having an exclusive experience in their own mind that was not shared with their friends and family, that this would destroy the fabric and foundation of what a family is. Of course, prior, to the book on a winter’s evening in front of the fire, people talked, told stories, shared the day’s news. Would or could the book stop this?

Now we are in the position where people fear that the book will now be lost to the Kindle book reader, the computer, the tablet and the mobile phone. Seems to me that as each new invention of social distraction comes along what we fear most of all is change.

So what about social media?

Facebook allows people to share in a digital electronic way. It allows people to share at anytime with anyone anywhere in the world. It opens up the world and creates an awareness of other people in other situations and other countries. But what it does is creates change. It is a new form of communications. Those people that grow up with modern technology will see it as normal and the way that it is. They will not feel bereavement for the loss of the paper book when they can hold 200 books on their Kindle.

Just as the book was a feared when it was first developed so too is social media now. For many it is a threat. Some governments are so scared by its existence that it is blocked from the servers in that country. Why would a government or an interest group be sacred of people openly expressing their thoughts and feelings in a public forum? It is probably that they have things that they would rather keep hidden.

I think, that like most things, social media is neutral. Think of a knife! The knife is neutral; it is neither good nor bad. It is what we do with it that makes it good or bad. There are good books and bad books. There is good social media and bad social media. It is not what it is, it is what we do with it that counts.

Be happy, live in the present, and use your social media positively.

Take care

Sean x

TSHP115: Overcoming Grief

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What’s Coming This Episode?

Life can throw some tough scenarios at you while we’re here, but losing a loved one can often be the toughest. Sean and Ed are here to help with a chat about grief and bereavement.

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Bereavement

Bereavement goes way beyond death and the loss of a loved one. We may experience many losses in life before we experience our first death. When we experience any loss it is the emotional bond between us and that person, thing, event or object that we feel as they are stretched and sometimes, snapped. So, in this blog I want to look at the sense of loss beyond that of death.

Loss assumes that we own something. We cannot lose what we do not have or own. This may seem obvious when we are talking about losing a watch or having a wallet stolen, if our house is burgled or the contents of car taken. Yet, there are many levels of loss that are not material. They may be to do with love or emotion, though with all things we may also feel some ownership.

Status and our sense of self
The loss of face, position or status can leave us feeling diminished or that we have lost something. This is because we tend to define ourselves by what we ‘do’ rather than by who we ‘are’. At the dinner party we turn to the person next to us and ask “what do you do?” This sense of ‘doing’ is often regarded above ‘being’. We tend to value our-self and others by what we do. In your value system is a surgeon of higher status than a dustman?

They way that we see ourselves as list of what we do tends to come out when we answer the question “Who am I?” In most cases the answer will comprise of a list of the things that we do or the roles that we play. When what we do is seen as more important than who we are things like retirement becomes big issues of loss because we no longer have a place and a role in society, we have lost our label.

The loss in change
This is why there is often a sense of loss when life changes. The rites of passage as we move through life from, school to, university, Job, relationship, children, grandchildren, retirement and so on all describe the loss that is the past and may, to the awake mind, embraced the potential gains of the future that can only come with change.

Change by choice
When we choose to change we may move joyfully towards a new situation. Perhaps the past has not served us well and we are happy or even eager to leave it behind. However, even during the most positive of changes, it likely that there will still be a sense of loss from the broken connections to the past

Imposed change
To have change enforced on us through redundancy, dismissal, divorce, accident, illness and so on will often leave us feeling anger and resentment to those people or circumstances that have brought about the change. Imposed change may effect what we do or what can do. If we have an accident or a stroke we may lose the physical or mental ability to function as we have done in the past. Such losses change how we see or describe our-self.

Consider this
If you were to write a description of yourself from ten years ago how different would it be from your description of how you see your self today? You would doubtless see some change that may even be positive. What are the losses that you can see? You might also try projecting forward ten years and consider what changes you would like to see.

Preparing for change
Being aware that change is the only constant, knowing it will always happen, allows us to prepare in advance. Preparing for the loss of loved ones and close family members eases the passing when it happens. A pre-retirement course can minimise the loss of identity that come with the loss of role. Parenting courses can prepare us for the huge impact that children will have on our lives and our relationships.

Preparation for material loss
For most people this means insurance policies that are there to compensate us when we suffer material loss. That may include critical illness cover, redundancy cover, car insurance, house insurance, travel insurance all of which compensate us for loss. In these cases insurance seems like a waste of money unless or until you need to call on the policy after a loss.

Preparation for emotional or spiritual loss
In this I mean loss of relationship though estrangement, divorce, death and so on. The only way to prepare for these is to live in the present. Not to be attached to the past and what was or to crave what might be in the future. To live in the now is to be Mindful.

Mindfulness
Because loss is related to change the experience spans the line from past, through the present to the future. The bereavement of loss is the attachment that we have to the past. Many losses will always have a connection to past either through nostalgia or sometimes anger and hurt. In Mindfulness we encourage the ability to live in the present to be here now. Dealing with loss is about dealing with our attachment to the past. To live in the present we need to let go of the emotional attachments that we have to what was, enjoy what is and embrace what is yet to be.

When considering how you deal with loss I highly recommend Step one in our book, Live In the Present.

Be happy, be lucky and enjoy your life

Sean x

TSHP114: Dealing with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

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What’s Coming This Episode?

Trauma. Stress. They go hand in hand. One follows the other and the effects can last longer than you might think. If they do, then you could be looking at a case of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and that ain’t no fun, let me tell you.

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Dealing with PTSD

What is a trauma?

Trauma, is a Greek word meaning “wound”. A wound can be physical, mental, emotional, financial and so on. The concept of trauma comes from the idea that the wound, or event that is being experienced, is greater than our resources to deal with it. In that sense we have been overwhelmed. However there is a difference between experiencing trauma and being traumatised.

Traumatised, or traumatisation is when the overwhelming experience/trauma creates an amount of stress that is so great that it exceeds our ability to deal the emotions aroused. This is clearly an emotional issue. Trauma or traumatic disorders are always emotional.

Post trauma is the emotional fall out that stays with us after the experience has ended. It is our time to process the emotions and this may take days or weeks. In most cases the emotional effects of a trauma will be normalised in eight to ten weeks.

Repressed trauma can happen when an event is too difficult for us to deal with and we hide it in the recesses of the mind. When this happens we may have no direct memory of the event that caused the trauma, though it may still effect who we are, how we experience the world and, our behaviour.

Recovered memory may be delayed by weeks, years, or even decades. Though when it does emerge the original repressed emotions are released as though they have just happened. Therapeutically this release of emotion and memory is termed an abreaction and involves the re-experiencing of the trauma physically, emotionally and mentally.

Emotional responses Although in repression the memory is lost to the consciousness of the mind it has a constant effect on everyday life and experience and may appear as irrational fears, anxiety, depression, phobia etc. This is described as something within us but outside of our control.

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is when the emotional responses are not repressed but are also not processed. When the effects of the event remain active after six weeks it is given the PTSD diagnosis.

PTSD Symptoms will vary but will include finding it difficult to forget the incident or event that happened. There may be flashbacks, daymares or nightmares about it. Unstable and irrational emotional responses such as anger, tears, anxiety, depression, phobias, disturbed sleep/eating patterns, and so on.

Rumination is the symptom builder. We know that what we think about we bring about that thoughts become things. When we continually go over traumatic events and are unable to let them go they become more intensely embedded in our unconscious and conscious mind because we keep thinking about, and reinforcing them in our mind/brain.

The MindBrain This is where the software of the psychological mind and the hardware of the brain interface. The main aspect of the brain that effects our emotional self is the limbic system in the centre of the brain. Within the limbic system is a little organ called the amygdala. In this organ are templates of cells that relate to out emotional responses. Let say that when I am young I watch my mother reacting phobic-ally to spiders, I then build a template of cells in my amygdala so that when I see a spider the cells release chemistry and so I also react to the spiders as a phobia. Over time my spider template will become hotter and more embedded the more I visit it.

All emotional responses are like this, even the positive ones. So, that if I see the object of my love the love template of cells become hot and releases the chemistry that make me feel loving.

It normally takes about five repetitions of emotional experience to set up a template unless it is punched traumatically and then it is created immediately. Once a traumatic template has been established it will remain hot and active and become more embedded over time unless, or until, it is treated.

Treatment for trauma is a variable feast and will depend on where you live and the therapy that is fashionable at the time. Cognitive therapies such as CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) given over a few sessions are not that good at dealing with trauma in the long-term. They do have a short- term effectiveness by putting in place cognitive tools, sometimes if the emotion was repressed it can reappear at a later date.

EMDR or Eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing is a therapy that mimics the rapid eye movements that happen during the dream cycle in the sleep pattern. As the emotional trauma is encoded into the MindBrain using the same part of the system EMDR is surprisingly effective in the majority of cases.

Rewinding is by far my best option, as it uses the very same process to desensitise a template in the amygdala as was used to put it there in the first place, this is visualisation. When we revisit a trauma it is through the senses of sight, smell, taste and touch, none of which are cognitive. During rewind therapy the emotional memories are address directly and desensitised.

Mindful meditation is becoming mainstream psychology. Mindfulness is the best prevention for all forms of stress and provides the resources needed at the point of trauma. The process of mindfulness is relaxation, contemplation, concentration and meditation a process that is in itself therapeutic. Consistent meditators become their own therapists and counsellors and are able to overcome many things that overwhelm others.

Medication has to be the last on my list. I am not against medication on this basis, if I have a headache I will do all that I can to get rid of it, as a last resort I will take an aspirin. There are medications that can help with anxiety, depression, panic, high blood pressure and so on. There are also natural alternatives that maybe gentler on the system both psychologically and physiologically.

If you do suffer trauma never suffer alone psychotherapy is a good and powerful thing.

Take care and be happy

Sean x