Boarding school survivors are characterized by many positive
qualities. Often there is an individuality and a creativity,
an ability to tough things out, and a capacity to endure
privations with good humour. But there are costs too. The
humour sometimes covers profound emotional and spiritual wounds.
In order to survive our schooling we may have sought to amputate an
important part of ourselves, a part that isn't necessarily a "winner"
or successful, but loving and vulnerable. Our partners may be aware of
a certain subtle absence, a lack of trust or intimacy that has become
second nature to us. It is as if we were taught only too well how to
be private, self-reliant, coping individuals. Boarding school made us
a master of disguises. When it comes to adult, intimate relationships,
we need to recover spontaneity, self-expression, a willingness to risk
all and be hurt - or be loved. Our caution and calculation are then
a huge obstacle.
This is problematic for us to talk about because boarding school was
sold to us as something that made us special and uniquely loved. We
had the good fortune, we were given to understand, to have parents able
and willing to make great sacrifices so that we would have a head start
in life. Is it suprising then that we find it such a challenge to speak
about the actual joylessness of much of school life, the emotional
withdrawal, the sense of being trapped, the torment of isolation,
secretiveness and shame that was in reality a large part of our daily
existence? We were sent away to an institution that could feed us,
educate us, teach us sports and social skills and how to be a confident
manipulator, but one that could never give us a parent's love.
We adapted, of course, to this abrupt, bewildering alteration in our
young lives. We learned the rules, kept ourselves busy and, from sheer
necessity, we hid our longing for our home and family. Pretty soon we cut
ourselves off from our loving feelings, because to miss as much as we did
would be too painful to bear. How did we survive and become sexual adults,
in a cold, rule-bound place from which everything soft or tender was removed?
How did we compensate and how do we live this out today?
If you want to discuss participating in the workshop and/or to reserve a
place, please call 020 7243 6752 or email marcusgottlieb@gmail.com. The
fee will be £160, of which £60 is due in advance. The venue is The
Coach House, 14a St Luke's Road, Notting Hill, London W11 1DP
(click here for location details).
The fee
includes lunch on Sunday.
Marcus Gottlieb, formerly a solicitor, has graduated from an 8-year
training in humanistic and existential psychotherapy at Spectrum, a long
established institute accredited to the United Kingdom Council for
Psychotherapy. He uses gestalt, psychosynthesis, psychodrama and other
models, and he is particularly interested in finding a synthesis of F.M.
Alexander's bodywork method with Stanley Keleman's formative psychology.
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