After reading this, I blinked several times and double-checked that today isn't April 1st.
As someone with a fairly extensive involvement in the early days of the counselling movement, I can only despair that what we set out so hopefully to do in the 1970s and '80s has ended up in such a hideously banal fashion. Although the eager manner in which such a starry-eyed Panglossian prescription is being lapped up by a wilting government desperate to remedy the multiplying ills of the sad society it has mis-spent the past decade in creating comes as no surprise. The acid comment of a GP that to imagine a few weeks of CBT [Cognitive Behaviour Therapy] is going to transform miserable people languishing in idleness and dependency into happy shiny productive workers is "embarrassing in its absurdity" is putting it mildly. As for the notion that it's a simple matter to recruit and train the requisite army of therapists, capable of inducing happiness to order, I am - for once - speechless.
Given the choice between Lord Layard and Professor Brainstawm, I plump for the latter every time!
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There are some interesting letters on this topic in today's 'Guardian';
http://lifeandhealth.guardian.co.uk/wellbeing/story/0,,2287347,00.html
Happiness being ruled by decree? It's the last thing I could think of.
But... One may expect anything from these politicians of ours.
Welcome back, Anticant.
Hey there anticant,
I couldn't even get to the end of the article.....it makes me want to weep with despair, except that I might then get CBT'd with 6 NHS weeks and heaven only knows what effect that would have on my melancholia.
You know that I have posted quite extensively on this too. I think my major concern is that those for whom CBT doesn't work in the long term - and that is a significant number - end up pathologising themselves and their 'unhappiness' further because the miracle cure didn't work. And let's face it, for those who have significant fractures of the self simply 'thinking' yourself better is not an option or they would've succeeded in that quite some time ago.
Suddenly the night shift at Tesco seems quite appealing.
Good to see you back. Hope you had a lovely holiday x
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