‘Living with uncertainty’
Saturday 12th–Sunday 13th May 2018
Our 2018 conference took place at the beautiful Woodland Grange in Leamington Spa, Warwickshire. Its theme, suggested by our chairman Declan Lyons, couldn’t be more pertinent with the tumultuous state of affairs we see all around us and the ever-increasing numbers of people suffering from mental health problems.
Living with uncertainty
Over millions of years brains evolved to reduce uncertainty. We learn in order to make us resilient and thus have a survival advantage. We study the past to try and read patterns of possibility in situations around us in the present. We observe, reflect and try to peer into the future in order to predict threats, or deduce how people might react to us, see round the next bend, so to speak.
In other words it is uncertainty that impelled us to develop and unfold our powers. That is the positive side of living with uncertainty.
From the point of view of mental health, accepting uncertainty and living well with it is essential but many are unable to do this, which is a contributing factor to anxiety disorders, depression and breakdowns.
In an ever more rapidly changing world, with 24–7 global news coverage, the unexpected event is always with us creating a miasma of low-level anxiety in the population ensuring a continued rise in mental illness. And modern media ramp it all up using fear to focus attention on the latest health scares, cyber-hacking, financial uncertainty, terrorism, and so on. Absurd levels of bureaucracy and media manipulation also constantly undermine our need for security and control interfering with our ability to discriminate between true and false, useful and harmful, honest and dishonest, safe and unsafe.
Conference Speakers
The speakers, who are drawn from a wide range of backgrounds, will explore the topic from multiple angles with a selection of broad-ranging talks and presentations. The final list is speakers has just been announced (view the full programme below), they include Joe Griffin and Ivan Tyrrell, co-founders of the HG approach, Sue Cook, the well-known journalist, writer, radio and TV broadcaster and David Goodhart.
Sue is an Ambassador for the Prince’s Trust and a patron of the Rainbow Trust, the Children’s Liver Disease Foundation, and the British Wireless Fund for the Blind. She has an honours degree in psychology.
David is a prominent figure in public debate in the UK, founder and former editor of Prospect magazine and author of the best seller The Road to Somewhere, of which Jonathan Haidt said, “The best and most complete explanation I’ve seen for why things seem to be coming apart.”
Just some of the topics being covered over the weekend:
Why the ability to tolerate uncertainty made us human – The rise and fall of civilisations and human adaptability – Research into the efficacy of the HG approach – How to create ‘Safe-Uncertainty’ with let-down children – The paralysing effect of domestic emotional abuse – Overcoming the uncertainties faced by traumatised Armed Forces personnel on returning to Civvy Street – Political uncertainties: How the EU divided Britain into ‘The Anywheres’ and the ‘Somewheres’ – Why foreign travels broaden the mind – Entering motherhood and the labyrinth of uncertainty that follows – Neglected children reconnected with their families – How to encourage GPs to use HG tools – Whistle-blowing and Resilience – The freelancer’s life of uncertainty – And a new tool we could use to help counter the twin curses of nihilism and materialism that beset much of the world today.
(Attendance counts as 12 hours of CPD for HGI Members)
View the full programme below.
Programme
Saturday 12th May 2018
Tea, coffee and other refreshments
Dr Declan Lyons
Dr Declan Lyons – HGI chair and consultant psychiatrist at St. Patrick’s University Hospital, Dublin
Dr Shona Adams
Dr Shona Adams, clinical psychologist and HG practitioner, and Dr Steven Allan, clinical psychologist, University of Leicester
A summary of Dr Adams’ and Dr Allans’ research on the effectiveness and acceptability of a single rewind session and the results of a systematic review and meta-analysis based on 13 studies. The talk will illustrate the language of uncertainty in research and will include what claims you can now make about HG research.
Ivan Tyrrell
Ivan Tyrrell, HGI and Human Givens College director
Exploring the unknown requires tolerating uncertainty, which makes us strong. In this helicopter view of history Ivan looks at the importance of taking the long view when considering and dealing with the large and small challenges we face today. We can all see that our form of civilization is undergoing rapid changes and Ivan asks if that means we are in a rising or falling stage and what this pressure is doing to us?
Tea, coffee and other refreshments
Chris Dyas, HG practitioner at NSPCC
Far too many children with identified mental health problems face a prolonged and uncertain wait for clinical services. In these situations they easily become targets for bullying or exploitation and frequently resort to self-defeating and dangerous behaviour. Chris describes an innovative project underway in Stoke-on-Trent aimed at quickly equipping professionals and carers to understand these children’s emotional needs so as to respond more effectively to acute distress.
Hannah Jackson, HG practitioner
Hannah looks at the many forms of domestic emotional abuse and the impact they have on people’s lives, and describes how she helps people suffering from psychological abuse.
Tony Gauvain (Colonel, retired), chair of PTSD Resolution
Transitioning from being a serviceman to being a civilian is always an uncertain business; even more so when harbouring hidden fears and trauma. Two ex-clients tell their stories, through interviews.
Lunch and networking
David Goodhart, journalist, commentator, and founder and former editor of Prospect magazine.
David’s best-selling book The Road to Somewhere described how people came to be divided into two camps: the ‘Anywheres’, who have achieved identities derived from their careers and education, and the ‘Somewheres’, who get their identity from a sense of place and from the people around them and who feel a sense of loss due to mass immigration and rapid social change.
Tea, coffee and other refreshments
John Zada, travel writer, photographer and co-founder of the Conciliators Guild
John, a Canadian, shares some tales of his experiences while travelling in remote and unsettled parts of the Middle East and North America. Drawing together his own observations, and those of others, he’ll show how uncertainty when travelling to places off the beaten path can also be a catalyst and key ingredient for profoundly enriching experience.
Dr Declan Lyons, Dr Shona Adams, Ivan Tyrrell, Chris Dyas, Hannah Jackson, Tony Gauvain, David Goodhart, John Zada
Time to reflex on all the content of the first day.
chaired by Dr Declan Lyons
(Not part of the conference but open to all HGI members)
Dinner and networking
Sunday 13th May 2018
Tea, coffee and other refreshments
Dr Declan Lyons
Sara Shoesmith
Sara, an HG therapist, explores the common uncertainties, anxieties and unrealistic expectations felt by many women as they transition to motherhood for the first time. She explains how her own experience motivated her to help other mums who struggle on this difficult journey.
Tina Hamilton-James
Each year a number of children are taken into local authority care for neglect. Many crave to be reunited with their family and live for long periods of time with the uncertainty of whether they ever will be. It is a similar situation with the parents, despite the poor way in which they cared for their children. Tina believes HG can help improve the situation.
Dr Sue Beckers
With the waiting times for NHS mental health services so long and services so stretched, GPs are in an ideal position to offer quick, effective interventions to support their patients with anxiety, stress and low mood within the consultation. However, they are understandably reluctant to take on anything that they perceive will add to an already fraught and over-long working day. Sue Beckers shows how sharing her HG skills transformed her GP colleagues practice in Dorset.
Tea, coffee and other refreshments
Bernie Rochford, former clinical commissioner
If resilience is about “…quickly returning to a former condition… springing back into shape…recover quickly to original form,” what does that mean for whistleblowing in the NHS? Bernie Rochford was a clinical commissioner when she raised serious concerns about patient safety. She talks about what that experience meant to her and the implications for us.
Sue Cook, journalist, broadcaster and author
As a freelance journalist, broadcaster and novelist (On Dangerous Ground and Force of Nature), Sue Cook found herself picking her way through the ups and downs of an exciting and varied broadcasting career (including Crimewatch and Children in Need) and personal life and evolved an optimistic perspective on living with uncertainty. She has an honours degree in psychology.
Lunch and networking
Joe Griffin, social psychologist and co-founder of the human givens approach
After three years spent reflecting on how to refine HG ideas and embed them in the world more securely, Joe now offers an exciting way to do this. He will present a valuable new tool, grounded in innate needs, that fosters individual and group intelligence in a way that effectively helps individuals and organisations more easily find meaning and purpose in what they do. Working closely with his HG colleague Bart McEnroe, they developed and tested this in their consultancy work for business with great success. Joe feels that this tool is so powerful that it could help counter the twin curses of nihilism and materialism that beset so many people in the world today.
Tea, coffee and other refreshments
Dr Declan Lyons, Sara Shoesmith, Tina Hamilton-James, Dr Sue Beckers, Bernie Rochford, Sue Cook, Joe Griffin
End of the conference weekend