For years now I have felt a deep aversion to workshops. You know, those events when a group of people get together to work collectively on some mutually beneficial project or other. For me, in particular, my aversion is to counselling workshops. More particularly it’s down to my history and experience of them, of which there is quite a bit. Some of it positive but sadly a lot of negatives.
In my Blog post – “Manchester 69”- I wrote about my own start on this journey of self discovery. It was a private course, held over a couple of weekends. I had very little money back then, so I was allowed to work my passage, so to speak, by ripping out an old bedroom fire surround and boxing in the chimney, to pay for the course.
For a few of those early years in the 70s, all went reasonably well. I went along to a few more classes and small workshops, by this time down in London, in order to build my knowledge and experience. I even managed to get to one very large workshop, which seemed to number around 60 to 80 people. It was an interesting experience, but that’s as far as it went.
Things went pear shaped for me when I moved back north. I got very involved with my local network up there. I took on quite a bit of leadership and responsibilities such as distributing a quarterly news letter, collating addresses and contact details and becoming treasurer.
Then one day I received a letter, the content of which was very accusatory. I was mortified and didn’t know how to respond. Neither it seemed, did others in the network. So I ended up feeling very defensive and isolated. I simply didn’t have the resources or support to manage it.
Ok, so that was nothing to do with workshops, but it did reveal something about myself; that I was ill equipped for the roles I had taken on. More importantly, I was ill supported by the community that should have stepped up in my defence. Sadly, I think they were as confused as I was.
From a workshop point of view, I’ve had other distasteful experiences. Where people behaved towards me in a, shall we say, less than compassionate way.
On one occasion I was held (pinned?) down on the ground by a group of people.
I’ve had a workshop leader, after I’d retired to bed with a migraine, try to drag me out of the bed and back into the group. All the time berating me for letting everyone down.
I’ve been taken to one side in a group and told that I was too distressed for counselling; work that one out.
To be honest, I’ve had lots of experiences outside of the supposedly safe environment of the counselling arena. From childhood through to old age, there are probably too many to mention here. Suffice to say that my experience of groups of people of any persuasion has been that they are not to be trusted. One to one I am fine with and, although I say it myself, I excel in that space. I’ve never had a problem with the fundamental principles of the theoretical model, I apply them every day of my life, not just in counselling sessions.
Unsurprisingly, I now have a sense of dread if someone invites me to a workshop. My sense of enjoyment of any group endeavour has been well and truly knocked out of me. They are definitely not my fun place to be.
