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Frances Hamilton's Blog

Matters of Counselling & Psychotherapy

Turning and turning ...

Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,  The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere  The ceremony of innocence is drowned;  The best lack all conviction, while the worst  Are full of passionate intens...
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Life, all life ...

Life, all life  began without words.  Life is made - and no one owns it.  The Tao is neither selfish nor proud. The Tao is generous and graceful in what it does Without ever claiming any merit And the sage's greatness lies  in taking no credit. 

I am not what happened to me; I am what I choose to become ....

I walk down the street, There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.  I fall in.   I am lost ... I am helpless It isn't my fault. It takes forever to find a way out.  I walk down the same street.   There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.  I pretend I don't see it.  I fall in again.  I can't believe I am in this s...
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Man follows the earth ...

Man follows the earth. Earth follows the universe. The universe follows the Tao.  The Tao follows only itself.  Open yourself to the Tao, then trust your natural responses; and everything will fall into place. Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength;  mastering yourself is true po...
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The place where we live ...

On the seashore of endless worlds children play .... Tagore 

A child's view of the world ...

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream  The earth, and every common sight,  To me did seem  Apparelled in celestial light, The glory and the freshness of a dream.  It is not now as it hath been of yore; Turn wheresoe'er I may,  By night or day,  The things which I have seen I now can see no more.  The Rai...
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This is the creature ...

This is the creature there has never been. They never knew it, and yet, none the less, they loved the way it moved, its suppleness, its neck, its gaze, mild and serene.  Not there, because they loved it, it behaved  as though it were.  They always left some space. And in that clear, unpeopled space they saved it lightly reared its he...
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The Mother of all Creation

​The Tao ... is the breath that never dies It is the Mother of All Creation. It is the root and ground of every soul the fountain of Heaven and Earth, laid open. Endless source, endless river River of no shape, river of no water Drifting invisibly  from place to place it never ends  and it never fails. "The Tao Te Ching"

Keeping Still, Mountain

True quiet means keeping still when the time has come to keep still and going forward when the time has come to go forward.  In this way rest and movement are in agreement with the demands of the time, and thus there is light in life. Mountains standing close together: The image of KEEPING STILL, Thus the superior man Does not permit his thoug...
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Life ... began without words

Life, all life ... began without words. Life is made ... and no one owns it.  The Tao is neither selfish nor proud.  The Tao is generous and graceful in what it does ... Without claiming any merit And the sage's greatness lies in taking no credit.

We hear so much about the abuse of human rights ...

What, I wonder do you consider to be your most fundamental human right?  Some might say, to be loved; to feel love; to be cared for; to be treated with kindness.  In other words, to have one's emotional needs and desires honored.  Need as a basic instinct necessitates biological, emotional and spiritual satisfaction.  Survival i...
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Hope ... a fundamental deceit ... ?

​James Hillman in his book on 'Suicide and the Soul' (1997) says 'Hoping is not hoping for what one hopes for; one hopes not for that which is already known.  Such hope is hope for the wrong thing.  It is illusion.  He quotes Eliot: 'I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait w...
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Lao Tzu: The Best

The best, like water, 

Benefit all and do not compete. 

They dwell in lowly spots that everyone else scorns. 

Putting others before themselves, 

They find themselves in the foremost place 

And come very near to the Tao. 


In their dwelling, they love the earth; 

In their heart, they love what is deep;

In personal relationships, they love kindness; 

In their words, they love truth; 

In the world, they love peace. 

In personal affairs, they love what is right. 

In action, they love choosing the right time.

It is because they do not compete with others 

That they are beyond the reproach of the world. 


For Valentine's Day ..... 'New Dawn Rose'

With pale pink unruly flowers 

And scent of heaven

You riot into blousiness

And showers of defeat.


The more we sternly cut you down

The more you eagerly return 

To share our lifelong summers 

And our disorderedness. 


You'll carry on when we are gone 

With each returning year 

Climbing walls and flowering summers 

For countless dawns to come. 

(By Alice Audsley from: 'Another Packet of Poems' )

Tao Te Ching

"The Tao is the breath that never dies. 

It is a Mother to all Creation.

It is the root and ground of every soul

 - the fountain of Heaven and Earth laid open.

Endless source, endless river

River of no shape, river of no water

Drifting invisibly from place to place 

it never ends 

                          it never fails."



Tao Te Ching

Lao Tzu practised the Way and the Virtue (Tao and Te) and his teachings sought to dispel the self.  He lived in Chou for a long time, but seeing its corruption, he departed.  Upon reaching the Pass, the Keeper who lived there was delighted to see him and asked him 'As you are just about to leave this world behind you, would you for my sak...
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Caught in a storm of emotion?

 Seeking some other way through those troubled waters?  As we sail upon the waves that carry us into the New Year perhaps you are wondering what awaits you there.  You may feel a combination of trepidation and excitement in the face of possibilities.  Will there be a repeat of past difficulties which are not welcome or will ther...
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Will you set sail in the coming year?

 "The search for reason ends at the shore of the known; We do not leave the shore of the known in search of adventure ... or because of the failure of reason to answer our questions.  We sail because our mind is like a fantastic seashell, and when applying our ear to its lips, we hear a perpetual murmur from the waves beyond the shore." (...
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